No todos los subalternos son iguales: el miedo en Herencia de Clorinda Matto

DOI: https://doi.org/10.46744/bapl.202001.003
Keywords: naturalism, fear, Afro-Peruvian, nation

Abstract

In this paper we examine the novel Herencia (1885) by Clorinda Matto. We focus especially on the book’s Afro-Peruvian character, Espiritu Cadenas, and how he is configured as an object of fear. Based on the
theory of gender and emotions, we study how Espiritu, as a subordinate character, has no possibility of occupying a place in the post-war nation imagined by Matto, as opposed to the mestizo character Margarita, for example. In this sense, through the analysis of the naturalistic aesthetic used by the Peruvian author, we realize that, from her perspective, there are subaltern subjects that can be saved and incorporated into the republican nation. The conclusions to which we arrive show that the novel, under the influence of naturalism and its determination over inheritance, represents the Afro-Peruvian character as an object that causes fear and that, therefore, cannot be saved, because stereotypes that link the Afro-Peruvian with the erotic, the sexual and the contaminated continue to be fed in the 19th century.

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Author Biography

Mercedes Mayna-Medrano, University of Pennsylvania

Estudió Literatura Hispánica en la Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú y, luego, una Maestría en Lingüística en la misma casa de estudios. Actualmente, completa su doctorado en Estudios Hispánicos en la Universidad de Pensilvania, Filadelfia, Estados Unidos. Su área de investigación se concentra en la narrativa sur-andina (Perú-Bolivia) del siglo xix e inicios del xx, y temas de raza, economía y estética. En el 2019, elaboró el estudio preliminar de la nueva edición de El padre Horán. Escenas de la vida del Cuzco, de Narciso Aréstegui. Ha publicado algunos artículos en revistas como Boletín del Instituto Riva Agüero (2012) y Tinta Expresa N.° 5 (2014), y algunas reseñas en Lexis (2015) y en Revista de Crítica Literaria Latinoamericana (2018).

Published
2020-06-30
How to Cite
Mayna-Medrano, M. (2020). No todos los subalternos son iguales: el miedo en Herencia de Clorinda Matto. Boletín de la Academia Peruana de la Lengua, 67(67), 75-101. https://doi.org/10.46744/bapl.202001.003
Issue
No 67 (2020): Enero - Junio
Section
Articles

Copyright (c) 2020 Mercedes Mayna-Medrano

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