Temas de Nuestra America. Revista de Estudios Latinoamericanos

19-29

Authors: Maria del Rocio Garcia-Rey

This work focuses on the children's stories of Carmen Lyra, the Costa Rican author of Cuentos de mi tía Panchita (Stories about my Aunt Panchita, 1922). Our approach is an extrapolation from several of the points made by Angel Rama's landmark work Narrative Transculturation in Latin America. While we are aware of the fact that Rama's work does not specifically address children's literature, it does present us with valuable elements to help explain the cultural game in which the re-writing and "translation" of Lyra's stories are immersed.

57-68

Authors: Rafael Cuevas-Molina

The dispute whether there was genocide in Guatemala is a generator that moves a part of the art and literature in this country. Memory has become a place of dispute. The art became a means of expression of those who believe their rights have been violated. What were the issues privileged by that art whose key is the memory in Guatemala? This paper proposes mainly two issues: violence and missing ones. The performance artist Regina Galindo, the writer and artist Isabel Ruiz and photographer Daniel Hernandez are presented as representative examples whose work reflected this subject.

93-104

Authors: Jaime Castañeda-Hernández

The concept of the internal enemy as "the ally of the international communist conspiracy" in Latin America is addressed in this article as the systematic application of a series of measures drawn from the Truman Doctrine and, at its core, the inevitable paradox of the universal war of good vs. evil, communism vs. capitalism, civilization vs. barbarism, in the language of the post-Cold War and the polarity of the nations of the Southern Cone and Mesoamerica, considered by the United States to be in need of the protection and safeguarding of the imperial eagle nation. Within this context, we analyze how intelligence agencies such as the Administrative Department of Security (DAS) and the Secretariat of Intelligence of the Province of Buenos Aires (DIPBA) were implemented in Colombia and Argentina, respectively, giving rise to political persecution, human rights violations, and the deterioration of the living conditions of the people, who were assaulted, persecuted and assassinated for opposing the governments of the time. Likewise, the article harshly criticizes the School of the Americas for its systematic implementation of counter-guerrilla tactics and strategies, which, far from alleviating damages or socializing the civil population, has left a trail of systematic human rights violations throughout the decades.

131-148

Authors: Emmanuel N. Kahan; Laura Schenquer

We live in an era in which the Holocaust has become a universal trope of historic trauma. The Nazi genocide has come to be known as the greatest disaster of civilization and, as such, simply mentioning it or comparing it to other repressive events stirs or blocks meanings about specific events. In the case of Argentina, the resonance of the memory of the Holocaust penetrated the origins of the most recent military dictatorship. As early as the year 1976, external voices that denounced the regime for perpetrating genocide were heard publically around the world. This article analyzes some uses of the Holocaust during the military dictatorship in Argentina, questioning the ways in which the memory of the Holocaust stirred or blocked feelings and the collective imagination on the repressive regime's practices.

169-186

Authors: Andrés Bisso

This study looks at the way in which El Día newspaper from the city of La Plata, Argentina, reproduced, analyzed and commented on the different trials of Nazi war criminals in the early years after the war. For the purpose of our analysis, we look at both editorials written on the specific dimensions of these trials and also the form, quantity and reproduction of news from international agencies. Lastly, the study analyzes the impact of such news on national and local politics and the interpretations made to that effect by the newspaper in question.

203-224

Authors: Boris Matías Chinchpun

After the end of the Second World War, Julius Evola returned to Italy to offer "orientamenti" to the "men who still stand amongst the ruins". From his Roman apartment, this aristocrat acted as a pubblicista, spreading his traditionalist ideas through books and journals. One of his strategies consisted in differentiating himself from the fallen regimes: discussions held years before with "official" intellectuals were recovered by Evola as to prove the superiority of his doctrine. In this fashion, he stated that his racism was "spiritualist" instead of "materialist" and "biologicist", implying that it should be separated from the "racial scientists", the persecutions and the extermination camps. However, the distinction had clear limits: the "magical Baron" not only upheld his racist worldview, but also reaffirmed his deep-held antisemitism and adopted contradictory positions when considering then Holocaust. These ambiguities were reflected on the uses that, beginning in the 80's, some circles linked with the enduring Right-wing Argentinian nationalism made of Evola. The circulation of his ideas lead to the appearance of El Fortín, the first local publication which proclaimed itself "evolian". From its pages, the contributors articulated a "Traditional and alternative" view on domestic politics and the international arena. Through this case, this article will scrutinize how Evola was received by his Argentinian followers and will take into account, at the same time, how racism, antisemitism and negationism developed in end-of-century nationalism.

245-254

Authors: Jáiril Núñez-Moya

The author proposes an analysis of the newest book by Jorge Ramírez-Caro, published by the editorial house of the Universidad Nacional de Costa Rica, under the EUNA imprint. ISBN 978-9977-65-450-8