Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American Studies

This article critically evaluates the only extant English translation of José Luandino Vieira’s 1964 short story collection Luuanda. I argue that the text presents three clear obstacles to translation: first, the revolutionary attitude that the text has come to symbolise is specific to the political climate of the source culture; second, its language is radically experimental; and third, the form of the text is subversive only with reference to the historico-political context of its country of origin. Through a close examination of Tamara L. Bender’s attempts at negotiating these obstacles for an Anglophone readership, I explore the ways in which cultural difference can be mediated and recreated through translative practices.

Since the signing of the Rome General Peace Accords in 1992, Mozambique has seen a proliferation of new artistic production and experimentation with new materials and techniques. This article explores the ways in which the incorporation of hitherto unused aesthetic vocabularies in Mozambican contemporary art has brought about a coexistence of artistic paradigms. Focusing on the work of Gemuce and Félix Mula, I argue that this coexistence comprises a coming together of cultural forms from different social contexts, indicating a process of 'translatability’ that tracks patterns of interference across the cultural cartography of global capital and postcolonial geopolitics.

(This is paper has been accepted by the journal African Identities for a special issue on 'Marxism and African Literatures' edited by Alexander Fyfe.)

Critical realism has a long pedigree in Marxist literary criticism. Most fully developed as an aesthetic theory by Georg Lukács, it was conceptually limited by a narrow understanding of realism and the suggestion that only realist art could be critical of social reality. In an attempt to revise the rigidity and dogmatism of Lukács' theory, Michael Löwy proposed the category of 'critical irrealism' which emphasised the fact that there were many non-realist works of art that contained powerful critiques of the social order. More recently, the Warwick Research Collective (WReC) has taken up Löwy's arguments to work out the implications of critical irrealism for world-systems analysis and Trotsky's theory of combined and uneven development. This paper seeks to critically evaluate the WReC's theorisation of critical irrealism through a reading of Angolan author Ondjaki's Os Transparetes (2012). Recently published in English translation as Transparent City (2018), Ondjaki's novel is centred around a protagonist that is in the process of becoming transparent. As the novel's most salient non-realist features become a means of launching a trenchant social critique against the institutionalised corruption and industrial malpractice of Angola's 'petroleum dictatorship', it seems as if the text corroborates the WReC's conception of irrealist aesthetics as the determinate formal register of (semi-)peripherality in the capitalist world-system. However, as a category with its conceptual foundations rooted in the tradition of western European literary realism and modernism, is the relevance of critical irrealism for African literatures inherently limited? Might not the persistence of oral traditions and non-European epistemologies within texts like Os Transparentes render irrealism obsolete as an analytical category for literatures produced under non-European social conditions? Opening with an intellectual history of the concept of critical irrealism, this paper argues that the reformulation of Marxist concepts in African contexts is a productive if not vexed theoretical exercise.

The war for Cuban independence, which began as the latest attempt in a series of insurgency movements against the Spanish rule, led to a major international conflict between Spain and the United States in 1898. In the end, after less that four months of open hostilities, Spain accepted the loss of the majority of its remaining overseas colonies in the Caribbean, South-eastern Asia and the Pacific. The so-called 'Disaster of the 98' became the starting point for a U.S. foreign policy that has shaped the military and political history of the 20th century.

Surprisingly, it has not been until quite recently that archaeologists have slowly started to explore this crucial conflict through its spaces and material remains. The potential for this approach looks really promising, as it might offer new insights into modern phenomena such as the precocious use of (re)concentration camps or the expression of contested memories related to 'humanitarian' interventions. In this paper I will review the state-of-the-art and identify some possible directions for the future archaeological research in this area.

ArqueotuR -Archaeological Tourism Network- is a worldwide international project born in 2006 and led by academics and professionals from the archaeology and tourism sectors. It is co-ordinated by the University of Barcelona and Ibertur Network, and comprises a series of public and private institutions working together for the development and promotion of sustainable archaeological tourism. ArqueotuR’s main public interface, its web portal http://www.arqueotur.org (Yahoo! Award-winning Spanish website in 2007), provides detailed and geo-referenced information about archaeological sites, museums, interpretation centres, events and festivals, as well as other initiatives by public and private stakeholders related to archaeological heritage. ArqueotuR contains only those sites which are open to the public and offer some basic resources and services to the visitors. The information collected and supplied through the website intends to facilitate the user to design the whole journey, linking heritage and cultural resources with tourism services available in the area, such as guided visits, accommodation and food, local craft workshops, specialist bookshops, etc. Beyond well-known World Heritage sites, the project also works towards the consolidation of those tourism products that include less popular sites and regions, encouraging the creation of thematic routes that strengthen inter-regional and international relations and the local third sector. ArqueotuR has collaborated with public bodies such as the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID) in the promotion of archaeological tourism in Latin America, the Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa through the creation of specific products like the Cave Art Route and the Central-American Colonial Route. At the time of writing, ArqueotuR is implementing its strategy to expand the project to non-Spanish speaking countries on the basis of a refurbished multi-lingual website and the location of new local partners, with a special emphasis on the Mediterranean area and northwestern Europe. This paper is intended to expose the project’s model, state of the art, and forthcoming actions.

The Spanish Civil War has traditionally been a source of interest and inspiration for historians, sociologists, politicians, novelists and even film-makers. Nevertheless, it has not been until the last decade that archaeologists have got fully involved in the study of the material dimension of this conflict and its aftermath: General Franco's national-Catholic dictatorship. Different branches seem to be joining in order to conform what is usually referred as the 'archaeology of the Spanish Civil War'. On the one hand, evolved from a tradition of military history and architecture, there is a growing interest in approaching 'archaeologically' the physical remains of the armed confrontation (battlefields, trench systems, urban air-raid shelters, etc). On the other hand, archaeologists have become an essential part of the civic movement campaigning for the so-called 'recovery of the historical memory'. This is a complex social phenomenon based on the widespread political repression that took place in Spain during and after the war, and whose most famous expression is the exhumation of mass graves all around the country. The construction of an 'archaeology of the Spanish Civil War' as a combination of so different approaches (heritage preservation and education, human rights investigations, left-wing political activism, etc.) does still require the development of a coherent theoretical corpus. It is the intention of this session to offer a global perspective of this multiplicity of viewpoints and motivations, while encouraging a deep international debate around the role and public responsibilities of archaeologists working on this field.

During the Cuban War for Independence, blockhouses and defensive lines (the so-called "trochas") were constructed in order to divide the island into separate sectors that could be gradually 'disinfected' of insurgents. The non-combatant population was removed from rural areas and resettled in a number of fortified towns where they would be 'protected' by Spanish troops. This counter-insurgency tactic led to the indiscriminate confinement of hundred thousands of civilians and is usually referred as the ultimate origin of the modern concept of concentration camp. Despite this, little research seems to have been carried out on the spatial dimension of this process, on how it actually took place on the ground, or on the extent to which it changed the landscape. I will argue that conflict archaeology might contribute to understand the way it was implemented, its long-term repercussions upon people and places, and how the memories of this tragedy still persist.

It has usually been underlined how crucial the visual representations of the mass grave exhumations have been for the public involvement in the so-called “historical memory movement" in Spain. It involves both the intentional production of a series of very specific forms and the mass consumption of these peculiar evocations of the social trauma caused by the Spanish Civil War. I will review how archaeologists' work has been depicted during this process and explore some possible precedents that could help to understand this phenomenon.

This dissertation analyses the role archaeologists are playing in Spain within the context of the so-called 'recovery of the historical memory'. I will review how the archaeology of the Spanish Civil War is being constructed by trying to combine very different approaches towards heritage, human rights and political activism. This is a recent and ongoing process which still needs the development of a coherent theoretical base. I will use the exhumation of mass graves as a phenomenon in which the complexities and contradictions of the current situation can be revealed. My main objective is to demonstrate how imperative it is to initiate a deep debate at the heart of the discipline in order to reconsider how archaeologists are joining this social movement. I will review several examples that illustrate the way some academics and professionals are beginning to assume new public responsibilities. This alternative implies defining and defending their own criteria while taking part in broader political controversies. This is precisely what tends to be avoided by those who understand the archaeological practice as an aseptic or apolitical task. In the case of the 'recovery of the historical memory', this conception does relegate archaeologists to a merely technical position with little legitimacy to question their own framework.

Este Trabajo de Fin de Máster constituye la primera fase de un proyecto de investigación doctoral interdisciplinar titulado “An archaeology of counter-insurgency: exploring the materiality and memory of 'reconcentración' during the Cuban War of Independence (1895-1898)” que ha dado comienzo en octubre de 2012 en el Departamento de Estudios Hispánicos, Portugueses y Latinoamericanos de la Universidad de Nottingham (Reino Unido), y que cuenta con financiación por un periodo de tres años por parte de la Vice Chancellor's Scholarship for Research Excellence. El objetivo es abordar un estudio centrado en la política de reconcentración llevada a cabo por las autoridades españolas en Cuba bajo el mando del general Valeriano Weyler, y que suele apuntarse como el origen último del concepto moderno de campo de concentración. La zona de análisis corresponde al extremo occidental de la isla que en su momento estuvo delimitada por la llamada “Trocha de Mariel a Majana” y que en la actualidad forma parte de las provincias de Pinar del Río y Artemisa. Espero que mi investigación ayude a enfocar la atención pública y académica hacia este proceso histórico, y que ofrezca una nueva visión sobre cómo se ideó e implementó, sobre sus repercusiones en las gentes y los espacios, y sobre cómo las memorias y representaciones culturales de esta dolorosa experiencia forman parte todavía hoy de la vida diaria de los cubanos. Mi intención en poner en práctica una aproximación metodológica fruto de la combinación de la arqueología del paisaje, la geografía histórica y la etnografía de cara a estudiar los restos materiales y efectos de la reconcentración, así como la relación dinámica entre esta materialidad y su recuerdo.

The Mapping Reconcentrados project focuses on reconcentration, a historical phenomenon that has been traditionally disregarded despite its crucial relevance for the understanding of mass violence in modern conflicts. This devastating counter-insurgency strategy, usually referred as the frame in which the modern concept of concentration camp emerged, was first implemented by the Spanish colonial authorities in nineteenth-century Cuba as a way to isolate the non-combatant population from the pro-independence guerrilla groups. Interestingly, a similar model has been replicated in many other contexts during the twentieth century. In all these cases, such as South Africa, the Philippines, Libya, British Malaya, Algeria or South Vietnam, the civilian population became the target of a ruthless military response designed to eliminate, once and for all, any possible support to the insurgency. Only in Cuba, for instance, more than 150,000 reconcentrados are said to have died as a (collateral) consequence of these measures, whilst probably over 45,000 Boer and African inmates perished at the 'refugee' camps in South Africa.

Our presentation explains the main objectives of this project, which is intended to encourage a fruitful debate and knowledge exchange among doctoral students and scholars working on these topics from disciplines such as History, Archaeology and Anthropology, War Studies, Memory and Post-Conflict Studies and Cultural Heritage Management. The on-line research community that we are coordinating from the University of Nottingham intends to promote networking and collaboration between researchers from different universities, countries and disciplines, and between these researchers and the wider community. This platform will be a meeting point where different experiences and approaches can be disseminated, shared, discussed, and eventually adapted to other projects (in terms of methodology, theoretical background, fieldwork methods, community engagement, or funding). Through our own research, especially on Cuba, we will illustrate how we expect this initiative to be of benefit to those studies that try to analyse and contextualise the particularities and memories of the different episodes of reconcentration that have taken place all around the world.

The reconcentration policy proclaimed by Spanish Captain-General Valeriano Weyler in 1896 still remains as a very controversial topic, evoking some of the darkest episodes of the Cuban War for Independence and the Spanish colonial past. Maybe as a consequence of a complex process of post-conflict reconciliation and nation-building, historians and archaeologists have traditionally paid little attention to the implementation and devastating impact of those measures on the ground. Interestingly, this strategy, mainly intended to prevent the non-combatant population from aiding the insurgents by applying a large-scale scorched-earth policy and mass internment, has been replicated in many other contexts during the 20th century, from South Africa and the Philippines to Algeria and South Vietnam.

In the Cuban case, while general descriptions refer to tens of thousands of civilians being relocated in a series of fortified towns where they suffered from starvation and lack of proper sanitation, the details and spatial dimension of this process still remain largely unexplored. My research is focused on the effects of reconcentration on both urban and rural environments, trying to understand the role that not only Spanish-held towns but specially coastal settlements and military outposts played in the configuration of a militarised landscape shaped by the tactical, economical and ideological perceptions of that displaced population. In this paper I will explain the preliminary results of a two-month fieldwork campaign in western Cuba (January-March 2014), after which it has been possible to establish the specific locations where some of those reconcentration camps were erected.

The nineteenth century witnessed the emergence of a series of innovative military responses to the so-called "small wars". Especially in colonial contexts, western armies had sometimes to deal with the opposition of a large proportion of the local population and the spread of guerrilla warfare. In many cases, this unconventional and 'uncivilised' tactics led to the application of ruthless and indiscriminate measures against those who were perceived as rebels. Once the classical distinction between combatants and civilians vanished, this counter-insurgency violence started to explicitly target the non-combatant population as part of the strategy to undermine and defeat the armed resistance. This rationale also justified the systematic destruction of the local economic and social base that guerrilla fighters needed in order to operate without a formal military structure.

From the Peninsular War in 1808 up to the mid-late twentieth century, some of these actions have left a deep imprint on the landscapes and memories of these conflicts. Thousands of blockhouses and small posts were built all around the world in a desperate effort to dominate and control hostile territories and critical lines of communication. At some point in the mid nineteenth century, this concept evolved into a more sophisticated solution, involving the complete isolation and gradual 'disinfection' of the areas dominated by the insurgents. These pacification processes usually included the construction of fortified lines, acting as a "condon sanitaire", and the adoption of aggressive scorched-earth and forced relocation or internment policies. In this paper I will offer an overview of the intellectual development and possible historical precedents of the reconcentration camps built in late c19th Cuba, a phenomenon that is usually referred as the ultimate origin of the modern concept of concentration camp.

The end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century witnessed the appearance of what scholars (such as Everdell, Agamben and Goldhagen) usually define as the first modern concentration camps. Their almost simultaneous use during the Cuban War for Independence (1895-1898), the Second Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902) and the Philippine-American War (1899-1902) represents a turning point in the way non-combatant population would be managed in recent conflicts, especially by modern counter-insurgency doctrines. In all those case-studies, drastic measures designed to defeat local guerrilla groups ended up causing tens of thousands of civilian victims, mainly due to starvation, poor sanitation and the spread of epidemic diseases among overcrowded encampments. Interestingly, the basic principle of undermining the insurgents' military capacity by segregating and confining the rural population in militarised enclaves has been put into practice in many other later contexts, such as Libya, British Malaya, Algeria and Vietnam.

My doctoral research is focused on how the so-called policy of reconcentración was implemented on the ground by Spanish colonial authorities in their attempt to dominate the Cuban insurrection in the mid-1890s. In my paper, based on my own fieldwork in western Cuba, I will review the potential contribution of historical archaeology to the understanding of these episodes of mass violence, not only in terms of their material dimension but also of their long-term impact upon landscape. I will also critically explore how contemporary historiography has interpreted the indiscriminate internment of the Cuban population and the more than 150,000 victims that it produced, including the bitter controversies around the intentionality of those deaths and the polemical figure of Spanish Captain-General Valeriano Weyler.

Su investigación de Doctorado para la Universidad de Nottingham explora, desde la Arqueología, las huellas de la Reconcentración que el 16 de febrero de 1896 iniciara el entonces Capitán General de la Isla Valeriano Weyler, como una estrategia contrainsurgente durante la Guerra hispano cubano-norteamericana.

Un Álbum de Fotografías de la Guerra de Cuba; un Plano de la Clínica Militar de Artemisa de 1897; y otros documentos inéditos, forman parte de una donación enviada a la biblioteca provincial Ciro Redondo por el estudiante doctoral en arqueología de la Universidad de Nottingham, Alberto P. Martí.