SAN ANTONIO, TX – The 11th sesquiannual El Mundo Zurdo conference is set for Nov. 6 through 8 at Trinity University in San Antonio. The conference – a collaboration between the Society for the Study of Gloria Anzaldúa (SSGA), Trinity University, and The University of Texas-San Antonio – aims to engage participants in the theme, “Hope Sin Fronteras: Reclaiming Fluidity, Empowering our Communities, and Enacting Resistance.”
The goal of the conference – which reflects la facultad Anzaldúa described in “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” – is to foment resistance and resilience to make sense of the current hostile political moment. This exploration of Anzaldúa’s vision, El Mundo Zurdo, cultivates a place for scholars, students, artists, and community members to both study and embody her activist legacy through sessions, workshops, roundtables, and panels.
The Society for the Study of Gloria Anzaldúa (SSGA) – which was founded by Dr. Norma E. Cantú, Norine R. and T. Frank Murchison Professor of the Humanities at Trinity University – has honored Anzaldúa’s legacy every 18 months since 2007. Trinity University has hosted the gathering since 2017.
Conference attendees are invited to an opening reception at Galeria E.V.A. at 3412 Floreson Thursday, Nov. 6 from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Featured sessions begin Friday morning.
Sessions
The program consists of six breakout sessions with over 40 panels, workshops, roundtables, or performances by over 150 scholars. Three featured sessions highlight the theme of the conference.
The first featured session, Anzaldúan Genres of Dissent and World-Building: Interweaving Creative and Critical Modes for Thinking Beyond Survival, kicks off the conference on Friday, Nov. 7 at 8:30 a.m. (Parker Chapel). Featuring Brenda Sendejo, Samantha Ceballos, Jackie Cuevas, and Anel Flores, this panel will model Anzaldúa’s technique of using multiple genres –autohistoria-teoría, poetry, creative non-fiction, visual arte, and mixed genres – to produce counternarratives of Chicana feminist thinking to share what it looks like to enact “hope sin fronteras.” The panel will explore intersecting themes such as embracing the significance of spiritual activism, theorizing through next generation borderlands poetry, haciendo caras in/outside the academy, and building queer and transgender arts communities.
The second session is scheduled for Friday, Nov. 7 at 5:00 p.m. in Parker Chapel. Titled Las Cartas Piscis: Comunologando En Este Momento De Arrebato Nacional Y Mundial, this performance by Inés Hernández-Ávila and Yvette G. Flores will showcase a set of “Communologues” that emerge from Gloria Anzaldúa’s “path to conocimiento.” Drawn from a book idea between Avila and Flores, Cartas was inspired by one of Anzaldúa’s essays. While the book was never completed, the writers have been talking since then about the collection of cartas with the title “Las Cartas Piscis.” Both Pisces, they have had a practice of writing to each other about life. This will be their first performance based on the exchanged letters.
The conference closes Saturday, Nov. 8 at 2:00 p.m. in Northrup Hall 040 with “Anzaldúan Dancing Rhythms: Malinche Moves,” which will situate and analyze the choreography and music of a dance piece titled “La Maldición de la Malinche,” by Ballet Nepantla. Andrea Guajardo will provide the history and context for the dance piece and the larger ballet program, “Nacimiento.”
Guajardo will speak on the history of the birth of the mestizaje and explore the emergence of Christianity and Christmas in the New World, pre-Hispanic rituals, the impact of colonization on the Americas, and the festive nature of present-day Christmas traditions celebrated in Greater Mexico.
Aída Hurtado will apply mestiza consciousness to theorize the piece and the role of La Malinche as a bridge between colonizer and the colonized.
Rachel Yvonne Cruz will deconstruct Amparo Ochoa’s rendition of “La Maldición de Malinche” as to composition, lyrics, and accompanying movement in the performance that mirrors and challenges colonization, internalized oppression, and betrayal.
From the Conference Literature:
We acknowledge the land we are on, Yanaguana, named for the life-giving waters of the San Antonio River.
Indigenous peoples have lived in and been caretakers of this area for approximately ten thousand years, and this long, rich history deserves telling. We pay respect and gratitude to the elders past and present and future, and the Indigenous people here today–especially in Texas, as it has the fourth largest population of American Indians in the United States.
We recognize Yanaguana has been protected by the Tap Pilam Coahuiltecan Nation and the Esto’k Gna/Carrizo-Comecrudo Nation. We recognize the region is also home to the Payaya, Coahuilteca, Lipan Apache, and Comanche, as well as other diasporic peoples from Mexico, the Southern Plains, and the Eastern United States.
We acknowledge the physical and cultural violence of colonialism as well as the vast contributions of Indigenous people to San Antonio. As Anzaldúistas, we commit to decolonial work and to accountability, dialogue, and collaboration that honors the Indigenous ancestry of this land and its inhabitants.
We pledge to learn about and act in solidarity with Indigenous struggles for social justice.
Artwork
The image for the 11th El Mundo Zurdo conference was designed by Salt Lake City-based Latina artist, Miriam Flores (miriamfloresdesign.com.) She drew inspiration from two deities: Chalchiuhtlicue, She of the Jade Skirt who represents water and fertility; and Naguala, The Shapeshifter referenced by Anzaldúa as a symbol of hybridity and resilience.
Flores set the deities before a “wall” transforming itself into butterflies as a way to reflect a challenge to borders. The waves in the foreground symbolize the power in fluidity.
Registration: elmundozurdo.wordpress.com
