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Chicana writers in the United States write to inspire social change, to challenge patriarchal and homophobic culture, to redefine traditional gender roles, to influence the future. Alvina E. Quintana examines how Chicana writers engage literary convention, through fiction, poetry, drama, and autobiography, as a means of addressing these motives. Her analysis of the writings of Gloria Anzaldua, Ana Castillo, Denise Chavez, Sandra Cisneros, and Cherrie Moraga addresses a multitude of issues: the social and political forces that influenced the Chicana aesthetic; Chicana efforts to open a dialogue about the limitations of both Anglo-American feminism and Chicano nationalism; experimentations with content and form; the relationship between imaginary writing and self-reflexive ethnography; and performance, domesticity, and sexuality. Employing anthropological, feminist, historical, and literary sources, Quintana explores the continuity found among Chicanas writing across varied genres - a drive to write themselves into discourse.
List of contents
Acknowledgments Introduction: Testimonio as Biotheory 1. Politics, Representation, and Emergence of Chicana Aesthetics 2. Classical Rifts: The Fugue and Chicana Poetics 3. The House on Mango Street: An Appropriation of Word, Space, and Sign 4. Shades of the Indigenous Ethnographer: Ana Castillo's Mixquiahuala Letters 5. Orality, Tradition, and Culture: Denise Chavez's Novena Narrativas and The Last of the Menu Girls 6. New Visions: Culture, Sexuality, and Autobiography Notes Index
Summary
Examines how Chicana writers engage literary convention through fiction, poetry, drama, and autobiography as a means of addressing these motives. Employing anthropological, feminist, historical, and literary sources, this book explores the continuity found among Chicanas' writing across varied genres.
