Rock Aesthetics in Colombian Literature and Culture: Writing the Noise(Music, Culture, and Identity in Latin America)

Rock Aesthetics in Colombian Literature and Culture: Writing the Noise explores the presence of a rock aesthetic in the Colombian literary field and how its pivotal role in creating alternative creative expressions that challenge the dominance of tropicality as the prevailing artistic reference. More than a musical genre or a cultural industry, rock is also an aesthetic: a significant social practice that allows one to understand what people consider beautiful or authentic. Since its birth in the mid-1950s, rock as an aesthetic has expanded worldwide, transforming and establishing dialogues with artistic practices such as literature. Through an analysis of a series of novels, poems, and manifestos written from the 1950s to the early years of the twenty-first century, David Marti´nez Houghton embarks on a literary, musical, and historical journey. On the way, he explores complex phenomena such as urban violence, the formation of youth identities, the penetration of pop culture, national identity discourses, and even the social and physical transformation of Colombian cities.

Table of Contents:
Part I: What Do We Mean by Rock Aesthetics? Chapter 1. Rock Aesthetics: More Than a Music Genre, More Than a Business Chapter 2. Rock as the Latin American Soundscape: From Music to Literature Part II: The Rock Aesthetic in Colombian Literature. Corpus Analysis Chapter 3. Nadaism: Rock Aesthetics in the Formation of the Literary Field in Colombia Chapter 4. To Die Before Growing Old: Rock Aesthetics in the Work of Andrés Caicedo Chapter 5. Rock Aesthetics as Resistance Against Death: The Punk Poetry of Giovanny Oquendo Chapter 6. Rock Aesthetics at the Turn of the Century in Colombia

About the Author :
David Martinez Houghton is professor at the Universidad del Norte, in Barranquilla, Colombia.

Review :
When people think about rock music there is still a privileging—for good reasons—of the music pioneered in the United States and Great Britain, influenced from a collage of genres that include blues, country, and jazz. The 1950s witnessed rock music’s dissemination throughout Latin America, and by the 1960s, new artists cropped up in spaces such as Mexico, Chile, Argentina, and, of course, Colombia. While the Colombian rock music scene expanded and witnessed local productions going beyond cover songs, the region’s literary circles took to the pen to expressing new thoughts and critiques with rock music as their soundtrack. Rock Aesthetics in Colombian Literature and Culture: Writing the Noise allows readers an opportunity to see how Colombian literature in the latter half of the twentieth century evolves through rock music’s own progression and transformation in response to the country’s ongoing socio-political and economic tensions.