What does it mean to be a man in the Andes? How can we approach this question without falling into the stereotypes of the “macho man,” the “Catholic conservative,” or the “patriarchal exploiter”? How are these stereotypes reproduced and contested in literary expressions from the region? How are these revisions relevant to contemporary struggles for justice and equality?

This panel will attempt to answer these questions and raise new ones, by studying various pieces of contemporary Andean literature, taking into account the cultural and historical particularities of the different societies that fall under the umbrella of what we call the Andes. The panelists will do so against the current scholarship, which, while criticizing heteronormativity, patriarchy, and homosociality, ends up reinforcing the appearance that these are inextricably fixed realities, the signs of an eternal fate of a failed region. Instead, the papers in this panel will highlight the glimpses of hope, the spaces of negotiation and contestation that literature reveals as new possibilities for building an equal society.

Following MLA instructions, each presentation will be no more than 12-13 minutes, to allow for introductions and transitions, while ensuring the required 15-minute discussion period is preserved and that the session ends on time. The presenters will appear in this order:

First, Manuela Borzone will start the discussion with an intertextual and historical review of the ideas of manliness condensed in the figure of the “outlaw” gaucho. First, she will examine how texts like Martin Fierro came to be national models in the XIX and early XX centuries. Then she will analyze how contemporary authors have rewritten this figure to comment on the continued effects of a carceral state bent on criminalizing the racialized poor. Through this, she will trace these authors' challenges to antiquated visions of masculinity and their proposals for alternative forms of being within the nation.

Continuing with our journey through the Southern Cone, Jonathan Guerra will study a novel set during the Chilean dictatorship of the 1980s: Pedro Lemebel’s Tengo Miedo, Torero (2001). Guerra will bring to the discussion concepts such as disidentification (Muñoz), division of labor in patriarchal societies (Lerner), and expression of gender violence (Segato) to explore how queer characters in this novel navigate the reduced field of labor shrunken by patriarchal violence. His work will contribute to a deeper understanding of identity negotiation and survival strategies of queer people within a male-controlled society.

In connection with the Chilean context, Natalia Chávez will take us to contemporary issues of migration within the Andes with her research on the male coming-of-age novel Seoul, São Paulo (2019) by Bolivian writer Gabriel Mamani Magne. The novel follows two men who migrate from their community in Bolivia to work in Chile and Brazil. Chávez will explain how the current global capitalist system disrupts the ideas of rootedness in the Andes, which is the base for the notions of masculinity, as represented in the characters' journey. She will also emphasize the challenges and new possibilities that this disruption opens up for thinking manliness in the region.

Finally, to further illuminate questions of indigeneity and authenticity in relation to masculinities, Carlos López will take us to Peru to show how faith and urban cultural identity are destabilized by pre-Columbian rituals related to sexual identities in Eielson’s Primera Muerte de María (1988). López will intersect postcolonial and queer theories to analyze the tensions of homoerotic male attraction, as portrayed in a post-apocalyptic love triangle. López will explore these tensions by dissecting a striptease sequence of one of the main characters, María Pacheco, also known as Lady Ciclotrón.