UC Berkeley

This study examines the representation of the city of Tijuana in the literature of four local writers: Federico Campbell, Luis Humberto Crosthwaite, Rosina Conde, and Heriberto Yépez. My discussion centers on how their writings confront and interrogate formulas that, coming from centers of cultural power in both Mexico and the United States, are used to explain this city's sociocultural logic: Tijuana as a capital of sin, as a pass-through city, as a threat to the so-called "national identity," or as the quintessential illustration of a process of cultural hybridity that transcends former ideas of class, nation, and identity. I argue that these writers have reclaimed a vision of Tijuana as an internal point of reference for themselves as artists and also as individuals. Instead of countering stereotypes with similarly totalizing metaphors, they reveal a set of diverse realities through the complex narratives of the individuals who interact in this space. Within this framework, they not only expose the way in which the hegemonic descriptive modalities of Tijuana are articulated and inscribed in the collective imagination, but also invite us to consider the city's inner sociocultural and economic borders, and the conflicting coexistence to which they give rise. In doing so, I also argue, their writings prevent us from oversimplifying border identities and border literature.