Los De Abajo Research Articles

The World of Aziza A.: Third Space in Identities

Every summer Wantijpark in Dordrecht, a small town in the western Netherlands, hosts a World Music festival called “Rainbowpark.” The performers of the 2002 season included Bun Sani from Surinam/The Netherlands, Ghalia Benali & Timnaa from Tunisia/ Belgium, Bayuba Cante from Cuba and Los de Abajo from Mexico. But the biggest star of the festival-that is, whose name was highlighted with the largest fonts in the posters and flyers-was Aziza A., presented as an artist from Turkey. In fact, this multi-faceted artist, whose real name is Alev Yıldırım, was born in Berlin in 1971 and has lived ever since. Her parents had lived in Germany as guest workers for 31 years and then returned to Turkey in 1999, but Aziza had stayed on in Berlin, which she now calls her home. I met her during the “Karneval der Kulturen” in Berlin (the Carnival of Cultures, which took place a month before the Rainbow festival) where she performed on the night of the grand parade.

Reception, Narration, and Focalization in Azuela's <em>Los de abajo</em>: Constructing and Reconstructing Azuela's Text

Reception, Narration, and Focalization in Azuela's <em>Los de abajo</em>: Constructing and Reconstructing Azuela's Text

‘Los De Abajo’: Women, Youth and Changes in the Structural Potential for Transformation in Chile

Recent restricted proletarianization of women and youth in Chile provides the principal structural basis for social and political mobilization within the popular classes towards socialist transformation. The bulk of the article carefully documents a set of structural changes related to the new process of restricted proletarianization, focusing on its impact on women and youth. Restricted proletarianization of women and youth in the leading agro-export sectors is emphasized. The authors then more tentatively relate this process to alterations in household structures, to emerging social organizations among the popular classes, and to changing labour and political organizations within the transformative left. Restricted proletarianization provides the structural necessity and the real possibility of socialist transformation in Chile.

Foreshadowing, Duplication, and Structural Unity in Mariano Azuela's Los de Abajo

C RITICS have generally considered Mariano Azuela's Los de abajo to be a loosely structured, episodic work consisting of a series of essentially unordered and unrelated scenes and incidents.' The original (1916) subtitle of the novel, Cuadros y escenas de la Revoluci6n Mexicana,2 and the fact that the work first appeared in 1915 in serial form in an El Paso, Texas, newspaper lent credence to such a view. Azuela himself described his novel as una

Point of View in Los de Abajo

THE critical attention that has been given to point of view in Los de abajo (1915) is minimal in comparison to proliferation of studies concerning characterization, theme and structure.' However, a careful reading of Los de abajo will reveal importance of narrative viewpoint in novel. Point of view is vantage point from which story is seen and told. According to Mier Sternberg, point of view is the most comprehensive principle motivating selection, combination and distribution of elements in narrative text.2 Norman Friedman, problem of point of view has always been one of subjectivity, that is, interference of an authorial narrator, versus objectivity, or disappearance of author.3 Friedman provides technical framework to show distinction between two poles, one of subjective telling and other of objective showing. He devises a specific and identifiable set of narrative modes through which an author progressively removes himself from story. Wayne C. Booth this problem is not clearly defined; point of view is not just a technique for subjectivizing and objectivizing but a narrative element which is concerned with manipulative effects of author on reader, creating different types of narrative distance between two. Booth says that authors affect our perceptions by using reliable or unreliable narrators: For practical criticism probably most important of these kinds of distance is that between fallible or unreliable narrator and implied author who carries reader with him in judging narrator.4 In order to provide some background to critical aspects under consideration in this article, it is necessary to point out that concept of narrative viewpoint encompasses two dimensions, one that exists in real world and another that exists in imaginative world of art-work. Cleanth Brooks and R. P. Warren state that one dimension-point of view-carries basic attitude or idea of author and other-focus of narration' --describes method of narration.5 Robert Weimann has taken problem of definition and terminology one step further by suggesting existence of a fusion of two types of point of view, historical and structural, within a work of literature:

Metaphysical Descriptions of Women in the First Sonnets of Gongora

16This scene is reminiscent of the one in Los de abajo where Demetrio Macias, amused and puzzled by Luis Cervantes' ingratiating reference to their cause, asks, -iPos cual causa defendemos nosotros? Mariano Azuela, Los de abajo, 3a ed. (Mexico: Ediciones Botas, 1949), p. 35. '7If names have special significance in this work, then presumably-and it has been suggested to me-so should that of Aurelio. However, this character neither parallels nor analogically contradicts that of Aurelian or Marcus Aurelius, the only historical personages the name calls to my mind, so the most one can make of it is an oblique suggestion of aura to mark the man as a blowhard. It seems that Romero did select names with historical or

The Artistic Personality of Demetrio Sumallacta

ion with the maguey. Thorny, bitter and bare, but forever stretching toward the sky, joyless but indestructible, the maguey symbolizes for him the anguish and hope of the collective soul of his race. And hope there is, for he heard the city men's talk of justice for the Indian, and his heart rejoices that there are people who think of the Indian as a man. Demetrio realizes all these things now and his joy is profound and intimate. In outlining the personality of Demetrio Sumallacta, and his perceptive appreciation of music, art and poetry,2 Alegria has created a unique figure among the Indians of fiction. The indigenous peoples of America have often been depicted as being susceptible to musical stimulus and an unforgettable example is the scene in which Demetrio Macias, the rough leader of Los de abajo, has to turn away his face so that no one may see the tears in his eyes after listening to Valderrama sing.3 But generally indianista literature has limited itself to showing that the Indian is human, whereas his oppressors think of him as an animal.4 El mundo es ancho y ajeno carries this message, but goes further. In showing the artistic and intellectual faculties of the untutored flutist, it points out a double abuse: not only do the Almenaibars of America exploit the Indians and deprive them of their inalienable social rights, but in their long-standing arrogance they commit an equally grave injustice in relegating the Demetrios to an inferior position and suppressing a personality so vital to society, the artist. These overlords allow the native talents to go unrecognized, whereas it is incumbent upon them to promote and develop the Indians' potential aesthetic contribution. Due to their greed and indifference, a rich source of artistic values and creation remains unk own and untapped to the impoverishment of culture in the nation and in the world. This is the distinctive mark of Ciro Alegria's protest, which places El mundo at the culmination of all that has been achieved by the novels written to vindicate the Indians and to indict their op-