This collection of essays interrogates the most contested social, political, and aesthetic concept in Chicana/o cultural studies—resistance.
If Chicana/o culture was born of resistance amid assimilation and nationalistic forces, how has it evolved into the twenty-first century? This groundbreaking volume redresses the central idea of resistance in Chicana/o visual cultural expression through nine clustered discussions, each coordinating scholarly, critical, curatorial, and historical contextualizations alongside artist statements and interviews. Landmark artistic works—illustrations, paintings, sculpture, photography, film, and television—anchor each section. Contributors include David Avalos, Mel Casas, Ester Hernandez, Nicholas Herrera, Luis Jimenez, Ellen Landis, Yolanda Lopez, Richard Lou, Delilah Montoya, Laura Perez, Lourdes Portillo, Luis Tapia, Chuy Trevino, Willie Varela, Kathy Vargas, Rene Yanez, Yvonne Yarbro-Bejarano, and more. Cara a cara, face-to-face, encounters across the collection reveal the varied richness of resistant strategies,movidas, as they position crucial terms of debate surrounding resistance, including subversion, oppression, affirmation, and identification.
The essays in the collection represent a wide array of perspectives on Chicana/o visual culture. Editors Scott L. Baugh and Victor A. Sorell have curated a dialog among the many voices, creating an important new volume that redefines the role of resistance in Chicana/o visual arts and cultural expression.
