Metaphors Of Immigration And Transnational Identity In “Señales Que Precederán El Fin Del Mundo” By Yuri Herrera

• In Event: The Body Adrift: Borders, Race, and Resistance from the Rio Grande to the Pacific

Abstract

The movement of individuals across the borders in the Americas has been a constant worry for politicians, one that has been accentuated since the arrival of the Trump administration into power. Questions of sovereignty, nationality and identity arise from this complicated issue as the individuals are no longer subjects of their previous state but are not citizens of the new one, not being under sovereignty of the latter. Moreover, the movement of individuals across the transnational space reveals tensions between the personal and the cultural identity and the transformation of the individual given the socio-economical and political environment around them. These issues are illustrated within the novel Señales que precederán al fin del mundo (2011) by Yuri Herrera. The journey the main character, Makina, will undertake in order to search for her brother at the other side of the Mexican American border will illuminate how the creation of the concept of nation-state undermines the real lives of those living at the border of legality. This paper will analyze the novel from a biopolitical angle, aiming to dissect the complicated relationship the illegal female immigrant has with power and how this becomes an obstacle on the creation of an identity when such concept is but an illusion.

Biographical Information

Dr. David Yagüe González is a lecturer in the Global Languages department at MIT. He earned his Ph.D. in Hispanic Studies from Texas A&M University in 2021, where he co-founded the Latinx Cultural Production working group with Alberto Moreiras. He also holds a Ph.D. in African American Literature from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, with a dissertation focused on Toni Morrison’s works and trauma. At Harvard University, he served as a Teaching Assistant in the Romance Languages and Literatures department and co-chaired the Transatlantic Studies research group. His publications include articles on biopolitics, animality, and gender, such as “Animalidad y Animalización en Amores Perros” (Miriada Hispánica, 2017) and “Looking for Something to Signify: Gender Performance and Cuban Masculinity in Viva” (Screen Bodies, 2020). He has also co-edited the volumes Shining Signs of the Day: Space and Senses in Transatlantic Culture (2019) and Wall to Wall: Law as Culture in Latin American and Spanish Context (2021).

Author

• David Yague Gonzalez, Massachusetts Institute of Technology