Dissertation
Coloniality of the Wor(l)d: Aesthetics, Heresy, and the Decolonial Spirit of La Xicanada | Advisor: Chela Sandoval
My doctoral research project is at the intersections of decoloniality, affect, sound, performance, art, cultural labor/production, and materiality. The theoretical analytic undergirding my investigation is what I call "the coloniality of the wor(l)d," as a relationship between the word (expression/narrative) and the world (reality). From this analytic, I consider the “artist’s workshop,” cultural texts, and public events (e.g., readings, exhibitions, and music) to theorize the sign system, life-world, soundscape, haptics, and imaginal/spiritual dimension of the Xicanx artistic producer’s (i.e., writer, musician, and visual artist) embodied process of production as a confrontation with the modern/colonial wor(l)d. In doing so, I offer an aesthetic theory of Xicanx autopoeisis, otherwise grounded in the cognitive. spiritual, and material terrain of what I extend as Xicanacimiento. This aesthetic theory posits a connection between the imaginary and the symbolic to form a heresy between speech, sound, and touch unfolding in the processes and performance situated in Xicanacimiento. In theorizing this affective and dialectical force, I propose the concept of "decolonial spirit" as a vector of symbolic, sonic, and imaginal resistance to the coloniality of the wor(l)d. This study is investigated through the methods of autohistoria-teoría, ethnography, pláticas, close reading, close listening, phenomenological inquiry, and radical bio-semiology.
This dissertation offers the trans-disciplinary practicum of Chicanx studies a philosophical and theoretical thread in the study of La Xicanada, situated in the long decade of the 1990s Indigenous resurgence conjuncture, into the new millennium. The content chapters of the dissertation outlines the bones to critical inquiry in Chicanx studies as it pertains to new directions in decolonial theory, literary, music, and visual art criticism, performance studies, and cultural studies.
My doctoral research project is at the intersections of decoloniality, affect, sound, performance, art, cultural labor/production, and materiality. The theoretical analytic undergirding my investigation is what I call "the coloniality of the wor(l)d," as a relationship between the word (expression/narrative) and the world (reality). From this analytic, I consider the “artist’s workshop,” cultural texts, and public events (e.g., readings, exhibitions, and music) to theorize the sign system, life-world, soundscape, haptics, and imaginal/spiritual dimension of the Xicanx artistic producer’s (i.e., writer, musician, and visual artist) embodied process of production as a confrontation with the modern/colonial wor(l)d. In doing so, I offer an aesthetic theory of Xicanx autopoeisis, otherwise grounded in the cognitive. spiritual, and material terrain of what I extend as Xicanacimiento. This aesthetic theory posits a connection between the imaginary and the symbolic to form a heresy between speech, sound, and touch unfolding in the processes and performance situated in Xicanacimiento. In theorizing this affective and dialectical force, I propose the concept of "decolonial spirit" as a vector of symbolic, sonic, and imaginal resistance to the coloniality of the wor(l)d. This study is investigated through the methods of autohistoria-teoría, ethnography, pláticas, close reading, close listening, phenomenological inquiry, and radical bio-semiology.
This dissertation offers the trans-disciplinary practicum of Chicanx studies a philosophical and theoretical thread in the study of La Xicanada, situated in the long decade of the 1990s Indigenous resurgence conjuncture, into the new millennium. The content chapters of the dissertation outlines the bones to critical inquiry in Chicanx studies as it pertains to new directions in decolonial theory, literary, music, and visual art criticism, performance studies, and cultural studies.
Research Agenda
La Xicanada
My principal research specialization is the life, culture, and politics of La Xicanada, since the 1960s. My research roots itself to four interrelated categories that shaped my questions: practices (culture), being (ontology), consciousness (phenomenology), and knowledge (epistemology). For me, La Xicanada comes to represent a body of knowledge, being/becoming, and multiple subjectivities within the modern/colonial world. The "X-" in La Xicanada is a rupture in the consciousness of the "Mexican American" subject articulated by a milieu whose philosophy and politics center on indigeneity, land, cosmovision, and Indigenous radicalisms. This protracted study proposes three lines of inquiry: How does La Xicanada, in their practices, confront the structures and discourses of US settler colonialism? How does La Xicanada engage, limit, and expand the politics of indigeneity in the Americas? Lastly, How does La Xicanada offer a new sense of feeling the world beyond modernity/coloniality?
Decolonial Feminism(s)
My research on decolonial feminism(s) is focused on a treatment of Chicana writers, artists, thinkers, philosophers, and theorists who subvert not only the dominant threads of (white) feminist politics, and its typology underscored by Chela Sandoval, such as the liberal, revolutionary, radical/cultural, and socialist feminisms, but who also stretch and expand the ideological forms of Chicana feminism itself. The specificity of Chicana subjectivity, as it was shaped by US third world radicalism, invites new views into the study of decolonial feminism itself. Below are the current research projects I am engaged in, as protracted investigations:
Grietas of the Underworld
Part of my theoretical investigations is an interest and commitment to the study of punk, queer, and sucio life in the Americas. This research takes form through the study of culture, music, "scenes," aesthetics, spaces, social movements, and practices. In particular, I consider the loudness, guttural noise, bad smells, and sucio aesthetics of punk, powerviolence, and grindcore communities at the intersection of latinidad, subaltern subjectivities, and relationships to DIY networks.
Brown Media Philosophy
One of my central interests is the history, theory, and practice of what I term brown media philosophy. I draw on the fields of digital humanities, science and technology studies, media studies, and theories of the cyborg to make sense of "brown" use, circulation, and creation of media. I particularly focus on zines, photography, social media, and podcasting.
Civilization, Philosophy, and the Modern/Colonial World
My long-term intellectual study is focused on a treatment of what is called by the Zapatistas as the civilization of death. This research and criticism is shaped by an immanent critique of "Western" civilization itself, as incarnated and sustained by the afterlife of European imperial rule, settler invasion, the colonies, capital, decolonization, philosophy, mythic violence, US imperialism, and "postmodernism." My approach to this immanent critique considers the web of knowledge in Marxism, world-systems theory, psychoanalysis, and critical theory. My offering for this critique of civilization is a set of combative analytics for the paths of decoloniality in the many struggles for life.
My principal research specialization is the life, culture, and politics of La Xicanada, since the 1960s. My research roots itself to four interrelated categories that shaped my questions: practices (culture), being (ontology), consciousness (phenomenology), and knowledge (epistemology). For me, La Xicanada comes to represent a body of knowledge, being/becoming, and multiple subjectivities within the modern/colonial world. The "X-" in La Xicanada is a rupture in the consciousness of the "Mexican American" subject articulated by a milieu whose philosophy and politics center on indigeneity, land, cosmovision, and Indigenous radicalisms. This protracted study proposes three lines of inquiry: How does La Xicanada, in their practices, confront the structures and discourses of US settler colonialism? How does La Xicanada engage, limit, and expand the politics of indigeneity in the Americas? Lastly, How does La Xicanada offer a new sense of feeling the world beyond modernity/coloniality?
Decolonial Feminism(s)
My research on decolonial feminism(s) is focused on a treatment of Chicana writers, artists, thinkers, philosophers, and theorists who subvert not only the dominant threads of (white) feminist politics, and its typology underscored by Chela Sandoval, such as the liberal, revolutionary, radical/cultural, and socialist feminisms, but who also stretch and expand the ideological forms of Chicana feminism itself. The specificity of Chicana subjectivity, as it was shaped by US third world radicalism, invites new views into the study of decolonial feminism itself. Below are the current research projects I am engaged in, as protracted investigations:
- Anzaldúan Heresy: On the Path of the Self-Devouring Serpent
- The Flesh of Writing: Cherríe Moraga's Philosophy of Desire
- Sandovalian Love: On Decolonial Science and Differential Praxis
- Re-Visioning Malintzin: Norma Alarcón's Philosophy of Refusal
Grietas of the Underworld
Part of my theoretical investigations is an interest and commitment to the study of punk, queer, and sucio life in the Americas. This research takes form through the study of culture, music, "scenes," aesthetics, spaces, social movements, and practices. In particular, I consider the loudness, guttural noise, bad smells, and sucio aesthetics of punk, powerviolence, and grindcore communities at the intersection of latinidad, subaltern subjectivities, and relationships to DIY networks.
Brown Media Philosophy
One of my central interests is the history, theory, and practice of what I term brown media philosophy. I draw on the fields of digital humanities, science and technology studies, media studies, and theories of the cyborg to make sense of "brown" use, circulation, and creation of media. I particularly focus on zines, photography, social media, and podcasting.
Civilization, Philosophy, and the Modern/Colonial World
My long-term intellectual study is focused on a treatment of what is called by the Zapatistas as the civilization of death. This research and criticism is shaped by an immanent critique of "Western" civilization itself, as incarnated and sustained by the afterlife of European imperial rule, settler invasion, the colonies, capital, decolonization, philosophy, mythic violence, US imperialism, and "postmodernism." My approach to this immanent critique considers the web of knowledge in Marxism, world-systems theory, psychoanalysis, and critical theory. My offering for this critique of civilization is a set of combative analytics for the paths of decoloniality in the many struggles for life.
Collaboration
Natalia M. Toscano | UNM Chicana and Chicano Studies
I am engaged in a long-term collaboration with scholar-comadre Natalia M. Toscano, working at the intersections of indigeneity, Chicana feminism, zapatismo, and a critical inquiry of the long history of Chicanx studies in the United States. Our projects (ongoing, completed, and imagined) are as follows below:
I am engaged in a long-term collaboration with scholar-comadre Natalia M. Toscano, working at the intersections of indigeneity, Chicana feminism, zapatismo, and a critical inquiry of the long history of Chicanx studies in the United States. Our projects (ongoing, completed, and imagined) are as follows below:
- Red Road Traveler: The Xicanx Humanism of Luis J. Rodríguez
- Nepantlera Study: Chicana Feminist Theorizing in the Face of the Civilization of Death