Maria A. Cerdas Cisneros

“Desterritorialización, simulacro de realidad y espacios virtuales en algunas obras de César Aira”

Dr. Maria A. Cerdas Cisneros, assistant professor, recently published “Desterritorialización, simulacro de realidad y espacios virtuales en algunas obras de César Aira” in Rondas Literarias de Pittsburgh 2017, vol.1, 2018, pp. 29-50.

The article examines the writing of Argentinian author César Aira and proposes a new way to read his experimental works.

Elaborates Cisneros, “It focuses more attention on social and cultural aspects of Aira’s work rather than on his writing style.”

Cisneros’ goal with this article was “to show how Aira criticizes our current society’s use of technology to simulate reality. This simulation increases our incapacity to recognize and live real experiences.”

Much of Aira’s writing discusses globalization in Latin American cities.

Says Cisneros, “Globalization has affected traditional cultures which have to make adaptations to their identities in order to survive the global market. Nowadays, new identities related to the global market have appeared in Latin American cities and are creating trends related to excessive consumerism.”

Judith Martin

“Colonial Counternarratives in Therese Robinson’s Die Auswanderer (The Exiles; 1852)

Professor Dr. Judith Martin’s recent article, “Colonial Counternarratives in Therese Robinson’s Die Auswanderer (The Exiles; 1852),” appeared in the 2018 issue of Feminist German Studies.

The article examines how this novel by a German American immigrant woman depicts the nineteenth-

century United States as a complex historical space filled with regional and ethnic tensions.

Says Martin, “Drawing on the fields of ethnic literature, postcolonial theory, and gender studies, [the article] analyzes interactions between ethnic groups including German-, Irish-, and Spanish-Americans, and enslaved and free African Americans against the backdrop of sectional conflicts between North and South before the Civil War.”

Immigration is a widely discussed issue in today’s political climate.

Martin explains, “Therese Robinson’s literary mapping of U.S. colonial history and geography is relevant for understanding current discussions of immigration and American national identity.”