Latin American Literature at the Rise of Environmentalism

Ecocritical approaches in Latin Americanist literary and cultural studies (carried out in Latin America, the United States, or Europe) owe considerably to the dissemination of environmental literatures in English and to the ecocritical approaches developed in academia for studying these literatures. The drift of ecocritical approaches from English departments to foreign literature and comparative literature departments is driven by the relevance of environmental concerns, the will to address them across the curriculum, and the fact that comparison helps us recognize differences and commonalities. This development in academia parallels the dissemination of environmental discourses across borders occurring in the environmental movements themselves. Let's take, for instance, a discourse that has been evolving in Latin America since the early 2000s and has been actively used by social movements: buen vivir.1 “Buen vivir” or “vivir bien,” is a Spanish phrase that refers to indigenous-based alternatives to the negative impacts of economic development. The discourses of buen vivir focus on the good life in a broad sense, that is to say, the classical ideas of quality of life, but with the specific idea that well-being is only possible within a community. In most approaches, the concept of “community” is understood in an expanded sense that includes nature. Buen vivir, therefore, embraces the broad notion of well-being and cohabitation with others and nature. Buen vivir relies on values associated with indigenous traditions, and in this sense the concept explores possibilities beyond the modern Eurocentric tradition. On the other hand, it includes critical reactions to classical Western development theory that echo certain indigenous perspectives, for instance, radical environmental postures, particularly deep ecology and other biocentric approaches that reject the anthropocentric perspective of modernity and recognize intrinsic values in the environment. Another example would be the coincidence with feminist perspectives that link gender roles with societal hierarchies and the domination over nature. In spite of its historical emphasis on the local, environmentalism is a transnational phenomenon, politically and culturally, following and responding to processes of globalization and increasingly focusing on planetary issues.2Today, in the global North, ecocriticism is demanding from its practitioners an understanding of developments beyond their borders, as well as a cross-cultural sensitivity, ethics, and politics. In the global South, and certainly in Latin America, I argue, it is precisely the responsibility of literary and cultural studies to be at the frontline of this kind of research. Among the pending tasks in Hispanic studies are the study of canonical authors and texts from ecological perspectives and the expansion of that canon. On the other hand, environmental or ecological readings of Latin American literatures and cultures will benefit from a comparison with other literatures from the global South, and vice versa, since they have similar environmental problems, struggles, and histories. The current pattern in Hispanic studies of not engaging enough with the reflection on the relationship between society and nature and the human and the nonhuman in the history of Latin American literature and the arts projects the false image to our students, South and North, that these topics have been totally secondary in this tradition and that literature and the arts have nothing to say regarding current environmental issues and conflicts in the region.This article contributes to the achievement of these goals with a reading of El zorro de arriba y el zorro de abajo (1971) (The Fox from Up Above and the Fox from Down Below [2000]) by Peruvian writer José María Arguedas (1911–1969). Los zorros (The Foxes), Arguedas's last, posthumous, and allegedly unfinished novel, explores major transformations in Peruvian Andean culture under the stress of migration in the 1960s. The novel also records Arguedas's own existential crisis that led him to commit suicide. Arguedas was one of the most influential Latin American writers of the twentieth century. Since his death, he has become an emblematic figure in theories of Latin American cultural identity based on the idea of transculturation, mestizaje, or hybridity. Arguedas's appeal owes to his forceful understanding of Peruvian cultural identity as the product of the conflicting but creative encounter of Andean, oral, traditional, and rural cultures, on the one hand, with Western, Christian, written, modern, urban and cosmopolitan cultures, on the other. For more than thirty years, Arguedas constantly rethought his profound critique of economic and cultural modernization and practiced through his literature a convinced self-conscious alternative adaptation to modernization rooted in Andean traditions. His importance can be measured too by the attention he receives from his rivals, for instance, from Nobel Laureate novelist Mario Vargas Llosa, also a Peruvian. In La utopía arcaica: José María Arguedas y las ficciones del indigenismo (2004), Vargas Llosa, despite his admiration for Arguedas, elaborates again on an argument he has made in several occasions throughout his own career: Arguedas and the history of Peruvian indigenismo fell into the trap of yearning for a nostalgic “return” to idealized premodern conditions.In this article, I argue that there is in Los zorros an emerging ecological thinking that surges ironically from the limitations of ecologies that are portrayed in the book as “Andean” or “provincial” (in the sense of “small town” and “unsophisticated”) ecologies that are overwhelmed by a major environmental crisis in the city of Chimbote, on the Peruvian coast. A massive number of people from the Andean highlands had poured into Chimbote, a former fishing town, lured by the expectation of job opportunities in the largest steel mill in the country but especially in the fish meal industry that had made of Chimbote the largest fishing port of the world. What has been omitted so far in interpretations of Arguedas's last novel is his attention to the ecological crisis brought about in Chimbote by resource-destructive economic and technological processes and to how this ecological disruption is coextensive with damage to the social fabric and psychological life of the immigrants. Intercalated in between the chapters, in sections entitled “Diarios” (“Diaries”), Los zorros also tells the story of the psychological breakdown of the subject that introduces himself as the author of the novel and that identifies himself as José María Arguedas, although the accuracy of these autobiographical sections has been much debated.3 in the sections are to his own to and the transformations in Chimbote for Peruvian and to the to this story in an the story to be of the Chimbote to his of the of Andean culture in an alternative of a modern and more Peruvian Chimbote his of literary based on a sense of to the In to Chimbote, will have to a of his with zorros is in Chimbote, a on the Peruvian that within a had from a fishing to an Chimbote is with Andean in steel in the of fishing fish of the or in the this is into fish meal for meal is fish used as a and as for from the it was in The on the of a environmental crisis are of the of the Andean in La del el del de las de y El de de de las las y el a y el del de las a las de a del y of the the of the from the in of that as they and The of the of of the in the and out over the and the of the that out of the on to the made out of the that at a and can from similar throughout the novel a story of environmental that is as by the or by of its For the novel to the fact that the number of on the Peruvian had been to of in the novel, the are from and the fishing to for them in the this and of is to other to the life, the Chimbote the and the and are by the fish meal and is not by the the of the the city by the is the in the is in the the nonhuman of the and human In the fish meal industry is an of and by its in the In the novel, the for a social of the is its by the of good and for their own that was and by a for the indigenous of and into Chimbote from Andean town, from other and from the in they on the in Chimbote has The of for job and the under the of the this migration conflicts between the and of and between of and can the ecological crisis in Los zorros by on current thinking about urban and and and made one or the and of in in the world. Chimbote had the environmental and of for and of and urban for from and so In spite of the fact that Chimbote was the of a of there was or to a much and urban the fact that had in this the of on by an to an of the environmental in Chimbote, the also attention to the and through the and in Chimbote their sense of in nature. In the of a most of a of and and an to and a Andean to and these the are not only their identity on the of Chimbote and its but are also to with the the and the much on the of the these the and of the y las y y el las y las de y las las de a de and one by one he made them he the to the and that for and the the Andean and the the that from the on the In to the of also an the immigrants. in this novel the is not an of rural life by an or Western subject but a of and for the rural Andean from rural life by the of the too the ecology in the that has driven them out of the into the from the on the in the This of economic and opportunities has the Andean on of they have environmental Los the have become of the to their and identity in to a of and not in to the of or of current of to the is in Chimbote of the of its environmental crisis and social as well as there is a story of throughout The story of de one of the is a of these his was in a the of for the with on the and him to a was or at that A of and one of his from the and to the of the the they in a under that they on a for a they to in of but was to a to or in other himself in the of from he was for with he to Chimbote, he and his at last a in a in a with a the that he in the is about the he and throughout his life and about the that migration has on the identity and sense of The Andean a their can they the in the in the they for their and their so de del Chimbote, so a so y el their in the of the has his more there is they him in in his he to the he his with and he for a in with is in Chimbote for the kind of sense of to in of and of has developed in American The in Chimbote is not by an of allegedly the for an environmental and In Chimbote, the have history of their with the other than through their in the of the they and their the the and values the for and environmental in Chimbote from Arguedas's understanding of Andean The ecological values portrayed as “Andean” in the novel a but they of alternatives to the environmental of the fish meal industry and the development that it too of environmental the themselves. In the of the for the fish meal despite their cultural actively and in the environmental that they a of nature. a el de La that to is about the is the in the world. The a commit to the that the Western and modern industry them to have become to a of that is driven not only by the to but by their to a Western the former into or is a of the of development or transnational the to the of the city and its The at the between the city and the the story are a of Chimbote and of are not in or are to or social for in Chimbote or to a or more than modern or more than Western, relationship with the to and conflicts and the expectation that economic modernization would the social and within the “Andean” ecologies to the as an environmental by literary the concept of an environmental refers the of in as a of and social and the for a and a to that This of Arguedas's “Andean” ecologies to the on The limitations of an “Andean” ecology in Los zorros a ecological thinking for its to in Arguedas's Los his most novel, to in that novel Arguedas on the one the of indigenous by a of to the nature by On the other hand, Arguedas indigenous and with nature to the of the Andean the by the in The of Arguedas's “Andean” ecologies is that although the of his at the and they not Arguedas as the of their in of the most on Arguedas and on Latin American cultural studies in the of the twentieth the the to Arguedas's as an into the ecological that was his own as in his he was his influential to Arguedas, and La (The On in his that he a las de y a las de el de de de de de el a for nature for that I have in the has led to I own the of people an they can to our in a increasingly and to In the on made of this for for the is that it was the in the developed but that at its in the to to our this a the that in Latin America had in an or ecological this is portrayed within the novel emerging ecological thinking in Los with the Arguedas a of and that be by to the discourses at that What are the in Chimbote is a the that them from the by the fish meal the that the of are in that them from other. For instance, the radical American that are the of theory they are of of foreign are the in In one a Peruvian in development as a of social is to by the the he by the on the importance of theory for the of For and the other the city of the former of the and the of Andean is the of for that and for understanding in they are their the and an from the of the a of the steel mill and a over the by the the The Peruvian to the tells y de a he with the and that had him the meal with the American the is that of the with a to in that of zorros for an urban environmentalism to but not by Andean ideas on the of and nature. is not a of environmental that is the to the of human and nonhuman life in Chimbote but a of social to alternatives to the of and the the by and be to for and social and In spite of their these a that would into the fact the by Chimbote would be by a an of the environmental from these specific historical these and the into Andean for alternatives and for on how to of that are emerging in the Chimbote, the indigenous de is to the of the from and The novel one of the in the as the On one the city the and the the to their to of the city and the is the port of In the the would be of at to the or the the to their in the to the they so in an and out to the for but his and for the indigenous in the y y he el el to him and that to more attention to and I him about in and its he has to be and to has to be to the negative The are so they and his are to a sense of in the of the of the and are to The to and an for and a he himself in Chimbote not have the with the sense of that has for instance, in American a to recognize the to the is by the the that and on with other and cultures, by or or a with the of a but the of Andean this to the of the most fish meal he el a de las y el y y el de las not to have in to in that are in in the and for the are that the on to or nothing at there are and the reflection of foreign in their but of are the de as well as other in the novel, has become that Chimbote is a to other within or in Chimbote is the product of and ecological is also a example of as by the of between culture and or in the social that and to that transnational are the the and the city and the This can the of especially the United The of Chimbote have an relationship with the several in the city and its are in the of them are is an there is with the and in the and the there is and his the that the city La de de de el El a el el a las a death, the of fish of American a not as it to be The is to kind of Spanish it be to their will on they in the the would also with good he had the as a in the so far in the novel to or of the of and environmental other of the environmental in of the global cultural identity to an “Andean” ecology as a of environmental or by the and economic in Chimbote, of social within the movements to and and a transnational sense of that the sense of and the of Los zorros a The concept is a on environmental Los or global of at processes of and their of and This is the ecological thinking out of the that Arguedas is to in Los The ecological thinking of Los zorros for a of the in the it not specific Los zorros is a in the sense that the in A of by reading of the American to a throughout the for the and the that a story about the history of the fish meal the and the environmental The in Los zorros is the the city and in with his or the politics. to the in The and is a of that by a of over into a The not the but in to The in Chimbote are of a address them within a as the discourses of buen vivir in fact in Latin American politics. buen vivir, or of (2004), Los zorros that Chimbote is a of human and nonhuman although the of between them are el de el de de del de La el el de Chimbote, a y a el y las y on the with of La the has by the a of how and to him as from For he is the only one and as a and in in the last of the novel, us that the book to the the for a of the that it would to he can only the for this Los particularly in the Arguedas a “provincial” perspective by himself as a “provincial” writer is in the urban of the and more in de he de las he y y del y del de de y el de de I it I one of the people of this that I have from than from the differences that I have and a and a between a and one from between an the of a the of a and the of the This “provincial” identity is not a from but a of the of the transnational in our are is also a from have their sense of to beyond the In the the of the “provincial” to other Latin American especially literary and it is precisely of a of human and nonhuman that he the more cosmopolitan Latin American de y del de las from the and from the in that in an an I say the they have in are much more than their is that or to is by or The nonhuman a or a is an a subject but an of and an a Los and Arguedas's in a for and for of and and so In the the of he owes to y vivir a y de he de and I be to for a the of the well with and on the with of to that I have to with the in the to In that life is more of a life for a environmentalism in his own to this In the tells about his encounter with but in a that it with El de las el y de y y el el de a de el de y of by their and by the with they are was to and the in that by the of on at that of the the of and of into modernization in Chimbote, the subject in the sections the of his for history and a novel of las the of the with that novel the to the between the Andean and the of Spanish el el de las y el y in the novel, that to be by the the for in that is the of the that the developed on the and in the by and Chimbote, is for a the Andean in that he is with his of a that and him at the he has used el y el de a Chimbote y el in that novel, the Andean and it is own I in of the novel although to I not have a profound understanding of in Chimbote and in the the of the novel, that his is only possible under a sense of with the more than human and that his is to with the nature of and of that link to the was or he for of a his sense of to the to a from he a el y el las a de las encounter with that have been the and and in to the link with that link was I was to the of into Los that to nonhuman In an from that of Chimbote, the city of to the last of by his with a in the is El de de el de y y de del del buen a y de he in the of the y the of this city that is the of of the good to be I to him I his is the the most I have in other or in other In “provincial” ecology of the for his is the of of and by or La el El de de de las a las de las el La y El del de el del the the world. The of the that in is from the and into over the the of the under the The is more and it can be The the of the to of these to his of the is that he has to under a sense of with the and regarding the of his for Peruvian The the that the and in Chimbote are in is In in this he introduces a of them under the of unfinished of the are not to and of the and of the In Los zorros a out of the of the limitations of his This is a more in the and of and in the of or be in of on of The that Chimbote and its emblematic as possible in the to the idea that the be to but is of possible The or in but not by the The is the of a the and of and so that has been in the and as well as the can will in the Los people can to the that the in Los zorros us a Chimbote to a that is and by the this Los zorros has but to its to the and as a of to the of the for the of and in Chimbote therefore, the nature of its This includes an understanding of the of human and nonhuman history in zorros is for the approaches to the in Latin American literature that in the and early in with the of the environmental in the United was in and the was in and a environmentalism was as into Latin America from the and from (The of was in by the of Los zorros by for instance, the of the environmental in the United States, as well as the critique of the or an too by thirty the current on the environmentalism of the and ecocriticism in the global Los zorros is a of a literary to de that so far has been by literary and environmental in spite of the fact that it was responding to the on ecologies of the emerging and of and the of to environmental have been the subject of a number of within the last and can be by to the concept of the environmentalism of the developed by in his book of that For these social movements have as a to the impacts of on or from the global For these the is a of and for The are the of Western development on The ecological disruption is coextensive with damage to the social these or of their over but also to discourses on the of nature life or other of the of and so in and the of the has this the environmentalism of the in the current historical of in ecology and have become The has on but it also has through or through that has across in an to therefore, to be on a their environmental through with other economic and cultural as they environmental not as a planetary but as a of zorros a story of environmental movements as the in Latin Los zorros can be understood as an of the historical from these movements have as a of cultural of In a Los zorros the kind of limitations and within the of that have had to in to to

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