Reviews

Borderlands / La Frontera by Gloria E. Anzaldúa

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keight's review against another edition

4.0

Borders are set up to define the places that are safe and unsafe, to distinguish us from them. A border is a dividing line, a narrow strip along a steep edge. A borderland is a vague and undetermined place created by the emotional residue of an unnatural boundary. It is in a constant state of transition. The prohibited and forbidden are its inhabitants.

One of those books I've been meaning to read for many years, Borderlands / La Frontera was a groundbreaking book when it was published in the late 1980s and the term "intersectionality" hadn't been coined yet. Today (hopefully) the concept of enmeshed oppressions is more familiar, though her framing of Mexico's history from an Aztlán perspective will likely be less so. In today's political climate, that view of the space where the US and Mexico meet is more important than ever, but that is not the only dividing line established here. Read more on my booklog

nottclaudiasboat's review against another edition

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5.0

Tengo tanto que decir sobre este libro que no sé ni por dónde empezar. La obra que ha escrito Gloria Anzaldúa es tan maravillosa que aún no entiendo cómo no he podido leerla antes (ni siquiera conocerla). Esta obra, que entra dentro del marco de la literatura postcolonial, trata sobre el significado de vivir en una frontera y ser chicana, es decir, una persona de origen mexicano que vive en Estados Unidos (a lo que ella hace referencia como "border woman"). Lo que supone todo esto es sentir que no se pertenece a ninguno de los dos países.

Respecto a mi opinión, no solo ha sido increíble leer las experiencias de la autora, sino la capacidad que tiene para acercar su cultura a los lectores. En cada una de las páginas de este libro se trata la cultura chicana y me he sentido cautivada por cada una de ellas. Es más, siento que tras leer este libro, conozco tan solo una mínima parte de esta cultura (de la que estoy deseando leer más en profundidad).

Por otra parte, el libro me ha parecido "mind-blowing" en el sentido de que me ha hecho dudar sobre todas las concepciones del mundo que poseo, sobre todo aquellas que la sociedad me ha inculcado. Es increíble lo mucho que no sabemos de otras culturas; en particular, todo lo que desconocemos acerca del sufrimiento que otros (en este sentido, los blancos) hemos causado. Tal y como dice Anzaldúa, "The dominant white culture is killing us slowly with its ignorance" (¡y cuánta razón tiene!).

Por ello, doy gracias por este libro y, en general, por todos aquellos que hacen que dudemos de todo lo aprendido e impuesto por la sociedad, sobre todo aquello relacionado con el feminismo, racismo e imperialismo.

No puedo acabar esta review sin mencionar estos versos del libro:
"This land was Mexican once,
was Indian always,
and is.
And will be again"

5/5⭐

livjohanna's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative reflective fast-paced

5.0

chaotic_abi's review against another edition

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reflective medium-paced

5.0

I remember reading some chapter of this book in high school and being enamored with it and the way Anzaldua writes. I'm so glad my college Spanish class assigned the first half. The two halves are very different, with the first sounding very academic and the second being all poems but I enjoyed both.

allisonjpmiller's review against another edition

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4.0

Never have I been more frustrated by the fact that I can only read patchwork phrases and individual words in Spanish! I so wish I were fluent so I could've read this entire book instead of only really digesting the parts in English. But what I was able to absorb was totally visceral and transfixing. I'm especially fascinated by how mestiza consciousness, the way Anzaldúa describes it, functions much like entropy in an open system—at least, that's the metaphor that kept coming into play for me while reading: breaking paradigms and worldviews and identities down to their essential parts and using those parts to create something new. Immediately bought [b:Light in the Dark/Luz en lo Oscuro: Rewriting Identity, Spirituality, Reality|23719169|Light in the Dark/Luz en lo Oscuro Rewriting Identity, Spirituality, Reality|Gloria E. Anzaldúa|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1429743093l/23719169._SX50_.jpg|43328769] because I want to dig deeper into some of these ideas.

jizellereads's review against another edition

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challenging informative

5.0

really eye-opening to the pedagogical thinking of post coloniality within the Latine community. as a texan chicana, i really needed to read this and was very moved by it.