Violence and history in Latin America

HIST UN 3683, Fall 2016

Wednesday, 4:10-6:00 pm, Fayerweather 302

Pablo Piccato, Department of History, Columbia University

Office hours: Wednesdays, 10:00am to noon; Fayerweather 324, [email protected]

This course will build the conceptual tools to understand violence historically. Its premise is that violence is not an endemic or natural aspect of Latin American life but that it has many contingent modalities that can be best understood in a historical perspective. We will look at violence as a component of oppressive power, class and gender relations. At the same time, however, we will also consider the productive effects of violence, as violent practices constitute politics, nationalism, masculinity and revolutionary thought. We will also look at the way in which violence, particularly state but also revolutionary violence, generated enduring social efforts to seek justice and preserve the memory of victims. The final research paper will present student’s original take on these topics.

The course will combine readings on theory, history and the social sciences intended to build a historical perspective. In the second half of the semester, the focus will turn to the research and writing of a paper that will be based on primary sources but will also engage the readings from the first part of the semester.

Primary sources will include documents in Spanish or Portuguese generated by diverse state and non-state institutions. They can also include press, literature, visual arts and oral accounts. Although required readings are in English, research competence in Spanish or Portuguese is strongly encouraged.

Prerequisites: Students should have taken introductory level courses on Latin American history, politics or culture. Advanced reading ability in Spanish.

Grading: attendance; participation in the class discussion and in the course’s blog (15 percent of the grade); presentations on primary sources (5); participation in workshops on projects and drafts of other students’ papers (10); final paper (70).

Laptop or tablet use is not allowed during seminar meetings. More than one absence without justification will result in a decimal point discounted from the final grade per each day missed.

Weekly schedule:

September 7

Introduction:

Readings and methodology. Primary sources. Course structure: First part: theories and stories. Second part: research and writing. The quantitative dimension of violence in Latin America.

Readings:

Benjamin, “Critique of violence.”

United Nations Development Programme, “Citizen security.”

September 14

How to think about violence historically:

Arendt, On Violence; Borges, “Ema Zunz.”

September 21

Performance of violence in the cattle frontier:

Chasteen, “Murder for Show”; Echeverría, “El matadero.”

September 28

Violence and honor

Piccato, Tyranny of Opinion, chapter 7; Gotkowitz, “Trading Insults.”

Discussion of samples of judicial records:

Roumagnac, “Matadores de mujeres,” p. 97-119, 180-216.

October 5

Sexual violence:

Chapter 5 in Carey, I Ask for Justice; Earle, “Rape and the Anxious Republic”; Piccato, “El Chalequero.”

Bring 3-5 references to judicial, journalistic or other kinds of narrative records of cases of violence. Prepare a discussion of a sample.

October 12

Violence and politics:

Roldán, Blood and Fire.

See also Gillingham, “We Don’t have Arms.”

October 19

Violence, revolution and emancipation:

Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth, chapters 1 and 4; chapters by Degregori, Pino, Manrique and Rénique in Stern, ed., Shining and Other Paths.

October 26

Working with sources:

Ginzburg, “The Inquisitor as Anthropologist”; Ginzburg, “Checking the Evidence.”

Workshop on projects and sources. Distribute an abstract and list of sources for your project on Monday by noon through Courseworks. Prepare comments on an assigned project.

November 2

State violence:

Archdiocese of São Paulo, Torture in Brazil.

See also CONADEP, Nunca más.

Violence, fascism and populism:

Finchelstein, Ideological Origins, chapters 5 and 6.

November 9

Violence and social life:

Taussig, Law in a Lawless Land.

November 16

Workshop of drafts:

Distribute a section of your paper by Monday at noon in Courseworks. Prepare comments on the paper assigned to you.

November 23

Autocrítica of violence:

Elgueta and Marchant, eds., Historia Reciente, chapters by Calveiro, Pozzi, Vezzetti and Tarcus.

Violence, memory and justice:

Chapter by Crenzel in Alier and Crenzel, eds., The Struggles for Memory.

November 30

Contemporary violence:

Martínez, A History of Violence.

December 7

Workshop of final papers:

Distribute your paper by Monday at noon in Courseworks. Prepare comments on the paper assigned to you.

December 23 Final paper

Bibliography

Alier, Eugenia, and Emilio Crenzel, eds. The Struggles for Memory in Latin America: Recent History and Political Violence. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015.

Archdiocese of São Paulo. Torture in Brazil: A Report. New York: Vintage Books, 1986.

Arendt, Hannah. On Violence. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1969.

Bernstein, Richard J. Violence: Thinking without Banisters. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2013.

Benjamin, Walter. “Critique of Violence.” In Reflections: Essays, Aphorisms, Autobiographical Writings, 277–300. New York: Schocken Books, 1978.

Benjamin, Walter. “Theses on the Philosophy of History.” In Illuminations: Essays and Reflections, 253–64. New York: Schocken Books, 2007.

Bolaño, Roberto. Distant Star. New York: New Directions Pub, 2004.

Borges, Jorge Luis. “Ema Zunz” in El Aleph. Buenos Aires: Emecé, 2007.

Carey, David. I Ask for Justice: Maya Women, Dictators, and Crime in Guatemala, 1898-1944. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2013.

Chasteen, John Charles. “Violence for Show: Knife Duelling on a Nineteenth-Century Cattle Frontier.” In The Problem of Order in Changing Societies: Essays on Crime and Policing in Argentina and Uruguay, 1750-1940. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1990.

CONADEP. Nunca Más (never Again). Accessed May 24, 2012. http://www.columbia.edu/cgi-bin/cul/resolve?clio8519335.

Earle, Rebecca. “Rape and the Anxious Republic: Revolutionary Colombia, 1810-1830.” In Hidden Histories of Gender and the State in Latin America, edited by Elizabeth Dore and Maxine Molyneux. Durham N.C.: Duke University Press, 2000.

Echeverría, Esteban. El Matadero. Accessed August 16, 2016. http://www.digitaliapublishing.com/a/16287/.

Elgueta, Gloria, and Claudia Marchant, eds. Historia Reciente Y Violencia Politica: Lucha Armada En La Argentina. Santiago: Tiempo Robado, 2013.

Fanon, Frantz. The Wretched of the Earth. New York: Distributed by Publishers Group West, 2004.

Finchelstein, Federico. The Ideological Origins of the Dirty War: Fascism, Populism, and Dictatorship in Twentieth Century Argentina. Oxford ; New York: Oxford University Press, 2014.

Gotkowitz, Laura. “Trading Insults: Honor, Violence, and the Gendered Culture of Commerce in Cochabamba, Bolivia, 1870s–1950s.” Hispanic American Historical Review 83, no. 1 (February 2003): 83–118.

Guevara, Che. Guerrilla Warfare. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, c1998.

Gillingham, Paul. “‘We Don’t Have Arms, But We Do Have Balls’: Fraud, Violence, and Popular Agency in Elections.” In Dictablanda: Politics, Work, and Culture in Mexico, 1938–1968, edited by Paul Gillingham and Benjamin Smith, 149–72. Durham: Duke University Press, 2014.

Ginzburg, Carlo. “Checking the Evidence: The Judge and the Historian.” Critical Inquiry Vol. 18, No. 1 (Autumn, 1991), pp. 79-92. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1343716.

Ginzburg, Carlo. “The Inquisitor as Anthropologist.” In Clues, Myths, and the Historical Method, translated by John Tedeschi, 156–64. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1992.

Martínez, Oscar. A History of Violence: Living and Dying in Central America. New York: Verso, 2016.

Piccato, Pablo. The Tyranny of Opinion: Honor in the Construction of the Mexican Public Sphere. Durham: Duke University Press, 2010.

Roldán, Mary. Blood and Fire: La Violencia in Antioquia, Colombia, 1946-1953. Durham: Duke University Press, 2003.

Roumagnac, Carlos. Matadores de Mujeres (Segunda Parte de “Crímenes Sexuales Y Pasionales”). Mexico City: Ch. Bouret, 1910.

Stern, Steve J., ed. Shining and Other Paths: War and Society in Peru, 1980-1995. Durham [NC]: Duke University Press, 1998.

Taussig, Michael T. Law in a Lawless Land : Diary of a Limpieza in Colombia. New York: New Press : Distributed by W.W. Norton, 2003.

Traverso, Enzo. La Historia Como Campo de Batalla : Interpretar Las Violencias Del Siglo XX. Buenos Aires, Argentina: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2012.

United Nations Development Programme. “Citizen Security with a Human Face: Human Development Reports.” Accessed August 17, 2016. http://hdr.undp.org/en/content/citizen-security-human-face.

Usigli, Rodolfo. Ensayo de un crimen. México: Secretaría de Educación Pública, 1986.

Vargas Llosa, Mario. Historia de Mayta. Caracas: Seix Barral, 1984.

———. ¿Quién Mató a Palomino Molero? Barcelona: Seix Barral, 1986.

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