Talk: Magic Realism and Colombian Vallenato, Ann Arbor
Sayan Bhattacharyya
4:30 pm, Burton Memorial Tower, Room 506
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Professor Ana Maria Ochoa of Columbia University will be talking
about "Magical Realism in the Construction of Popular Music Discourse
in Colombian Vallenato."
During the 1990s, vallenato became the most widespread Colombian musical
genre both nationally and internationally. This presentation explores
the relationship between the construction of discourses on folk
and popular music surrounding vallenato and the rise of magical
realism as an interpretive framework from which to read Colombian
artistic creativity. More specifically, it explores the correlations
between Garcia Marquez' writings in the 1940s, his novels
(particularly One Hundred Years of Solitude) and recent
recorded productions of vallenato that are framed in terms of
magical realism. One of the questions Prof. Ochoa will explore
is how the popular music discourses are determined through
national histories and the placement of these histories
within a global interpretive framework of circulation of
literature and sounds.