The 1973 military coup in Chile deposed the democratically elected Salvador Allende and installed a dictatorship that terrorized the country for almost twenty years. Subsequent efforts to come to terms with the national trauma have resulted in an outpouring of fiction, art, film, and drama.In this ethnography, Macarena Gomez-Barris examines cultural sites and representations in postdictatorship Chile - what she calls "memory symbolics" - to uncover the impact of state-sponsored violence. She surveys the concentration camp turned memorial park, Villa Grimaldi, documentary films, the torture paintings of Guillermo Nunez, and art by Chilean exiles, arguing that two contradictory forces are at work: a desire to forget the experiences and the victims, and a powerful need to remember and memorialize them. By linking culture, nation, and identity, Gomez-Barris shows how those most affected by the legacies of the dictatorship continue to live with the presence of violence in their bodies, in their daily lives, and in the identities they pass down to younger generations.

About the Author
Macarena Gomez-Barris is Assistant Professor of Sociology and American Studies and Ethnicity at the University of Southern California.

Reviews
"This book is a solid and original contribution to the expanding work on the construction of memory in Chile." The Americas



Book Information
ISBN 9780520255845
Author Macarena Gomez-Barris
Format Paperback
Page Count 240
Imprint University of California Press
Publisher University of California Press
Weight(grams) 272g
Dimensions(mm) 210mm * 140mm * 15mm