Literary transculturation in Latino United States of America: An analysis of language in the works of Tato Laviera and Robert G. Fernandez.

Abstract

This dissertation studies the theory of transculturation and its application to the study of U.S. Latino literature. Specifically, I analyze Spanglish as a form of linguistic transculturation in the poetry of Tato Laviera and Roberto G. Fernandez' novel Raining Backwards.

In the second chapter, I analyze the poetry of Tato Laviera from la carreta made a u-turn, ENCLAVE, AmeRican, and Mainstream ethics/etica corriente in light of transculturation. The analysis reveals how Laviera successfully presents a unique linguistic and cultural worldview through Spanglish. Laviera's Spanglish poetry demonstrates a cosmology that emphasizes how past and present transculturations are a means of both survival and creativity in the Latino community.

In the first chapter, I provide the definition of transculturation as offered by Fernando Ortiz as well as a review of other formulations of transculturation and subsequent critiques of the theory. Furthermore, I provide an appraisal of other frameworks that theorize cultural contact in the Americas---such as mestizaje, heterogeneidad, hybridity, awqa, the melting pot, and multiculturalism---in order to demonstrate why transculturation is particularly applicable to the study of U.S. Latino literature.

In chapter three, I use transculturation in order to analyze the language used by Roberto G. Fernandez in his novel Raining Backwards . I find that Fernandez employs a unique type of Spanglish through the Hispanization of English rather than the more traditional anglization of Spanish. Through the use of calques, Hispanisms, and intertextuality I reveal that Fernandez is able to subvert the language of authority and preserve a particularly Latino cosmology through transculturation.