Redreaming America

Number of page: 232
Author: Debra A. Castillo
Publisher: SUNY Press
Rating:
Category: Literary Criticism

What would American literature look like in languages other than English, and what would Latin American literature look like if we understood the United States to be a Latin American country and took seriously the work by U.S. Latinos/as in Spanish
Debra A. Castillo explores these questions by highlighting the contributions of Latinos/as writing in Spanish and Spanglish. Beginning with the anonymously published 1826 novel Jicoténcal and ending with fiction published at the turn of the twenty-first century, the book details both the characters’ and authors’ struggles with how to define an American self. Writers from Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Mexico are featured prominently, alongside a sampling of those writers from other Latin American heritages (Peru, Colombia, Chile). Castillo concludes by offering some thoughts on U.S. curricular practice.

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About The Author

Debra A. Castillo is Stephen H. Weiss Presidential Fellow and Professor of Romance Studies and of Comparative Literature at Cornell University and the coauthor (with Maria-Socorro Tabuenca Cordoba) of Border Women: Writing from La Frontera.