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Sonic Negations: Sound, Affect, and Unbelonging Between Mexico and the United States

Abstract

This dissertation uses the concept of auditory cultures to trace how Mexican and U.S. Latina/o subjects use sound and music to articulate political dissent. “Sonic Negations: Sound, Affect, and Unbelonging Between Mexico and the United States” brings together the fields of performance and sound studies to show how the sonic presents a contested political arena through which transnational Latina/o artists, musicians and listening publics construct alternative sensory realms detached from national forms of belonging. I contend that non-culturally dependent forms of sound—noise, metal, punk, and 80s British music—allow individuals to approach negative affects, such as melancholia, despair, and idleness. Drawing from recent work in performance studies and queer theory on the political potentialities of negative affects, the study argues for the importance of attending to the political critiques inherent in auditory cultures and practices within both Latina/o and Latin American contexts.

The first chapter analyzes Mexico City-based artist Iván Abreu’s series M(R.P.M), in which he creates playable ice-records of nationalist Mexican songs. I investigate how the pieces invite listeners into the complex history of ice in the Latin American imaginary to question contemporary calls for Mexican nationalism. The second chapter contemplates the early performances of Mexican artist collective SEMEFO and the work of underground Tijuana-based musician María y José. I argue for the ways these artists use aggressive sound to confront the unending violence that has plagued Mexico over the last few decades. My third section concentrates on performance artist Nao Bustamante and her “mariachi-punk” band Las Cucas to consider the lesbian punk scream as an ethical rejection of normative Latina and queer identity. The final chapter contemplates the phenomenon of the Latina/o fan culture around British rock star Morrissey. I show how Latina/o listening publics turn to melancholia and depression as affects that force us to reconsider relationality by questioning the nation as the site of inclusion.

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