I explain in this blog my reaction to the readings of the week: \u201cIn Search of a New Topography\u201d by Guillermo G\u00f3mez-Pe\u00f1a; \u201cThe Hollywood Latina Body as Site of Social Struggle: Media Cinstructions of Stardom and Jennifer Lopez\u2019s Cross-Over Butt\u2019\u201d by Mary C. Beltr\u00e1n; and \u201cThe Embodiment of Salsa: Musicians, instruments and the Performance of a Latin Style and Identity\u201d by Patria Rom\u00e1n-Vel\u00e1zquez.<\/p>\n
G\u00f3mez-Pe\u00f1a\u2019s text deals with the Mexican revolutionary group of the 90s called the Zapatistas, and more precisely with its leader, the so-called Subcomandante Marcos. The extract explains that Marcos initially won popularity by trying to be a popular culture phenomenon: he used slang, references to urban culture and pop culture, theatrical performance\u2026 But he eventually lost this popularity: people simply got tired of his character with time, as if he was a pop star instead of a guerillero.<\/p>\n
Beltr\u00e1n\u2019s text focuses on the fact that in the late 1990s, most of the popular attention devoted to Latina star Jennifer Lopez was centered around the shape of her butt. From this rather unconventional starting point, the author tries to develop an argumentation about how this could illustrate a media system that is still uncomfortable with promoting the body shape of non-white women or, to the contrary, an industry that continues to use and to extrapolate stereotypes from other ethnicities.<\/p>\n
The last text, by Patria Rom\u00e1n-Vel\u00e1zquez, is centered around the theme of salsa, a Latin dance\/music that the author of the essay uses to reflect on ethnicity and culture. By taking the example of Salsa musicians who are not Latin and who play in London, the essay states that, though we consider salsa to be a pure element of Latin America popular culture, musicians from other backgrounds can learn it but, due to the differences in places, they will play it slightly differently: one does not need to be Latin to play Salsa but according to the place of learning the result will differ (not that there is a more authentic way, warns the writer). Additionally, salsa bands in English-speaking countries note the constrains imposed by the industry: to remain profitable, they have to cope with the expectations and the limited familiarity of their audience with this music. They must keep the Spanish lyrics fairly simple and restrain themselves to create a music to make people dance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I explain in this blog my reaction to the readings of the week: \u201cIn Search of a New Topography\u201d by Guillermo G\u00f3mez-Pe\u00f1a; \u201cThe Hollywood Latina Body as Site of Social Struggle: Media Cinstructions of Stardom and Jennifer Lopez\u2019s Cross-Over Butt\u2019\u201d by Mary C. Beltr\u00e1n; and \u201cThe Embodiment of Salsa: Musicians, instruments and the Performance of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48113,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2301628,2301166,2301362,2302959,2300807,2301800,2302455,2303062,2302299,2055538,57784,2300490,2302622,2300209,2302061],"class_list":["post-33","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dangerous-border-crossers-the-artist-talks-back","tag-guillermo-gomez-pena","tag-in-search-of-a-new-topography","tag-instruments-and-the-performance-of-a-latin-style-and-identity","tag-jennifer-lopez","tag-mary-c-beltran","tag-patria-roman-velazquez","tag-popular-music","tag-quarterly-review-of-film-and-video","tag-reaction-to-readings","tag-salsa","tag-subcomandante-marcos","tag-the-embodiment-of-salsa-musicians","tag-the-end-of-popular-culture","tag-the-hollywood-latina-body-as-site-of-social-struggle-media-constructions-of-stardom-and-jennifer-lopezs-cross-over-butt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/aledemeelast201\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/aledemeelast201\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/aledemeelast201\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/aledemeelast201\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48113"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/aledemeelast201\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/aledemeelast201\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/aledemeelast201\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33\/revisions\/34"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/aledemeelast201\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/aledemeelast201\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/aledemeelast201\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}