Tag
Brazil
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Meritocracy Is a Dystopia
Netflix Brazil’s 3% presents a desperate future city that nevertheless proclaims its citizens all have an equal shot at success. Sound familiar?
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Brazil’s Malaise
A whiff of the apocalyptic surrounds the compounding crises currently afflicting Brazil. A surge in violent crime unfolds alongside a new and dangerous illness; a financial crisis begets a political crisis and the two quickly converge; an incestuous political elite forsakes investment in basic infrastructure in favor of profit-driven sporting spectacles; a president is chased…
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Loss in Translation
Walter Benjamin’s well-known essay “The Task of the Translator” claims that “translation is a form,” an artistic act in its own right. For Benjamin, both text and translation yearn toward a mystical “pure language,” a kind of aesthetic state that transcends mere communication. This pure language comprises a rich constellation of texts and textual possibilities,…
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Rio, Capital of Disaster Capitalism
The Olympic rings loom large over Rio de Janeiro. Seven years after the city won its bid to host the games, the impending two-week extravaganza has swept changes across the Marvelous City, as Rio is known, dividing its already conflict-riven social, political, and economic urban landscape even more deeply. In contrast to the heady days…
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F(r)iction in Translation
This is the latest installment of El Mirador, an ongoing series curated by Francisco Cantú. Spanish for “the lookout point,” El Mirador collects original nonfiction, translation, and visual art on the American West, the US/Mexico borderlands, and Indian Country. There isn’t, a priori, a kinship between literary thrillers and thrillers about literature. Idra Novey’s debut novel, Ways to Disappear, however, seems…
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All Eyes On Brazil
With the 2014 FIFA World Cup now well under way, and the Olympics coming in 2016, Brazil is assuming its place on the world stage. The current tournament has generated more coverage of the country—and its far-flung corners—than ever before. Be it David Beckham’s trip into the Amazon for BBC television, or writers “slumming” it…
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Security Laboratories
In recent years, feminist movements in Egypt have negotiated with gendered logics of governance oriented around the imperative to protect women from sexual harassment. Meanwhile, in Brazil, activists have rearticulated campaigns waged by a newly reformed police force intent on rescuing children from transnational sex trafficking networks. In his new book, the political scientist and…
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Recycling Literary Culture: A Conversation with Lúcia Rosa
Over the past decade, a new style of publishing has emerged as a response to the economic and environmental conditions facing twenty-first-century Latin America. Cardboard books, colorfully hand-painted and assembled by workshop collectives, are now bought and sold in nearly every major Latin American city. The “cartonera” publishing collectives take their name from cartoneros: urbanites…
