Latin American Science Fiction in the Space Age, 1945-1969

FAIN: FEL-257137-18

Rachel Harper Haywood Ferreira
Iowa State University of Science and Technology (Ames, IA 50011-2000)

A book-length study of the science fiction genre in Latin America between 1945 and 1969.

This book project will examine the history of the science fiction genre in Latin America during the period 1945-1969, including the relationship of genre development to international and local scientific and political events: from Hiroshima to Sputnik to the Cuban Missile Crisis to the Moon landing. Latin American writers have adapted science fiction to reflect their own realities: expanding the science fiction megatext to include postcolonial perspectives from the margins of world power, calling into question the assumptions and interpretations of the Northern tradition, increasing the permeability of the genre’s limits, and engaging in national and global discourses on identity, history, politics, culture, and modernity. My research aims to increase our understanding of science fiction in Latin America during this crucial time in twentieth-century history, thereby revealing a more complete and complex picture of the genre and of the region.