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Cinematographic and Literary Representations of the Femicides in Ciudad Juarez

Arellano-neri, Olimpia
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1368013240

Abstract Details

2013, PhD, University of Cincinnati, Arts and Sciences: Romance Languages and Literatures.
In the border city of Ciudad Juarez, from 1993 to 2008, around 450 women (the exact number is unknown) were brutally murdered or simply disappeared in mysterious circumstances. Although the femicides have not stopped as of yet, the various patterns that characterized the femicides during this period have recently been overshadowed by a different type of murder which involves both men and women and which seems to occur during the daylight and in more public places. The large number of femicides has attracted international attention from groups ranging from human rights associations to individual authors working in different literary genres. The femicides and all the social conflicts that have been linked to them have yielded a vast production of literary and cinematographic pieces which attempt to represent the murders and the circumstances under which they took place. In this dissertation, six documentaries Senorita extraviada (2001), The City of Lost Girls (2003), The City of Dead Women (2005), Bajo Juarez (2006), On the Edge (2006), and Silencio en Juarez (2008); three fiction films Espejo retrovisor (2002), Bordertown (2006), and Traspatio (2009); and three novels Desert Blood (2005), 2666 (2004), and Las muertas de Ciudad Juarez: El caso de Elizabeth Castro Garcia y Abdel Latif Sharif Sharif (1999) are analyzed and compared. The ability of writers and filmmakers to use textual, aural and visual elements to reproduce the likeness of the reality before them is assessed, as well as the strategies employed to compel us to believe that that reality is indeed re-presented before us objectively. The comparison of the representation of the victims aims to answer two questions: whether or not an objective depiction of victims can be achieved without compromising their identity and individual value as human beings, and whether or not these femicides can be represented in a way that neither over-emphasizes nor ignores the implied violence or the socio-political circumstances under which these crimes happened. At the same time, comparison of the plots serves to answer another key question, namely that of the perceived causes of the femicides.
Nicasio Urbina, Ph.D. (Committee Chair)
Therese Migraine-George, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Maria Moreno, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
242 p.
Latin American Literature
femicides; Ciudad Juarez, Mexico; mimetic representations; Riffaterre; feminist theory; irony;

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Arellano-neri, O. (2013). Cinematographic and Literary Representations of the Femicides in Ciudad Juarez [Doctoral dissertation, University of Cincinnati]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1368013240

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Arellano-neri, Olimpia. Cinematographic and Literary Representations of the Femicides in Ciudad Juarez. 2013. University of Cincinnati, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1368013240.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Arellano-neri, Olimpia. "Cinematographic and Literary Representations of the Femicides in Ciudad Juarez." Doctoral dissertation, University of Cincinnati, 2013. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1368013240

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

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This open access ETD is published by University of Cincinnati and OhioLINK.