Berkeley Review of Latin American Studies, Spring 2017

Harley Shaiken and Claudia Paz y Paz and the campanile in the background on the Berkeley campus. (Photo by Peg Skorpinski.)

COMMENT: Spring 2017

By Harley Shaiken | The CLAS Chair comments on the highlights of the Spring 2017 issue of the Berkeley Review of Latin American Studies.

President Enrique Peña Nieto toasts the queen of Spain at a state dinner in 2014.  (Photo courtesy of Presidencia de la República Mexicana.)

MEXICO: Why Mexico Fell Apart, and How to Fix It

By Denise DresserOutlining the transition from the delirium of the "Mexican Moment" to the disenchantment of the "Mexican Morass."

A display of photos and posters highlighting the missing Ayotzinapa students. (Photo by Jorge Mejia Peralta.)

LAW: Paz y Paz and the Missing 43

By Brittany Arsiniega | A profile of Claudia Paz y Paz's groundbreaking life and work investigating the disappearance of 43 Mexican students. 

A demonstrator’s sign reads, “As long as money changes hands, there will be no democracy.” (Photo by Armando Aguayo Rivera.)

MEXICO: Mexit: The Return of Distant Neighbors

By Lorenzo MeyerAnalyzing Mexico's "double crisis" - an external crisis caused by the relationship with the U.S., and an internal political crisis characterized by corruption and impunity.

Portrait of Myrna Mack at the site of her murder on 12 Calle in Guatemala City, renamed Calle Myrna Mack.  People gather to commemorate the anniversary of her death each September 11. (Photo by Fabricio Alonso.)

HUMAN RIGHTS: Helen Mack and a New Generation

By Calixtho Lopes, Kevin Figueroa, and Arlette Jacome, with Beatriz ManzUC Berkeley Central American students reflect on Helen Mack's talk about the late Myrna Mack, social activism in Guatemala, and opportunities for young people to effect change.

A makeshift memorial to Víctor Jara on the street in Santiago in 2009. (Photo by Ibar Silva.)

LAW: Secrets, Lies, and the Case of Victor Jara

By Almudena Bernabeu | An examination of how systems of secrets and lies impacted victims' rights to truth, justice, reparations, and non-repetition, in the context of the Chilean dictatorship.

Migrants in Ixtepec, Mexico, climb on top of the freight train “La Bestia” in 2014. (Photo by Eduardo Verdugo/Associated Press.)

ART: MONTARlaBestia (Riding the Beast)

Photos by Jim Block | The artist collective Artistas Contra la Discriminación explores the meaning of "riding the beast" and migrating to the United States.

The Brazilian Chamber of Deputies is a scrum of struggling lawmakers during the impeachment vote,  April 2016.  (Photo by Marcelo Camargo/Agência Brasil Fotografias.)

BRAZIL: Democracy at Stake

By Carlos Milani | A discussion of the origins of Brazil's profound current institutional, political, and economic crisis.

Operation Crossroads Baker nuclear test spreads a huge mushroom cloud at Bikini Atoll in 1946. (Photo from U.S. Department of Defense/Wikimedia.)

DIPLOMACY: Negotiating Nuclear Safety

By Celso Amorim | The history of Brazil and Argentina's collaboration "in defense of peace, understanding, and integrated development" regarding nuclear materials.

A spreading desert in the foreground for the isolated town of Lurín, Peru. (Photo by Kristian Golding.)

RESEARCH: Development on the Peripheries

By Karen Chapple and Sergio MonteroThe relationship between governance processes and local economic development in small cities and peripheral regions in Latin America.

A line of pine trees on fire at dusk during the Happy Camp Fire in northern California, 2014. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Forest Service.)

CONICYT: Chile & California: The Impact of Wildland Fires

By María del Carmen Thomsen, Pedro Reszka, Andrés Fuentes, and Carlos Fernandez-Pello | A study of the very similar vulnerabilities to wildland fires in that country and California.

 A portrait of Clarice Lispector, Rio de Janeiro, 1969. (Photo by Alair Gomes.)

LITERATURE: Rediscovering Clarice Through Translation

By Katrina Dodson | Insight into "Lispectormania" and the process of translating Clarice Lispector's "Short Stories."

Clarice Lispector sits on a couch writing on a typewriter in 1961. (Photo by Claudia Andujar.)

POETRY: From "That's Where I'm Going"

By Clarice Lispector | Lines from "É para lá que eu vou" ("That's Where I'm Going").