Motherhood, Mourning, Testimonio, and the Representation of Silenced Histories

Starting from Gayatri Spivak's seminal essay "Can the Subaltern Speak?" this dissertation examines the way in which Latin American testimonios allow subaltern voices to emerge. By expanding the genre beyond written texts, I explore the ways in which testimonio informs the visual art of women artists from the Americas and the Caribbean, and thus, informs subaltern representation. Fully cognizant of external pressures which impede and affect the construction of subjectivity, I use Winnicott's theoretical framework to demonstrate the connection between creativity, subaltern representation, and agency. By applying Winnicott's theories on transitional objects and potential spaces to Rigoberta Menchu's testimonio, Doris Salcedo's installations, Ana Mendieta's photographic performance pieces, Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons' video installations and performances, and Cristina Garcia's Dreaming in Cuban, I illustrate the various ways that these artists negotiated their subjectivities, claiming agency over their representation. Additionally, because trauma is a large part of testimonio, my dissertation-by analyzing the reception of I, Rigoberta Menchu: An Indian Woman in Guatemala-problematizes the concept of "Truth." If trauma, by its very nature, eludes articulation through language, how can "Truth" be measured and/or expected? And, importantly, how are memory and knowledge about these traumas constructed? By reading these artists' work through the framework of Abraham and Torok, this dissertation demonstrates how the body, silence, and absence are integral to understanding the unspeakable histories of subaltern communities.