The Western Hemisphere through the Eyes of Latin Americanists: Contending Historiographies in the Study of Hemispheric Relations, 1898-2012

JUAN PABLO SCARFI

San Juan

Congreso; American Studies Association, Annual Meeting, 2012, Dimensions of Empire and Resistance; 2012

American Studies Association (ASA)

In this presentation, I will attempt to trace a genealogy of the geopolitical and historiographical imaginaries of inter-American hemispheric relations in the modern period since the rise of the U.S. as a hemispheric power by 1898 up to the present, focusing on the historical evolution of the status of Latin America in the Western Hemisphere. The argument I seek to put forward could be synthesized as follows: the unsettled and contradictory place and status of Latin America in the Western Hemisphere has shaped the ways in which Latin Americans and Latin Americanists have studied hemispheric relations, developing thus contending historiographical and interpretative traditions. The ambivalent reaction of Latin America towards U.S. growing ascendancy in the modern period since 1898 is at the heart of that contradiction. In other words, Latin American Studies as a field and inter-American studies as practiced by Latin Americanists has been significantly influenced by an attempt to explore and understand the threats that U.S. ascendancy entailed for Latin America. It is not coincidence that most of the canonical thinkers and writers that epitomized Latin Americanism, such as Simón Bolívar, José Martí, José Enrique Rodó, Rubén Darío, Francisco García Calderón, were sceptic and defensive towards U.S. culture and traditions. This cultural and historiographical legacy is still very influential, for when in recent years a series of academic programs on hemispheric studies and all sorts of Institutes of the Americas began to be created in an evident move towards hemispheric and Atlantic historical studies, there was an important resistance from almost the entire community of Latin Americanists in the U.S. and in Europe to include the U.S. in the study of Latin America.