19 - Displaced Selves

Summary

This chapter examines how displacement has been portrayed in Latin American women's writing in the second half of the twentieth century and, specifically, how it has impacted women as subjects. It focuses on authors from the Spanish-speaking Caribbean, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico, whose narratives cover events in the 1960s and 1970s. The chapter explores fiction from the Southern Cone countries concerning the aftermath of the military coups d'etat of the 1970s and 1980s. Overall, the period addressed in these works coincides with the political and social transformations of the 1960s, which allowed for an increasing presence of women in the public sphere. The three authors discussed in the chapter immigrated to New York City with their families at a young age. Educated in the United States and writing in English, Julia Alvarez, Cristina Garcia, and Esmeralda Santiago show aspects of the acculturation process that exiles and economic migrants experience in a bicultural setting.