‘Whichever way you turn,there is the face of God’ diaspora,memory, and historiography from the margin in The Moor’s Account by Laila Lalami

In The Moor’s Account, Laila Lalami dares to dust off the archive of official history that passed over the testimonies of a Moroccan slave during the Discovery Age. This paper explores the way the slave capitalizes on historiography to reconstruct the Western monolithic history. In so doing, the re-constructor’s memory performs a number of roles. It registers the history of the European conquest of La Florida using micro narrative frameworks that highlight salient differences from the official record. Besides, the diasporic memory that the present novel advocates has the intention to mark a difference of the silenced subjectivity from the supremacist histories through a transnational matching of homeland with diaspora. This transnationalism is coupled with a look forward to circumvent the essentialism implied in the monologic narratives. In shuttling between the past, present, and future, memory espouses cosmopolitanism as an alternative to the fundamentalism which threatens people’s cultural diversity.     

Problems and contradictions of participatory democracy: lessons from Latin America

The participatory innovations of the last few decades, particularly in Latin America, seem to suggest that the establishment of more participatory democracies is possible. However, limitations have characterized important participatory experiences. While the Bolivian, Ecuadorian, and Venezuelan attempts to promote popular participation have produced both positive and negative effects, some of these participatory experiences’ limitations are useful to highlight more general problems and contradictions that seem to be inherently associated with the establishment of participatory democracy in poorly functioning liberal democracies and in exclusionary and unequal societies. This analysis suggests that, paradoxically, the establishment of effective and inclusive participatory institutions may be less feasible where participatory mechanisms appear, at first glance, as most needed and promising.     

连横《台湾通史》论析：基于学术史的考察

连横一生以搜集、记录、整理、保存、研究台湾历史和文化为职志,著述颇丰,尤以《台湾通史》名世。纵观《台湾通史》的出版史和相关研究的学术史,实与近代以来中国历史进程相契合,其独特的学术价值和现实意义也逐步彰显。20世纪90年代以来,海峡两岸的《台湾通史》研究均进入新的发展阶段,无论视角还是视野、方法还是理论,特别是在学术性或学理性上,都有显著的推进和拓展。     

新世纪两岸对台湾文学诠释权的争夺——以“反攻”大陆学者写的《台湾文学史》为例

某些台湾作家在新世纪对大陆学者撰写的《台湾文学史》或分类史所做的“反攻”,主要是出版《台湾新文学史》或类文学史的著作,对“台湾文学是中国文学一个组成部分”、“反共文学”是一种逝去的文学、“皇民文学”就是汉奸文学的观点作出反弹。他们从政治上和学理上清算大陆学者的台湾文学史观时,还把岛内的统派学者“捆绑”在一起．。代表人物有钟肇政、陈芳明、林瑞明、谢辉煌。     

大陆学界台湾史研究的宏观检讨

台湾史是一门兼具学术与政治意义的新兴特色学科。中国大陆的台湾史研究,从学科建设的角度来说,属于中国历史学的分支学科。从研究史的角度,对于60多年来大陆学界台湾史研究成果做一宏观性的检讨,具体分析各个不同时期台湾史研究的特点,剖析唯物史观与“台独”史观论争的典型事例,提出新的研究问题,展现新的研究趋向,将有助于推动台湾史研究的深入拓展。     

Spaces of self-consciousness: Carla Accardi's environments and the rise of Italian feminism

“Spaces of self-consciousness” examines three environments created by the Italian artist Carla Accardi in light of an emerging feminist politics. Though better known as a painter, Accardi created these three-dimensional works during an era of political and social upheaval in which her own commitment to the Italian feminist movement began to take shape. Her environments were deeply imbricated both with her own experience of autocoscienza, or consciousness-raising, as well as with radical design proposals that rejected the current state of civilization. This article examines how these environments functioned as prototypes of the transient, anti-institutional spaces that she would later create as co-founder of Rivolta femminile, a historic Italian feminist collective, and examines a previously obscure moment in Carla Accardi's career.     

Transnational labor action in Latin America: from the struggle against the Free Trade Area of the Americas to the return of labor relations

Neoliberalism was the hegemonic political and economic model in Latin America during the 1990s. The promotion of a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) was a fundamental policy to extend neoliberal policies and foreign influence throughout the region. In a momentum built throughout that decade and into the 2000s, the trade union movement joined forces with social movements to create a counterhegemonic force using traditional and novel power resources. This alliance managed to defeat the FTAA and was a central force in supporting new center-left administrations throughout the region. The developments since that historic event have shown the relevance of political contexts and strategic outlooks for the long-term success in maintaining, or failing to maintain, such kinds of alliances.     

Look at Detroit: The United Auto Workers and the Battle to Organize Volkswagen in Chattanooga

ABSTRACT

On February 14, 2014, workers at Volkswagen’s new plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, voted 712 to 626 against being represented by the United Automobile Workers of America (UAW). The result capped one of the most high-profile organizing campaigns of recent years, with most media accounts anticipating a UAW victory, especially as VW had declared that it would not oppose the union. The VW election is also now attracting scholarly interest, with accounts stressing the role of external opposition – especially from conservative politicians and lobby groups – along with the UAW’s over-reliance on partnerships with German actors. Providing a detailed analysis of the campaign, this article recognizes the importance of these factors, but also argues that an important role was played by the UAW’s strong association with the domestic automakers, and especially with Detroit, their historic base. Citing the fact that foreign automakers had expanded since the 1980s while the domestics had contracted, opponents effectively linked the UAW with economic decline. These arguments swayed many workers. Placing the VW story within the broader struggle of the UAW to organize a foreign-owned auto plant, the article also stresses structural obstacles, especially the location of Greenfield plants in areas of low union density.     

The agroecological revolution in Latin America: rescuing nature,ensuring food sovereignty and empowering peasants

This paper provides an overview of what we call ‘agroecological revolution’ in Latin America. As the expansion of agroexports and biofuels continues unfolding in Latin America and warming the planet, the concepts of food sovereignty and agroecology-based agricultural production gain increasing attention. New approaches and technologies involving the application of blended agroecological science and indigenous knowledge systems are being spearheaded by a significant number of peasants, NGOs and some government and academic institutions, and they are proving to enhance food security while conserving natural resources, and empowering local, regional and national peasant organizations and movements. An assessment of various grassroots initiatives in Latin America reveals that the application of the agroecological paradigm can bring significant environmental, economic and political benefits to small farmers and rural communities as well as urban populations in the region. The trajectory of the agroecological movements in Brazil, the Andean region, Mexico, Central America and Cuba and their potential to promote broad-based and sustainable agrarian and social change is briefly presented and examined. We argue that an emerging threefold ‘agroecological revolution’, namely, epistemological, technical and social, is creating new and unexpected changes directed at restoring local self-reliance, conserving and regenerating natural resource agrobiodiversity, producing healthy foods with low inputs, and empowering peasant organizations. These changes directly challenge neoliberal modernization policies based on agribusiness and agroexports while opening new political roads for Latin American agrarian societies.