8th Fenix Congress: Publications

The 8th Fenix-congress (2022) zooms in on Jewish-Latin American and Spanish-Latin American women writers and their search for
identity. The results of this congress are published in four Special Issues, the 11th, 12th, 13th, and 14th Special Issues of the Fenix Network.
The 13th and 14th Special Issues, Women’s perspectives on the Jewish and Spanish exiles that Mexico brought together (Miradas femeninas sobre los exilios judío y español que México reunió) Part 1 and Part 2, are published in the journal Mexican Literature (Open Access, Web of Science ESCI, UNAM, vol 34 N° 2, 2023) and focus on the women writers (descendants) of two emblematic exiles –the Jewish and the Spanish– in Mexico. The studies compiled in these two Special Issues put into dialogue the literary texts published in the last fifty years (1972-2022) by two different groups of exiled writers, who were united in Mexico. The set of studies proposes a possible new way to address these exiles, not on the basis of ethnic, political, cultural, religious or linguistic differences that separate them, but on the basis of the Mexican context of reception and the feminine identity they have in common. The introduction of the Special Issue “Women’s Perspectives on Jewish and Spanish Exile in Mexico” (Houvenaghel 2023) elaborates on its intergenerational approach, which centers on two prominent exodus groups: the Jewish and Spanish communities in Mexico.

These issues are organized around two major themes. The first issue, Networks and communities grants a central place to the meaning of networks and communities for both the Jewish and the Spanish exiles in Mexico. Communities and networks are constructed both in private spheres (through private correspondence, personal assistance, family ties, friendships, and informal meetings) and in the public sphere (through more structured circles, public meetings and events, partnerships, and official collaborations). The issue adopts a gender perspective on networks and communities and juxtaposes women’s experiences of inclusion and exclusion. The authors consider how social formations are characterized by constant processes of transformation and development. What do these dynamic processes mean for the “inheritors” of exile? How do they look back on their mothers’ and grandmothers’ communities?

The second issue, Negotiating identities, brings to light a search for roots through spirituality, and emphasize the tension that exists between established traditions and canonical texts on the one hand, and the appropriation of this heritage by women writers on the other. They juxtapose the different strategies writers have used to carry out this search for identity, either from an individual and intimate perspective or from a collective one.

The 11th and 12th Special issues, Mapear el yo: autoconstrucción y espacio en autoras judeo-latinoamericanas/ Mapping the self: self-construction and space in Jewish-Latin American women authors and Entrevistas: Prácticas de transmisión y construcción de un sentido de pertenencia en escritoras judeo-latinoamericanas/ Interviews: Practices of transmission and construction of a sense of belonging in Jewish-Latin American women writers / Identidad espacial: Entrevistas con autoras judeo-latinoamericanas are published in América Sin Nombre (Open Access, Web of Science ESC). The 11th Special Issue juxtaposes different itineraries constructed by Jewish-Latin American writers toward the roots and aims at understanding the diversity and unity of these routes and journeys. The 12^th Special Issue includes interviews with  Jewish Latin American women writers on spatial identity negotiation across generations The Special Issue focuses primarily on three dimensions of this diversity/unity: the spatial dimension (1), the temporal dimension (2), and the imaginative dimension (3). In what way(s) do the routes traced between the territories of the ancestors and the new host territories relate to the geopolitical map in which the boundaries of the nation-state predominate? How do the past and the presen dialogue in these journeys towards a sense of belonging? How do reality and imagination interact in the depiction of the place of origin? These are the questions that guide our exploration.