Translocal misreadings

Eugeni d'Ors in Latin America and transatlantic studies today

Tania Gentic

pp. 207-235

in: Tania Gentic, Francisco LaRubia-Prado (eds), Imperialism and the wider atlantic, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2017

Abstract

Gentic examines the role transatlantic intellectual discussions played in producing an idea of Latin American identity before and during Eugeni d"Ors's visit to Argentina in 1921. She draws attention to what she calls the "planes of legibility" that allowed local readers to presume ideas from different national contexts shared universalizable philosophical ideals that were politically translocal. This process of thought, she argues, depends on readings that leave out, sublate, or transcend the material realities of local place, misplacing ideas so they can become legible to readers in other places. Put another way, she suggests that it is the epistemological movement from a specific context to an idea as placeless that makes the local legible elsewhere, a problem that remains fundamental to how critics approach transatlantic studies today.