Pliable facts and rigorous fictions: the cognitive persuasions of contemporary Latin American science fiction
According to literary critic Darko Suvin, science fiction demonstrates a “supposedly factual” approach to imagining new worlds. In Latin America, however, the factual basis of lived experience from which such fictions are crafted has not always been taken as a given. This essay shows how contemporar...
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Taylor & Francis Group
2024-12-01
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| Series: | Tapuya |
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| Online Access: | https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/10.1080/25729861.2024.2363100 |
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| author | Emily A. Maguire |
| author_facet | Emily A. Maguire |
| author_sort | Emily A. Maguire |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | According to literary critic Darko Suvin, science fiction demonstrates a “supposedly factual” approach to imagining new worlds. In Latin America, however, the factual basis of lived experience from which such fictions are crafted has not always been taken as a given. This essay shows how contemporary Latin American science fiction makes use of the tensions derived from the encounter between the pliable nature of fact and the supposed rigor of cognitive logic through an analysis of two contemporary texts from the Hispanophone Caribbean: Puerto Rican writer Pedro Cabiya’s (1971) novel Malas hierbas (2010) and Cuban director Arturo Infante’s (1977) film El viaje extraordinario de Celeste García (2018). A fragmented zombie tale whose narrator may or may not be a zombie, Malas hierbas explores the science of zombification even as it draws upon both folklore and the corpus of zombie literature and film. El viaje extraordinario engages the genre conventions of romantic comedy and the Cuban emigration film, using the familiar landscape of these genres in the story of a group of Cubans who are invited to visit a distant planet. Cabiya’s and Infante’s texts keep the reader or spectator suspended in the liminal zone where truth is an open-ended series of multiple possibilities. As they reveal the constructed nature of facts and the narratives that support them, these texts illuminate the ways in which the possibilities around us are already the work of constructed fictions. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-239b6d2b3de24f5ba79b1139b09d378e |
| institution | OA Journals |
| issn | 2572-9861 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2024-12-01 |
| publisher | Taylor & Francis Group |
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| series | Tapuya |
| spelling | doaj-art-239b6d2b3de24f5ba79b1139b09d378e2025-08-20T02:29:59ZengTaylor & Francis GroupTapuya2572-98612024-12-017110.1080/25729861.2024.2363100Pliable facts and rigorous fictions: the cognitive persuasions of contemporary Latin American science fictionEmily A. Maguire0Department of Spanish and Portuguese, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USAAccording to literary critic Darko Suvin, science fiction demonstrates a “supposedly factual” approach to imagining new worlds. In Latin America, however, the factual basis of lived experience from which such fictions are crafted has not always been taken as a given. This essay shows how contemporary Latin American science fiction makes use of the tensions derived from the encounter between the pliable nature of fact and the supposed rigor of cognitive logic through an analysis of two contemporary texts from the Hispanophone Caribbean: Puerto Rican writer Pedro Cabiya’s (1971) novel Malas hierbas (2010) and Cuban director Arturo Infante’s (1977) film El viaje extraordinario de Celeste García (2018). A fragmented zombie tale whose narrator may or may not be a zombie, Malas hierbas explores the science of zombification even as it draws upon both folklore and the corpus of zombie literature and film. El viaje extraordinario engages the genre conventions of romantic comedy and the Cuban emigration film, using the familiar landscape of these genres in the story of a group of Cubans who are invited to visit a distant planet. Cabiya’s and Infante’s texts keep the reader or spectator suspended in the liminal zone where truth is an open-ended series of multiple possibilities. As they reveal the constructed nature of facts and the narratives that support them, these texts illuminate the ways in which the possibilities around us are already the work of constructed fictions.https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/10.1080/25729861.2024.2363100Factfictionscience fictionCaribbeanPedro CabiyaArturo Infante |
| spellingShingle | Emily A. Maguire Pliable facts and rigorous fictions: the cognitive persuasions of contemporary Latin American science fiction Tapuya Fact fiction science fiction Caribbean Pedro Cabiya Arturo Infante |
| title | Pliable facts and rigorous fictions: the cognitive persuasions of contemporary Latin American science fiction |
| title_full | Pliable facts and rigorous fictions: the cognitive persuasions of contemporary Latin American science fiction |
| title_fullStr | Pliable facts and rigorous fictions: the cognitive persuasions of contemporary Latin American science fiction |
| title_full_unstemmed | Pliable facts and rigorous fictions: the cognitive persuasions of contemporary Latin American science fiction |
| title_short | Pliable facts and rigorous fictions: the cognitive persuasions of contemporary Latin American science fiction |
| title_sort | pliable facts and rigorous fictions the cognitive persuasions of contemporary latin american science fiction |
| topic | Fact fiction science fiction Caribbean Pedro Cabiya Arturo Infante |
| url | https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/10.1080/25729861.2024.2363100 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT emilyamaguire pliablefactsandrigorousfictionsthecognitivepersuasionsofcontemporarylatinamericansciencefiction |