Here is my LASA proposal:
Race Beyond Exceptionalism
Mestizaje is a key justification of cultural exceptionalism in Latin America. As foundational myth it has often served to limit the analysis of race and racisms, in the social sciences as well as the literary field. Is it possible to consider questions of race, or race and culture, without taking recourse in exceptionalist logics? This paper considers that question in light of the work of ethicist Denise Ferreira da Silva, author of Toward a Global Idea of Race (2007) and other writings on race and racism. According to da Silva, mestizaje is the process that produces the recognizable, yet subordinate racial “other” on whose ground the modern subject is sustained. For this reason mestizaje is precisely not “exceptional” in global processes. In order to analyze race beyond exceptionalism, we must also think outside coloniality/modernity (Mignolo), and consider decolonial options.
My LCHLL proposal is planned as a early version of this, and I must find the abstract.
Then I must create the abstract for the Vallejo symposium.
I will write these three papers, and finish and submit “The Darker Side of Mestizaje.”
I have a book review languishing, and might do it as well although it is far too late.
This, especially if I finish some of these other presentations as articles, will be enough for 2014, in this place, although I also want to actually design my alleged book (and I have various texts that will work well for that).
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 