{"product_id":"catastrophic-historicism-ronald-mendoza-de-jess-9781531505646","title":"Catastrophic Historicism: Reading Julia de Burgos Dangerously","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eCatastrophic Historicism\u003c\/i\u003e unsettles the historicist constitution of Julia de Burgos (1914-53), Puerto Rico's most iconic writer--a critical task that necessitates redefining the concept of historicism. Through readings of Aristotle, Walter Benjamin, Jacques Derrida, Werner Hamacher, and Frank Ankersmit, Mendoza-de Jes俍 shows that historicism grounds historical objectivity in the historian's capacity to compose totalizing narratives that domesticate the contingency of the past. While critiques of historicism as a realism leave untouched the sovereignty of the historian, the book insists that \u003ci\u003ereading\u003c\/i\u003e the text of history requires an attunement to \u003ci\u003edanger\u003c\/i\u003e--a modality that interrupts historicism by infusing the past with a contingency that evades total appropriation. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eAfter desedimenting the monumental tradition that has reduced de Burgos to a totemic figure, \u003ci\u003eCatastrophic Historicism \u003c\/i\u003ereads the poet's first collection, \u003ci\u003ePoema en 20 surcos\u003c\/i\u003e (1938). Mendoza-de Jes俍 argues that the historicity of \u003ci\u003ePoema\u003c\/i\u003e crystallizes in the lyrical speaker's self-institution as an embodied ipseity, which requires producing racialized\/gendered allegorical figures--the bearers of an abject flesh--that lack any ontological resistance to modern alienation. Rather than treating de Burgos's poetics of selfhood as the ideal image of Puerto Rican sovereignty, Mendoza-de Jes俍 endangers this idealization by drawing attention to the abjection that sustains our attachments to ipseity as the form of a truly sovereign life. In this way, \u003ci\u003eCatastrophic Historicism\u003c\/i\u003e not only resets the terms of ongoing critiques of historicism in the humanities--it also intervenes in Puerto Rican historicity for the sake of its transformation.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Ronald Mendoza-de Jes俍\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 1531505643\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781531505646\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Fordham University Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 01\/02\/2024\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 272\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.12lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.78d","brand":"Ronald Mendoza-de Jes俍","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":44652287918335,"sku":"9781531505646","price":32.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_fa8fea5a-dc54-4359-b8e9-85e1e3a84f80.jpg?v=1704215406","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/catastrophic-historicism-ronald-mendoza-de-jess-9781531505646","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}