Invisible Yet Hypervisible: Afro-Latin@ Voices and the Limits of Latinidad

In this paper, Karen Christian discusses how exclusionary identity politics within Latin@ communities work to render Afro-Latin@s culturally and racially unintelligible, simultaneously invisible and hypervisible in American... [ view full abstract ]

In this paper, Karen Christian discusses how exclusionary identity politics within Latin@ communities work to render Afro-Latin@s culturally and racially unintelligible, simultaneously invisible and hypervisible in American society. There is nonetheless a growing body of Latin@ fiction and non-fiction writing in which Afro-Latin@ identity is represented. These narratives engage questions of blackness, often in the form of postmemory of slavery and its consequences, and expand the scope of Latin@ discourse on race. This presentation explores how texts by Afro-Latin@ authors push the limits of traditional paradigms of latinidad.

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