Benjamín Valdivia
University of Guanajuato (Mexico). E-mail: valdivia@ugto.mx
Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF
DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s0n4
Latin America has been defined as a land which has no other possibilities than its future. Since the historic times gave to this part of the world the fate of being oppressed, all its past was an expectancy of a self-consciousness in search of identity. ¿What are we if our language and traditions were sacked by cruel conquerors? We were, from there, a search for being ourselves.
In any place and time, protest expressions are a common way in the battling to attain power. In many forms, protest is linked to the arts, as they are privileged vehicle for making a stand in favor of a specific political position, or to support an opposition. Arts are, in this connection, used to be subsidiary for an ideology, a set of assumed principles, or a desideratum sustained by some social group. In the other side, arts are ambiguous, or abstract, and need some amount of interpretation. The hermeneutic process applied to arts must cover all gaps and suppositions to complete, almost always in a verbal way, the idea; or to precise with words any lack of sense. Direct declarations or obvious elements give place to pamphletary pieces, but artists accept these if they can establish with certainty a militant proposition. In that, poetry is the best way for a fusion of the abstract realm of musicality with the direct phrasing of politics. In that case, the result is a song, transmitting concepts, but with the empowering of sounds. Martial rhythms, or traditional schemes already adapted in the basis of culture, can be a good option for composers having this purpose.
In Latin America, protest is almost a way of life, due to political conflicts, war, invasion, and submission, are continuous experiences from past centuries to present. Some philosophers, as we established before, think Latin America as a world region having a serious search for identity, since each stage of its past seems to be a destruction of any possibility of feel the life as a normal property of human beings; and seems, too, an expulsion from its proper self. Because of this historical feeling of not belonging, Latin America has only one stage for self-recovery or redemption: the future. Colonial oppression is a principal item whenever we search for a definition appliable. But, at the same time, we recognize a constant trend inside the heart of Latin America: revolutionary expressions inviting to build a better future or claiming for a transformation in a self-affirming way. For all of this, one can understand why exists a variety of artistic Latin American expressions aligned in this profound path to build a better life. Its revolutionary songs and poetry intent to service for that…FULL TEXT PDF>>