The Prison and the University in the Borderlands: A Latin-American Perspective of Prison Literary Writing
Based on a current Mellon-funded project to implement a higher learning Spanish / bilingual creative writing program in a Texas prison, the following talk will reflect on the interaction of two institutions: the university and the prison system from a US-Latin American comparative perspective.
The goal is to explore the rapports between these two apparently contradictory yet complementary modern institutions in the US and Latin America. Through the specific case of a Texas women’s prison, the talk will provide a conceptual reassessment of the university’s mission and bring forward the experience of collective-instituting subjects, who, in a situation of confinement and socioeconomic and linguistic marginality, shed light on the meaning of Literature in the era of displacement, migration, and neoliberalism.
Adela Pineda Franco is a Joe R. & Teresa Lozano Long Professor in Latin American Literary and Cultural Studies and the Director of the Tereza Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies (LLILAS) at the University of Texas at Austin. Prior to joining UT, she was Professor of Latin American Literature and Film at Boston University, where she also founded the Center of Latin American Studies.
Her scholarly work situates the study of literary and cinematic phenomena within transnational contexts and interdisciplinary frameworks, addressing the relationships between culture, politics, and intellectual thought. Her book on American writer John Steinbeck revisits this author’s work through a Mexican and cross-border vantage point. She is also well-known for her research on the international significance of the cultures of the Mexican Revolution, in particular, her book The Mexican Revolution on the World Stage: Intellectuals and Film in the Twentieth Century (2019).
Livestream: tinyurl.com/apinedalive
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