Focusing on a period neglected by scholars, Higgins reconstructs how during the colonial period criollos - individuals identified as being of Spanish descent born in America - elaborated a body of knowledge, an "archive," in order to establish their intellectual autonomy within the Spanish colonial administrative structures." "This book opens up an important area of research that will be of interest to scholars and students of Spanish American colonial literature and history."--BOOK JACKET.

First Published in 2004. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Latin America has historically been a fertile ground where utopian projects, movements, and experiments could take root and thrive. Each of the thirteen authors in this collective volume address a particular case or specific aspect of Latin American utopianism from colonial times to the present day. The America that the Spanish and Portuguese discovered became, from the sixteenth century onwards, a space in which it was possible to imagine the widest variety of forms of human coexistence. Utopias in Latin America reconsiders the sense and understanding of utopias in various historical frames: the discovery of indigenous cultures and their natural environments; the foundation of new towns and cities in a vast colonial territory; the experimental communities of nineteenth-century utopian socialists and European exiled intellectuals; and the innovative formulae that attempts to get beyond twentieth-century capitalism.

Pedro Juan Gutieacute;rrez's bestselling novel, Dirty Havana Trilogy, was hugely acclaimed for its honest depiction of a Cuban capital characterized by sleaze, sex, poverty and hedonism. In The Insatiable Spider Man we see the return of its anti-hero, who is again prowling the streets of Havana. Pedro Juan's relationship with his wife, Julia, is in terminal decline. He can no longer bear kissing her on the mouth and the trappings of domestic bliss hold no charms for this most restless and predatory of men. Our narrator's interests lie elsewhere: in the infinite possibilities of a chaotic Caribbean city and many chancers, artists and prostitutes who roam the streets in search of fresh experience. Pedro Juan Gutieacute;rrez again takes the reader on a journey into the underbelly of contemporary Havana - a world of easy sex, hard drinking and humorous anecdotes, that will be all too recognizable to the Gutieacute;rrez connoisseur.

Spanning thirty years of writing, Making Waves traces the development of Mario Vargas Llosa's thinking on politics and culture, and shows the breadth of his interests and passions. Featured here are astute meditations on the Cuban Revolution, Latin American independence, and the terrorism of Peru's Shining Path; brilliant engagements with towering figures of literature like Joyce, Faulkner, and Sartre; considerations on the dog cemetery where Rin Tin Tin is buried, Lorena Bobbitt's knife, and the failures of the English public-school system.

Unlike a conventional war waged against a standing army, a "dirty war" is waged against individuals, groups, or ideas considered subversive. Originally associated with Argentina's military regime from 1976-1983, the term has since been applied to neighboring dictatorships during the period. Indeed, it has become a byword for state-sponsored repression anywhere in the world. The first edition of this reference illustrated the concept by describing the regimes of Argentina, Chile (1973-1990), and Uruguay (1973-1985), which tortured, murdered, and disappeared thousands of people in the name of anticommunism while thousands more were driven into exile. The second edition expands the scope to include Bolivia (1971-1982), Brazil (1964-1985), and Paraguay (1954-1989). Includes a chronology, an introductory essay, a bibliography, and over 400 cross-referenced dictionary entries on the countries; guerrilla and political movements; prominent guerrilla, human-rights, military, and political figures; local, regional, and international human-rights organizations; and artistic figures (filmmakers, novelists, and playwrights) whose works attempt to represent or resist the period of repression.--Publisher.