Contemporary U.S. Latinx Literature in Spanish by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783030025984
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

La frontera visible y Frontera invisible—The Visible and the Invisible Borders

These two sections are about the physical and metaphorical border: Mexico–United States. The narrator speaks of the border as a place of suffering by describing Ciudad Juárez as “el limbo, el purgatorio, el camino al infierno, el soñado paraíso o el camino hacia lo conocido o desconocido” (53). 32 The narrator describes the border space where you find fences, police officers, ‘coyotes,’ 33 homeless, and people trying to cross. Also, the narrator mentions the border as a bridge that connects transnational identities : “El puente une y desune: al inglés y al español, a padres e hijos, madres e hijas, hermanos y hermanas, amigos y enemigos” (54). 34 It is in this space that transfronterizo coexists with transborder creating new spaces and new practices within the Borderlands . Hatfield’s characters represent the people who try to cross these spaces every single day as a result of the precarious living conditions in Mexico and Latin America.

The crossroads of spaces mentioned are what allow the characters in the text to exchange ideologies and understand each other’s side of the border. Ana being born in El Paso, TX., taken to Mexico by her mother and then returning to the United States converts Ana into a transnational individual. In the La frontera visible section, Ana and her mother are in the middle of the bridge trying to go across knowing that only one of them has a U.S. passport. In that moment, Ana realizes, “Es en ese espacio en donde se puede ser sólo un pasajero momentáneo, un vagabundo con pasaporte o sin él. Un aventurero estúpido que cree que el mundo es mejor allá de la frontera. Cómo puede suceder algo así si este espacio no es de nadie, nadie vive allí” (58). 35 Ana now recognizes ‘the visible border,’ where identity is nonentity and exists in that specific space on the bridge. Therefore, there is a need of metaphoric spaces where identities could intermingle freely. Ana and her mom need to look for a ‘pollero’ because her mother cannot cross at the border without a passport. Ana remembers “Hace algunos años hubo una vez un puente libre, ese que ahora es ‘libre’ sólo en mi imaginación” (62). 36 Ana regains a piece of memory when there were no borders and thus repossesses the individuals’ memories from the past. By coalescing segments of memories with real events, the characters finally are able to narrate their own Histories.

The visible border, ‘the bridge,’ also signifies the place where interactions and social and cultural exchanges take place on both sides, whereas, the ‘invisible’ border is hidden in the desert, tunnels or in the río. The Frontera invisible section represents the forbidden, where illegal actions and fears hide. The invisible borders are the areas where the unfortunate bodies of immigrants are found deceased and no one pays attention because they are invisible ‘stories’ and disposable bodies. Violeta and other characters try to cross the border and the

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