Strange Pilgrimages: Exile, Travel, and National Identity in Latin America, 1800D1990s(Jaguar Books on Latin America)

This fascinating collection of essays and articles shows how Latin Americans travels and residency abroad helped them re-examine their own origins and perceptions of their homeland. Latin Americans traveled both purposefully and frequently in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Strange Pilgrimages reveals their experiences in Europe and the United States, and explores their power to shape opinions and bring outside influence back to Latin America. This new book analyzes Latin Americans; longstanding attraction to and interest in other cultures as barometers of their own progress. In addition, Strange Pilgrimages examines the invention of tradition, cultural practice, and identity formation among nation-states. A combination of articles and primary sources provides readers with both informed analysis of the experiences of Latin American travellers and entertaining first-hand accounts from the travellers and exiles themselves. These travellers were a diverse group that included artists, diplomats, political exiles, athletes, dilettantes, and more. Readers will learn that Latin Americans came to understand their homelands better and in fact helped to define their own countries; identities through their experiences traveling and living abroad.

Table of Contents:
Chapter 1 Introduction: National Identity Formation in an International Context Part 2 I Constructing Nations after Independence and Beyond Chapter 3 Nature and Mother: Foreign Residence and the Evolution of Andrés Bello's American Identity, London, 1810–1829 Chapter 4 Extract of a Letter to Señor Don Vicente Azuero, New York, January 19, 1832 Chapter 5 Brazilians in France, 1822–1872: Doubly Outsiders Chapter 6 "The More I See, the More Surprised I Am:" Ramón de la Sagra, Baltimore, and the Concepts of Race and Poverty Chapter 7 Intellectuals, Indians, and the Press: The Politicization of Justo Sierra O'Reilly's Journalism and Views on the Maya while in the United States Part 8 II Touring Modernity Chapter 9 The Lure of Paris Chapter 10 Frou-Frous or Feminists? Turn-of-the-Century Paris and the Latin American Women Chapter 11 The Impact of Imported Sports on the Popular Culture of Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century Mexico and Central America Chapter 12 (En)Gendering Cultural Formations: The Crossings of Amanda Labarca between Chile and the United States Part 13 III Taking Sides Chapter 14 Latin Americans in Paris in the 1920s: The Anti-Imperialist Struggle of the General Association of Latin American Students, 1925-1933 Chapter 15 Encounter of Two Revolutions: Mexican Radical Elites in Communist Russia during the 1920s Chapter 16 Mexicans, Migrants, and Indigenous Peoples: The Work of Manuel Gamio in the United States, 1925–1927 Chapter 17 Guilt by Association: Jorge Eliécer Gaitán and the Legacy of His Studies in "Fascist" Italy Chapter 18 Between Crusade and Revolution: Two Argentines in Civil War Spain Chapter 19 Marriage by Pros and Cons: Love in a Time of European Exile Part 20 IV The Art of Living and Working Abroad Chapter 21 So Far From God, So Close to Hollywood: Dolores del Río and Lupe Vélez in Hollywood, 1925–1944 Chapter 22 To Be or Not to Be Brazilian? Carmen Miranda's Quest for Fame and "Authenticity" in the United States

Review :
An engaging, delightful, and informative collection of essays by and about Latin Americans who 'discover' Europe and North America. Beginning with Andrés Bello's nearly thirty-year exile in London and ending with Carmen Miranda's experiences in 1940s Hollywood, Strange Pilgrimages covers a lot of ground and covers it very well. This is truly an essential book for anyone interested in Latin American identity and its relationship to global culture. A unique collection of essays that explores hitherto unexamined terrain: not Latin America as the West's other, but the West as Latin America's other. These studies of Latin American travelers and Latin American exile communities furnish both scholars and students with a pioneering agenda of topics to further ponder and research. An essential book for anyone interested in Latin American identity and its relationship to global culture.