Introduction: Latin-American Critical Cultural Studies

M.L. PARDO

Discourses of the developing world. Researching problems, complexities and aspirations

Routledge. Taylor and Francis Group.

Lugar: Oxford; Año: 2014;

The chapter reflects on modernity, postmodernity, and academic life.  Modern and postmodern culture affect our everyday lives, and, consequently, the way in which we go about our research and approach both fieldwork and ethnographic enquiry. We must therefore reconsider our roots as discourse scholars, as well as the role of globalization and neoliberalism and their impact on our continent. The critical analysis of extreme poverty discourse carried out by a network of Latin American academics is discussed, focusing on the cultural challenges it poses to team members. The place of cultural studies in the neoliberal cultural model must be continually re-examined, exploring avenues for resistance to homogenization. Cultural resistance cannot be reduced to a set of practices functional to globalization: it should seek new horizons and look for alternative ways of contesting colonial Westernization even from within the cultural system of late capitalism.