Remembering Selena, re-membering latinidad

Theatre Journal

Volumn 54, Issue 1, 2002, Pages 63-84

  Paredez, Deborah ^a,b  

^a NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^b VASSAR COLLEGE   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 67650433714     PISSN: 01922882     EISSN: 1086332X     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/tj.2002.0024     Document Type: Article

References (60)

1. For more on the various attempts to theorize latinidad see: Frances R. Aparicio and Susana Chávez-Silverman, ed., Tropicalizations: Transcultural Representations of Latinidad (Hanover: University of New England Press, 1997);
2. William V. Flores and Rina Benmayor, ed., Latino Cultural Citizenship: Claiming Identity, Space and Rights (Boston: Beacon Press, 1997);
3. Nilda Flores-González, "The Racialization of Latinos: The Meaning of Latina/o Identity for the Second Generation," Latino Studies Journal 10.3 (1999): 3-31;
4. and Felix Padilla, Latino Ethnic Consciousness: The Case of Mexican Americans and Puerto Ricans in Chicago (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1995). Scholars in theatre, performance, and film studies have also produced nuanced analyses of latinidad in relation to cultural production.
5. See for example: José Estaban Muñoz, "Feeling Brown: Ethnicity and Affect in Ricardo Bracho's The Sweetest Hangover (and Other STDs)," Theatre Journal 52 (2000): 67-80;
6. Jennifer Negrón-Muntaner, "Jennifer's Butt," Aztlán 22.2 (1997): 181-95;
7. and David Román, "Latino Performance and Identity," Aztlán 22.2 (1997): 151-70.
8. As Jennifer Lopez's career, which skyrocketed following her portrayal of Selena in Gregory Nava's 1997 biopic Selena, demonstrates, despite ahistorical mainstream accounts that suggest otherwise, this was not the first Latin music explosion that marked the century. See, for example, John Storm Roberts, The Latin Tinge: The Impact of Latin American Music on the United States (New York: Oxford University Press, 1979).
9. For more on the political economic implications of Tejano music see Manuel Peña, Música Tejana: The Cultural Economy of Artistic Transformation (College Station: Texas A & M Press, 1999).
10. For nuanced analyses that explore the ways in which Selena operated within this context, see: Raúl Coronado, Jr., "Selena's Good Buy: Texas Mexicans, History, y Selena Meet Transnational Capitalism," Aztlán 26.1 (2001): 59-100;
11. and Deborah R. Vargas, "Cruzando Frontejas: Remapping Selena's Tejano Music Crossover," Changing Chicana Traditions, ed. Norma Cantú and Olga Nájera-Ramírez (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, In Press).
12. A few notable examples of this trend include: Michelle Habell-Pallán, "El Vez is 'Taking Care of Business': The Inter/national Appeal of Chicano Popular Music," Cultural Studies 13.2 (1999): 195-210;
13. Michelle Habell-Pallán and Mary Romero, ed., Latina/o Popular Culture (New York: New York University Press, In Press);
14. José E. Muñoz's work on Pedro Zamora in Disidentifications: Queers of Color and the Performance of Politics (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999);
15. José Quiroga's discussion of Ricky Martin in Tropics of Desire (New York: New York University Press, 2001);
16. David Román, "Latino Geneologies: Broadway and Beyond, the Case of John Leguizamo" in an unpublished manuscript from his book-in-progress on contemporary American theatre;
17. Alberto Sandoval-Sanchez, José Can You See?: Latinos On and Off Broadway (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1999).
18. Joseph Roach, Cities of the Dead: Circum-Atlantic Performance (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 33.
19. Adrien Kear and Deborah Lynn Steinberg, "Ghost Writing" in Mourning Diana: Nation, Culture and the Performance of Grief, ed. Kear and Steinberg (London: Routledge, 1999), 6.
20. Roach, Cities, 35.
21. I borrow the term "new nativism" from Juan Perea and George Sánchez. See Juan Perea, ed., Immigrants Out: The New Nativism and the Anti-Immigrant Impulse in the US (New York: New York University Press, 1999)
22. and George Sánchez, "Face the Nation: Race, Immigration, and the Rise of Nativism in Late Twentieth Century America," International Migration Review 31 (1997): 1009-30.
23. As the countless news articles on the 2000 Census projections and findings report, the Latina/o population surpassed projected figures and now constitute the fastest growing minority in the nation. This deluge of analysis points to the ways in which the 2000 Census constitutes an important indicator of how Latina/os have re-configured and are continuing to reshape national discourses on race and ethnicity. See, for example, Juan Andrade, "Latino Population Boom Shakes Up Entire Country," Chicago Sun-Times, 1 July 2001, late sports final ed., 35;
24. William Booth, "California Minorities Are Now the Majority;
25. Non-Hispanic Whites Dip Below 50%," The Washington Post, 31 August 2000, final ed., A01;
26. Tom Gorman, "California and the West: A Tripling of the Number of Latinos Led the Increase," Los Angeles Times, 14 March 2000, 3;
27. Greg Johnson, "Gaining Insight Into the Latino Middle Class," Los Angeles Times, 11 June 2001, 1;
28. Georgia Pabst, "Census Data Show Impact for Latinos," Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 16 July 2001, final ed., 6A;
29. Lori Rodriguez, "The Census: Big Gains for Latinos in Census," The Houston Chronicle, 11 March 2001, Al;
30. Richard Simon, "Presidential Candidates are Courting Voters in the Wake of Census Figures that Predict Latinos Will Soon Be the Largest Minority Group," Los Angeles Times, 18 September 1999, 12.
31. Jill Dolan, "Geographies of Learning: Theatre Studies, Performance, and the 'Performative,'" Theatre Journal 45 (1993): 421.
32. Bill Hewitt, Joseph Harmes, and Bob Stewart, "Before Her Time," People Weekly, 17 August 1995, 48-53.
33. Joe Nick Patoski, "The Queen is Dead," Texas Monthly, May 1995, 110.
34. David Hinckley, "Stern Heats Up Mexican Tempers," Daily News, 6 April 1995, 102;
35. and María Celeste Arraras, Selena's Secret (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1997), 24.
36. Hinckley, "Stern," 102.
37. In his discussion about Princess Diana, Johnson notes that the conscious decision to "not mourn" Diana is equally fraught with politicized implications as the decision to mourn the princess. Richard Johnson, "Exemplary Differences: Mourning (and Not Mourning) a Princess," in Mourning Diana: Nation, Culture and the Performance of Grief, ed. Adrien Kear and Deborah Lynn Steinberg (London: Routledge, 1999), 15-39.
38. Diana Taylor, "Downloading Grief: Minority Populations Mourn Diana," in Mourning Diana, 198.
39. Indeed, it is important to note that Stern issued his statement just 24 hours before Senator Alfonse D'Amato (R-NY) parodied Judge Lance Ito on Don Imus's nationally syndicated morning radio show. Critical of Judge Ito's handling of the O.J. Simpson trial, D'Amato launched into a fake Japanese accent, despite the fact that Judge Ito does not speak with one, proclaiming: "Judge Ito will never let it end. Judge Ito loves the limelight. He is making a disgrace of the judicial system, little Judge Ito." See Lois Romano, "The Reliable Source," The Washington Post, 6 April 1995, final ed., B03. Considered alongside D'Amato's performance of yellow-face, Stern's performance of "not mourning" Selena underscores the ways in which Selena's discursive body was often evoked to police the body politic.
40. See "Forever Selena: Census 2000," .
41. Larry Rohter, "A Legend Grows, and So Does an Industry," New York Times, 12 January 1997, H39. Emphasis added.
42. See, for example, Ana Castillo, "Selena Aside," The Nation, 29 May 1995, 764-66;
43. Sarah Kerr, "Selena's Siren Song," The New Yorker, 30 October 1995, 35-36;
44. Joe Nick Patoski, "The Queen is Dead";
45. and Ilan Stavans, "Dreaming of You," The New Republic, 20 November 1995, 24-25.
46. Rhoter, "A Legend," H39. Emphasis added.
47. Muñoz writes, "From the vantage point of [the "official"] national affect code, Latino affect appears over the top and excessive . The 'failure' of Latino affect, in relation to the hegemonic protocols of North American affective comportment, revolves around an understanding of the Latina or the Latino as affective excess." José Estaban Muñoz, "Feeling Brown," Theatre Journal 52 (2000): 70.
48. Jennifer Willis and Alberto Gonzalez, "Reconceptualizing Gender Through Dialogue: The Case of the Tex-Mex Madonna," Women and Language 20 (1997): 9-12.
49. Ellen Bernstein, "Selena Forever Performers Prepare for Opening Night," Corpus Christi Caller-Times, 12 March 2000.
50. Ellen Bernstein, "Selena's Tragic Life Headed to the Stage," Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 18 October 1999, 2. This promotional rhetoric proved effective, at least in part. A review of the production in the Chicago Sun-Times proclaimed, "Representing the American dream, Selena serves as every immigrant's story. No matter what nationality, anyone can identify with her triumph and ultimate tragedy." Laura Emerick, "Selena Forever," Chicago Sun-Times, 28 April 2000, final ed., 44. Ironically, in the attempt to ally Selena with the American dream, the review positions her alongside "every immigrant" ignoring the fact that both she and her parents were born and raised in the United States.
51. Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez, "An Eternal Star Shines 'Forever,'" Los Angeles Times, 25 March 2000, F1.
52. Ricardo Baca, "Forever a Local Legend," Corpus Christi Caller-Times, 21 March 2000.
53. Nina Garin, "When 'Forever' Isn't," San Diego Union-Tribune, 23 May 2000, E1.
54. The Los Angeles Times noted, "Selena has assumed a symbolic importance greater than most commercial productions in Los Angeles, for it is the first production at the Doolittle since the Ricardo Montalban Nosotros Foundation bought the theater last year with the intent of converting it into a Latino-oriented performing arts center." Don Shirley, "Selena Producers Upbeat Despite Losses," Los Angeles Times, 13 June 2001, F1.
55. Deborah Martin, "Outfits Based on Selena's Design Sketches," San Antonio Express News on the Web, 21 March 2000, . In addition to her formidable talents as a performer, Selena was also an aspiring designer who had launched her own design line before she died.
56. Laura Emerick, "New Stage Musical Revisits Singer's Life," Chicago Sun-Times, 21 April 2000, Weekend Plus section, 9.
57. For more on the zoot suit as an emblem of resistance, see: Douglas Henry Daniels, "Los Angeles Zoot: Race 'Riot,' the Pachuco, and Black Music Culture," The Journal of Negro History 82 (1997): 201-21;
58. Maurizio Mazón, The Zoot-Suit Riots: The Psychology of Symbolic Annihilation (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1992);
59. Chon A. Noriega, "Fashion Crimes: Chicano Identity and Clothing," Aztlán 26 (2001): 1-12.
60. Julio Martinez, "Selena Returns in Patchy New Musical," Los Angeles Times, 24 April 2001, Fl.