Light in the Dark/ Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E. Anzaldúa

47
LIGHT IN THE DARK LUZ EN LO OSCURO , , GLORI A E. A NZALDÚ A

Transcript of Light in the Dark/ Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E. Anzaldúa

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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LIGHT IN THE DAR K

LUZ EN LO OSCURO983154983141983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983145983140983141983150983156983145983156983161

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GLORI A E A NZALDUacuteA

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Latin America Otherwise Languages Empires Nations is a critical series It

aims to explore the emergence and consequences of concepts used to

de1047297ne ldquoLatin Americardquo while at the same time exploring the broad in-

terplay of political economic and cultural practices that have shaped

Latin American worlds Latin America at the crossroads of competing

imperial designs and local responses has been construed as a geocul-

tural and geopolitical entity since the nineteenth century This series

provides a starting point to rede1047297ne Latin America as a con1047297guration of

political linguistic cultural and economic intersections that demands

a continuous reappraisal of the role of the Americas in history and

of the ongoing process of globalization and the relocation of people

and cultures that have characterized Latin Americarsquos experience Latin

America Otherwise Languages Empires Nations is a forum that confronts

established geocultural constructions rethinks area studies and disci-

plinary boundaries assesses convictions of the academy and of publicpolicy and correspondingly demands that the practices through which

we produce knowledge and understanding about and from Latin Amer-

ica be subject to rigorous and critical scrutiny

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LIGHT IN THE DARKLUZ EN LO OSCURO

983122983141983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983113983140983141983150983156983145983156983161 983123983152983145983154983145983156983157983137983148983145983156983161 983122983141983137983148983145983156983161

GLORIA E ANZALDUacuteA983109983140983145983156983141983140 983138983161

983105983150983137983116983151983157983145983155983141 983115983141983137983156983145983150983143

983140983157983147983141 983157983150983145983158983141983154983155983145983156983161 983152983154983141983155983155

983140983157983154983144983137983149 983137983150983140 983148983151983150983140983151983150 2015

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copy 983090983088983089983093 The Gloria E Anzalduacutea Literary Trust

Editorrsquos introduction copy 983090983088983089983093 AnaLouise Keating

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper infin

Designed by Natalie F Smith

Typeset in Caecilia by Westchester Publishing Services

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Anzalduacutea Gloria author

Light in the dark = Luz en lo oscuro rewriting identity spirituality

reality Gloria E Anzalduacutea edited by AnaLouise Keating

pages cmmdash(Latin America otherwise languages empires nations)

Includes bibliographical references and index

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983093983097983095983095-983095 (hardcover alk paper)

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983094983088983088983097-983092 (pbk alk paper)

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983095983093983088983091-983094 (e-book)

983089 Anzalduacutea Gloria 983090 Creation (Literary artistic etc) 983091 Identity(Psychology) 983092 Mexican American women I Keating AnaLouise

983089983097983094983089ndash editor II Title III Title Luz en lo oscuro IV Series Latin

America otherwise

983152983155983091983093983093983089983150983097983093983162983092983094 983090983088983089983093

983096983089983096983093983092983088983097mdashdc983090983091

[B]

983090983088983089983093983088983089983092983088983096983091

Cover art Illustration by Natalie F Smith using details of

Coyolxauhqui (1047297gure FM983089)

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983141983155983152983141983139983145983137983148983149983141983150983156983141 983153983157983141 983156983137983150983156983151 983155983157983142983154983145983141983154983151983150 983161 983137983143983157983137983150983156983137983154983151983150 983161 983137983148983145983149983141983150983156983137983154983151983150

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Editorrsquos Introduction ix

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

983137983150983137983148983151983157983145983155983141 983147983141983137983156983145983150983143

Preace | Gestures o the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear 1

1 | Let us be the healing o the wound 9

The Coyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeo

2 | Flights o the Imagination 23

RereadingRewriting Realities

3 | Border Arte 47 Nepantla el lugar de la frontera

4 | Geographies o SelvesmdashReimagining Identity 65

NosOtras (UsOther) las Nepantleras and the New Tribalism

5 | Putting Coyolxauhqui Together 95

A Creative Process

6 | now let us shif conocimiento inner work public acts 117

Agradecimientos | Acknowledgments 161

CONTENTS

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Appendix 1 | Lloronas Dissertation Material 165

(Proposal Table of Contents and Chapter Outline)

Appendix 2 | Anzalduacutearsquos Health 171

Appendix 3 | Un1047297nished Sections and Additional Notes from Chapter 2 176

Appendix 4 | Alternative Opening Chapter 4 180

Appendix 5 | Historical Notes on the Chaptersrsquo Development 190

Appendix 6 | Invitation and Call for Papers Testimonios Volume 200

Notes 205 | Glossary 241 | Bibliography 247 | Index 257

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For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a working

from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporeal abstrac-

tion but on corporeal realities The material body is center and central The

body is the ground of thought983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 ldquo983120983154983141983142983137983139983141 983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161rdquo

What is the theme of my lifersquos work Is it accessing other realities

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In Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity Gloria Anzalduacutea excavates her creative process ( her ldquogestures ofthe bodyrdquo) and uses this excavation to develop an aesthetics of trans-

formation grounded in her metaphysics of interconnectedness1 Fromthe late 983089983097983096983088s when she entered the doctoral program in literature atthe University of California Santa Cruz (983157983139983155983139) until her death in 983090983088983088983092Anzalduacutea aspired to write a book-length exploration of aesthetics andknowledge production as they are in1047298ected through and shaped byissues of social justice identity (trans)formation and healing2 Sheviewed this pro ject both as her dissertation and as a publishable mono-graph although as explained in more detail later she did not follow atypical dissertation process Thoroughly researched and repeatedly

EDITORrsquoS INTRODUCTION

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

AnaLouise Keating

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revised this manuscript underwent numerous shifts in title tableof contents and chapter organization it exists in numerous partialiterationsmdashhandwritten notes outlines chapter drafts e-mail commu-nication conversations with writing comadres and computer 1047297les3 Because of her meticulous revision practices and various complicatedlife issues (including 1047297nancial pressures multiple simultaneous writ-ing projects philosophical changes in worldview and diabetes-relatedhealth complications) Anzalduacutea did not see this book through topublication However she was in the 1047297nal stages of its completion atthe time of her death

Focusing closely on aesthetics ontology epistemology and ethicsLight in the Dark investigates a number of intertwined issues includ-

ing the artist-activistrsquos struggles imagination as an embodied intel-lectual faculty that with careful attention and speci1047297c strategies caneffect personal and social transformation the creative process deco-lonial alternatives to conventional nationalism and more Light in the

Dark also contains important developments in Anzalduacutearsquos theoriesof nepantla and nepantleras spiritual activism new tribalism nosotras conocimiento autohistoria and autohistoria-teoriacutea as wellas additional insights into her writing practice and her intellectual-physiological experiences with diabetes4 In this introduction I show-

case Anzalduacutea as a multifaceted artist-scholar and offer backgroundinformation about the complicated history of this book5 I summarizeAnzalduacutearsquos recursive writing and revision process and situate Light

in the Dark within the context of her oeuvre describe the state of themanuscript at the time of her passing explore Anzalduacutearsquos potentialcontributions to twenty-1047297rst-century continental philosophy and fem-inist thought (especially neo-materialisms object-oriented ontologyand debates concerning the so-called linguistic turn) and speculate

on some of the ways this book might affect Anzalduacutean scholarship Ibegin by summarizing Anzalduacutearsquos complex recursive writing and re-vision process because this process is key to the history of her book

Anzalduacutearsquos writing process

Through a serendipitous series of events I met Gloria Anzalduacutea in983089983097983097983089 and was fortunate to become one of her ldquowriting comadresrdquo Ihad known her only a few days when she gave me a draft of one of her

Prieta stories to read and critique She treated me not as an awestruck

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fan but rather as a colleague with valuable insights6 I was amazedby her gesture There I was an unknown a nobody stumbling throughthe very early stages of my career and yet the creator of three ground-breaking books (BorderlandsLa Frontera This Bridge Called My Back andMaking Face Making Soul) was giving me her manuscripts asking me forfeedbackmdashfor detailed very speci1047297c commentary about her work I wasstruck by Anzalduacutearsquos intellectual-aesthetic humility by her willingnessto share her un1047297nished writings with others and by the partial state ofthe manuscript itself To be sure it was a captivating story (good plotline great characterization interesting ideas powerful metaphorscaptivating dialogue and so on) however the draft was uneven andneeded more work (In fact Anzalduacutea had interspersed revision-

related questions throughout the draft) Because I had assumed thatAnzalduacutearsquos words 1047298owed effortlessly and perfectly from her pen andkeyboard I was startled to realize the extent of her revision process Iam not alone in this type of Anzalduacutean encounter If you look throughher archival materials yoursquoll see that she regularly shared work inprogress with others7

As this anecdote suggests Anzalduacutearsquos approach to writing was dia-logic recursive democratic spirit-in1047298ected and only partially withinher conscious control She relied extensively on intuition imagina-

tion and what she describes in this book as her ldquonagualardquo As sheexplains in the preface

Irsquom guided by the spirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guid-ing spirit) is an inner sensibility that directs my lifemdashan image anaction or an internal experience8 My imagination and my nagualaare connectedmdashthey are aspects of the same process of creativityOften my naguala draws to me things that are contrary to my willand purpose (compulsions addictions negativities) resulting in

an anguished impasse Overcoming these impasses becomes part ofthe process

And what a process it was Anzalduacutearsquos writing process entailedmultiple simultaneous projects numerous drafts of each piece exten-sive revisions of each draft excruciatingly painful writing blocks link-ages and repetition among various writing projects and peer critiquesfrom her ldquowriting comadresrdquo editors and others9

Generally Anzalduacutea began a new pro ject by meditating visualizing

freewriting and collecting diverse source materials these materials

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983116983145983143983144983156 983145983150 983156983144983141 983108983137983154983147

983116983157983162 983141983150 983148983151 983151983155983139983157983154983151

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 346

983137 983138983151983151 983147 983145983150 983156983144983141 983155983141983154983145983141983155

983148983137983156983145983150 983137983149983141983154983145983139983137 983151983156983144983141983154983159983145983155983141 983148983137983150983143983157983137983143983141983155 983141983149983152983145983154983141983155 983150983137983156983145983151983150983155

983155983141983154983145983141983155 983141983140983145983156983151983154983155

983159983137983148983156983141983154 983140 983149983145983143983150983151983148983151 983140983157983147983141 983157983150983145983158983141983154983155983145983156983161 983145983154983141983150983141 983155983145983148983158983141983154983138983148983137983156983156 983140983157983147983141 983157983150983145983158983141983154983155983145983156983161

983155983151983150983145983137 983155983137983148983140983277983158983137983154-983144983157983148983148 983157983150983145983158983141983154983155983145983156983161 983151983142 983156983141983160983137983155 983155983137983150 983137983150983156983151983150983145983151

983137983138983151 983157983156 983156983144983141 983155983141983154983145983141983155

Latin America Otherwise Languages Empires Nations is a critical series It

aims to explore the emergence and consequences of concepts used to

de1047297ne ldquoLatin Americardquo while at the same time exploring the broad in-

terplay of political economic and cultural practices that have shaped

Latin American worlds Latin America at the crossroads of competing

imperial designs and local responses has been construed as a geocul-

tural and geopolitical entity since the nineteenth century This series

provides a starting point to rede1047297ne Latin America as a con1047297guration of

political linguistic cultural and economic intersections that demands

a continuous reappraisal of the role of the Americas in history and

of the ongoing process of globalization and the relocation of people

and cultures that have characterized Latin Americarsquos experience Latin

America Otherwise Languages Empires Nations is a forum that confronts

established geocultural constructions rethinks area studies and disci-

plinary boundaries assesses convictions of the academy and of publicpolicy and correspondingly demands that the practices through which

we produce knowledge and understanding about and from Latin Amer-

ica be subject to rigorous and critical scrutiny

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LIGHT IN THE DARKLUZ EN LO OSCURO

983122983141983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983113983140983141983150983156983145983156983161 983123983152983145983154983145983156983157983137983148983145983156983161 983122983141983137983148983145983156983161

GLORIA E ANZALDUacuteA983109983140983145983156983141983140 983138983161

983105983150983137983116983151983157983145983155983141 983115983141983137983156983145983150983143

983140983157983147983141 983157983150983145983158983141983154983155983145983156983161 983152983154983141983155983155

983140983157983154983144983137983149 983137983150983140 983148983151983150983140983151983150 2015

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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copy 983090983088983089983093 The Gloria E Anzalduacutea Literary Trust

Editorrsquos introduction copy 983090983088983089983093 AnaLouise Keating

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper infin

Designed by Natalie F Smith

Typeset in Caecilia by Westchester Publishing Services

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Anzalduacutea Gloria author

Light in the dark = Luz en lo oscuro rewriting identity spirituality

reality Gloria E Anzalduacutea edited by AnaLouise Keating

pages cmmdash(Latin America otherwise languages empires nations)

Includes bibliographical references and index

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983093983097983095983095-983095 (hardcover alk paper)

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983094983088983088983097-983092 (pbk alk paper)

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983095983093983088983091-983094 (e-book)

983089 Anzalduacutea Gloria 983090 Creation (Literary artistic etc) 983091 Identity(Psychology) 983092 Mexican American women I Keating AnaLouise

983089983097983094983089ndash editor II Title III Title Luz en lo oscuro IV Series Latin

America otherwise

983152983155983091983093983093983089983150983097983093983162983092983094 983090983088983089983093

983096983089983096983093983092983088983097mdashdc983090983091

[B]

983090983088983089983093983088983089983092983088983096983091

Cover art Illustration by Natalie F Smith using details of

Coyolxauhqui (1047297gure FM983089)

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983108983141983140983145983139983151 983141983155983156983141 983148983145983138983154983151 983137 983148983137983155 983149983141983149983151983154983145983137983155 983140983141 983149983145983155 983137983138983157983141983148983137983155 983161

983141983155983152983141983139983145983137983148983149983141983150983156983141 983153983157983141 983156983137983150983156983151 983155983157983142983154983145983141983154983151983150 983161 983137983143983157983137983150983156983137983154983151983150 983161 983137983148983145983149983141983150983156983137983154983151983150

983137 983144983145983146983137983155 983151983155 983137983149983137983150983156983141983155 983161 983137983149983145983143983137983155

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Editorrsquos Introduction ix

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

983137983150983137983148983151983157983145983155983141 983147983141983137983156983145983150983143

Preace | Gestures o the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear 1

1 | Let us be the healing o the wound 9

The Coyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeo

2 | Flights o the Imagination 23

RereadingRewriting Realities

3 | Border Arte 47 Nepantla el lugar de la frontera

4 | Geographies o SelvesmdashReimagining Identity 65

NosOtras (UsOther) las Nepantleras and the New Tribalism

5 | Putting Coyolxauhqui Together 95

A Creative Process

6 | now let us shif conocimiento inner work public acts 117

Agradecimientos | Acknowledgments 161

CONTENTS

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Appendix 1 | Lloronas Dissertation Material 165

(Proposal Table of Contents and Chapter Outline)

Appendix 2 | Anzalduacutearsquos Health 171

Appendix 3 | Un1047297nished Sections and Additional Notes from Chapter 2 176

Appendix 4 | Alternative Opening Chapter 4 180

Appendix 5 | Historical Notes on the Chaptersrsquo Development 190

Appendix 6 | Invitation and Call for Papers Testimonios Volume 200

Notes 205 | Glossary 241 | Bibliography 247 | Index 257

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For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a working

from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporeal abstrac-

tion but on corporeal realities The material body is center and central The

body is the ground of thought983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 ldquo983120983154983141983142983137983139983141 983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161rdquo

What is the theme of my lifersquos work Is it accessing other realities

983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983150983151983156983137983155

In Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity Gloria Anzalduacutea excavates her creative process ( her ldquogestures ofthe bodyrdquo) and uses this excavation to develop an aesthetics of trans-

formation grounded in her metaphysics of interconnectedness1 Fromthe late 983089983097983096983088s when she entered the doctoral program in literature atthe University of California Santa Cruz (983157983139983155983139) until her death in 983090983088983088983092Anzalduacutea aspired to write a book-length exploration of aesthetics andknowledge production as they are in1047298ected through and shaped byissues of social justice identity (trans)formation and healing2 Sheviewed this pro ject both as her dissertation and as a publishable mono-graph although as explained in more detail later she did not follow atypical dissertation process Thoroughly researched and repeatedly

EDITORrsquoS INTRODUCTION

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

AnaLouise Keating

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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revised this manuscript underwent numerous shifts in title tableof contents and chapter organization it exists in numerous partialiterationsmdashhandwritten notes outlines chapter drafts e-mail commu-nication conversations with writing comadres and computer 1047297les3 Because of her meticulous revision practices and various complicatedlife issues (including 1047297nancial pressures multiple simultaneous writ-ing projects philosophical changes in worldview and diabetes-relatedhealth complications) Anzalduacutea did not see this book through topublication However she was in the 1047297nal stages of its completion atthe time of her death

Focusing closely on aesthetics ontology epistemology and ethicsLight in the Dark investigates a number of intertwined issues includ-

ing the artist-activistrsquos struggles imagination as an embodied intel-lectual faculty that with careful attention and speci1047297c strategies caneffect personal and social transformation the creative process deco-lonial alternatives to conventional nationalism and more Light in the

Dark also contains important developments in Anzalduacutearsquos theoriesof nepantla and nepantleras spiritual activism new tribalism nosotras conocimiento autohistoria and autohistoria-teoriacutea as wellas additional insights into her writing practice and her intellectual-physiological experiences with diabetes4 In this introduction I show-

case Anzalduacutea as a multifaceted artist-scholar and offer backgroundinformation about the complicated history of this book5 I summarizeAnzalduacutearsquos recursive writing and revision process and situate Light

in the Dark within the context of her oeuvre describe the state of themanuscript at the time of her passing explore Anzalduacutearsquos potentialcontributions to twenty-1047297rst-century continental philosophy and fem-inist thought (especially neo-materialisms object-oriented ontologyand debates concerning the so-called linguistic turn) and speculate

on some of the ways this book might affect Anzalduacutean scholarship Ibegin by summarizing Anzalduacutearsquos complex recursive writing and re-vision process because this process is key to the history of her book

Anzalduacutearsquos writing process

Through a serendipitous series of events I met Gloria Anzalduacutea in983089983097983097983089 and was fortunate to become one of her ldquowriting comadresrdquo Ihad known her only a few days when she gave me a draft of one of her

Prieta stories to read and critique She treated me not as an awestruck

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fan but rather as a colleague with valuable insights6 I was amazedby her gesture There I was an unknown a nobody stumbling throughthe very early stages of my career and yet the creator of three ground-breaking books (BorderlandsLa Frontera This Bridge Called My Back andMaking Face Making Soul) was giving me her manuscripts asking me forfeedbackmdashfor detailed very speci1047297c commentary about her work I wasstruck by Anzalduacutearsquos intellectual-aesthetic humility by her willingnessto share her un1047297nished writings with others and by the partial state ofthe manuscript itself To be sure it was a captivating story (good plotline great characterization interesting ideas powerful metaphorscaptivating dialogue and so on) however the draft was uneven andneeded more work (In fact Anzalduacutea had interspersed revision-

related questions throughout the draft) Because I had assumed thatAnzalduacutearsquos words 1047298owed effortlessly and perfectly from her pen andkeyboard I was startled to realize the extent of her revision process Iam not alone in this type of Anzalduacutean encounter If you look throughher archival materials yoursquoll see that she regularly shared work inprogress with others7

As this anecdote suggests Anzalduacutearsquos approach to writing was dia-logic recursive democratic spirit-in1047298ected and only partially withinher conscious control She relied extensively on intuition imagina-

tion and what she describes in this book as her ldquonagualardquo As sheexplains in the preface

Irsquom guided by the spirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guid-ing spirit) is an inner sensibility that directs my lifemdashan image anaction or an internal experience8 My imagination and my nagualaare connectedmdashthey are aspects of the same process of creativityOften my naguala draws to me things that are contrary to my willand purpose (compulsions addictions negativities) resulting in

an anguished impasse Overcoming these impasses becomes part ofthe process

And what a process it was Anzalduacutearsquos writing process entailedmultiple simultaneous projects numerous drafts of each piece exten-sive revisions of each draft excruciatingly painful writing blocks link-ages and repetition among various writing projects and peer critiquesfrom her ldquowriting comadresrdquo editors and others9

Generally Anzalduacutea began a new pro ject by meditating visualizing

freewriting and collecting diverse source materials these materials

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983137 983138983151983151 983147 983145983150 983156983144983141 983155983141983154983145983141983155

983148983137983156983145983150 983137983149983141983154983145983139983137 983151983156983144983141983154983159983145983155983141 983148983137983150983143983157983137983143983141983155 983141983149983152983145983154983141983155 983150983137983156983145983151983150983155

983155983141983154983145983141983155 983141983140983145983156983151983154983155

983159983137983148983156983141983154 983140 983149983145983143983150983151983148983151 983140983157983147983141 983157983150983145983158983141983154983155983145983156983161 983145983154983141983150983141 983155983145983148983158983141983154983138983148983137983156983156 983140983157983147983141 983157983150983145983158983141983154983155983145983156983161

983155983151983150983145983137 983155983137983148983140983277983158983137983154-983144983157983148983148 983157983150983145983158983141983154983155983145983156983161 983151983142 983156983141983160983137983155 983155983137983150 983137983150983156983151983150983145983151

983137983138983151 983157983156 983156983144983141 983155983141983154983145983141983155

Latin America Otherwise Languages Empires Nations is a critical series It

aims to explore the emergence and consequences of concepts used to

de1047297ne ldquoLatin Americardquo while at the same time exploring the broad in-

terplay of political economic and cultural practices that have shaped

Latin American worlds Latin America at the crossroads of competing

imperial designs and local responses has been construed as a geocul-

tural and geopolitical entity since the nineteenth century This series

provides a starting point to rede1047297ne Latin America as a con1047297guration of

political linguistic cultural and economic intersections that demands

a continuous reappraisal of the role of the Americas in history and

of the ongoing process of globalization and the relocation of people

and cultures that have characterized Latin Americarsquos experience Latin

America Otherwise Languages Empires Nations is a forum that confronts

established geocultural constructions rethinks area studies and disci-

plinary boundaries assesses convictions of the academy and of publicpolicy and correspondingly demands that the practices through which

we produce knowledge and understanding about and from Latin Amer-

ica be subject to rigorous and critical scrutiny

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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LIGHT IN THE DARKLUZ EN LO OSCURO

983122983141983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983113983140983141983150983156983145983156983161 983123983152983145983154983145983156983157983137983148983145983156983161 983122983141983137983148983145983156983161

GLORIA E ANZALDUacuteA983109983140983145983156983141983140 983138983161

983105983150983137983116983151983157983145983155983141 983115983141983137983156983145983150983143

983140983157983147983141 983157983150983145983158983141983154983155983145983156983161 983152983154983141983155983155

983140983157983154983144983137983149 983137983150983140 983148983151983150983140983151983150 2015

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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copy 983090983088983089983093 The Gloria E Anzalduacutea Literary Trust

Editorrsquos introduction copy 983090983088983089983093 AnaLouise Keating

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper infin

Designed by Natalie F Smith

Typeset in Caecilia by Westchester Publishing Services

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Anzalduacutea Gloria author

Light in the dark = Luz en lo oscuro rewriting identity spirituality

reality Gloria E Anzalduacutea edited by AnaLouise Keating

pages cmmdash(Latin America otherwise languages empires nations)

Includes bibliographical references and index

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983093983097983095983095-983095 (hardcover alk paper)

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983094983088983088983097-983092 (pbk alk paper)

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983095983093983088983091-983094 (e-book)

983089 Anzalduacutea Gloria 983090 Creation (Literary artistic etc) 983091 Identity(Psychology) 983092 Mexican American women I Keating AnaLouise

983089983097983094983089ndash editor II Title III Title Luz en lo oscuro IV Series Latin

America otherwise

983152983155983091983093983093983089983150983097983093983162983092983094 983090983088983089983093

983096983089983096983093983092983088983097mdashdc983090983091

[B]

983090983088983089983093983088983089983092983088983096983091

Cover art Illustration by Natalie F Smith using details of

Coyolxauhqui (1047297gure FM983089)

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983108983141983140983145983139983151 983141983155983156983141 983148983145983138983154983151 983137 983148983137983155 983149983141983149983151983154983145983137983155 983140983141 983149983145983155 983137983138983157983141983148983137983155 983161

983141983155983152983141983139983145983137983148983149983141983150983156983141 983153983157983141 983156983137983150983156983151 983155983157983142983154983145983141983154983151983150 983161 983137983143983157983137983150983156983137983154983151983150 983161 983137983148983145983149983141983150983156983137983154983151983150

983137 983144983145983146983137983155 983151983155 983137983149983137983150983156983141983155 983161 983137983149983145983143983137983155

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Editorrsquos Introduction ix

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

983137983150983137983148983151983157983145983155983141 983147983141983137983156983145983150983143

Preace | Gestures o the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear 1

1 | Let us be the healing o the wound 9

The Coyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeo

2 | Flights o the Imagination 23

RereadingRewriting Realities

3 | Border Arte 47 Nepantla el lugar de la frontera

4 | Geographies o SelvesmdashReimagining Identity 65

NosOtras (UsOther) las Nepantleras and the New Tribalism

5 | Putting Coyolxauhqui Together 95

A Creative Process

6 | now let us shif conocimiento inner work public acts 117

Agradecimientos | Acknowledgments 161

CONTENTS

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Appendix 1 | Lloronas Dissertation Material 165

(Proposal Table of Contents and Chapter Outline)

Appendix 2 | Anzalduacutearsquos Health 171

Appendix 3 | Un1047297nished Sections and Additional Notes from Chapter 2 176

Appendix 4 | Alternative Opening Chapter 4 180

Appendix 5 | Historical Notes on the Chaptersrsquo Development 190

Appendix 6 | Invitation and Call for Papers Testimonios Volume 200

Notes 205 | Glossary 241 | Bibliography 247 | Index 257

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For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a working

from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporeal abstrac-

tion but on corporeal realities The material body is center and central The

body is the ground of thought983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 ldquo983120983154983141983142983137983139983141 983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161rdquo

What is the theme of my lifersquos work Is it accessing other realities

983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983150983151983156983137983155

In Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity Gloria Anzalduacutea excavates her creative process ( her ldquogestures ofthe bodyrdquo) and uses this excavation to develop an aesthetics of trans-

formation grounded in her metaphysics of interconnectedness1 Fromthe late 983089983097983096983088s when she entered the doctoral program in literature atthe University of California Santa Cruz (983157983139983155983139) until her death in 983090983088983088983092Anzalduacutea aspired to write a book-length exploration of aesthetics andknowledge production as they are in1047298ected through and shaped byissues of social justice identity (trans)formation and healing2 Sheviewed this pro ject both as her dissertation and as a publishable mono-graph although as explained in more detail later she did not follow atypical dissertation process Thoroughly researched and repeatedly

EDITORrsquoS INTRODUCTION

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

AnaLouise Keating

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revised this manuscript underwent numerous shifts in title tableof contents and chapter organization it exists in numerous partialiterationsmdashhandwritten notes outlines chapter drafts e-mail commu-nication conversations with writing comadres and computer 1047297les3 Because of her meticulous revision practices and various complicatedlife issues (including 1047297nancial pressures multiple simultaneous writ-ing projects philosophical changes in worldview and diabetes-relatedhealth complications) Anzalduacutea did not see this book through topublication However she was in the 1047297nal stages of its completion atthe time of her death

Focusing closely on aesthetics ontology epistemology and ethicsLight in the Dark investigates a number of intertwined issues includ-

ing the artist-activistrsquos struggles imagination as an embodied intel-lectual faculty that with careful attention and speci1047297c strategies caneffect personal and social transformation the creative process deco-lonial alternatives to conventional nationalism and more Light in the

Dark also contains important developments in Anzalduacutearsquos theoriesof nepantla and nepantleras spiritual activism new tribalism nosotras conocimiento autohistoria and autohistoria-teoriacutea as wellas additional insights into her writing practice and her intellectual-physiological experiences with diabetes4 In this introduction I show-

case Anzalduacutea as a multifaceted artist-scholar and offer backgroundinformation about the complicated history of this book5 I summarizeAnzalduacutearsquos recursive writing and revision process and situate Light

in the Dark within the context of her oeuvre describe the state of themanuscript at the time of her passing explore Anzalduacutearsquos potentialcontributions to twenty-1047297rst-century continental philosophy and fem-inist thought (especially neo-materialisms object-oriented ontologyand debates concerning the so-called linguistic turn) and speculate

on some of the ways this book might affect Anzalduacutean scholarship Ibegin by summarizing Anzalduacutearsquos complex recursive writing and re-vision process because this process is key to the history of her book

Anzalduacutearsquos writing process

Through a serendipitous series of events I met Gloria Anzalduacutea in983089983097983097983089 and was fortunate to become one of her ldquowriting comadresrdquo Ihad known her only a few days when she gave me a draft of one of her

Prieta stories to read and critique She treated me not as an awestruck

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xi

fan but rather as a colleague with valuable insights6 I was amazedby her gesture There I was an unknown a nobody stumbling throughthe very early stages of my career and yet the creator of three ground-breaking books (BorderlandsLa Frontera This Bridge Called My Back andMaking Face Making Soul) was giving me her manuscripts asking me forfeedbackmdashfor detailed very speci1047297c commentary about her work I wasstruck by Anzalduacutearsquos intellectual-aesthetic humility by her willingnessto share her un1047297nished writings with others and by the partial state ofthe manuscript itself To be sure it was a captivating story (good plotline great characterization interesting ideas powerful metaphorscaptivating dialogue and so on) however the draft was uneven andneeded more work (In fact Anzalduacutea had interspersed revision-

related questions throughout the draft) Because I had assumed thatAnzalduacutearsquos words 1047298owed effortlessly and perfectly from her pen andkeyboard I was startled to realize the extent of her revision process Iam not alone in this type of Anzalduacutean encounter If you look throughher archival materials yoursquoll see that she regularly shared work inprogress with others7

As this anecdote suggests Anzalduacutearsquos approach to writing was dia-logic recursive democratic spirit-in1047298ected and only partially withinher conscious control She relied extensively on intuition imagina-

tion and what she describes in this book as her ldquonagualardquo As sheexplains in the preface

Irsquom guided by the spirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guid-ing spirit) is an inner sensibility that directs my lifemdashan image anaction or an internal experience8 My imagination and my nagualaare connectedmdashthey are aspects of the same process of creativityOften my naguala draws to me things that are contrary to my willand purpose (compulsions addictions negativities) resulting in

an anguished impasse Overcoming these impasses becomes part ofthe process

And what a process it was Anzalduacutearsquos writing process entailedmultiple simultaneous projects numerous drafts of each piece exten-sive revisions of each draft excruciatingly painful writing blocks link-ages and repetition among various writing projects and peer critiquesfrom her ldquowriting comadresrdquo editors and others9

Generally Anzalduacutea began a new pro ject by meditating visualizing

freewriting and collecting diverse source materials these materials

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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xiv | 983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xv

y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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LIGHT IN THE DARKLUZ EN LO OSCURO

983122983141983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983113983140983141983150983156983145983156983161 983123983152983145983154983145983156983157983137983148983145983156983161 983122983141983137983148983145983156983161

GLORIA E ANZALDUacuteA983109983140983145983156983141983140 983138983161

983105983150983137983116983151983157983145983155983141 983115983141983137983156983145983150983143

983140983157983147983141 983157983150983145983158983141983154983155983145983156983161 983152983154983141983155983155

983140983157983154983144983137983149 983137983150983140 983148983151983150983140983151983150 2015

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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copy 983090983088983089983093 The Gloria E Anzalduacutea Literary Trust

Editorrsquos introduction copy 983090983088983089983093 AnaLouise Keating

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper infin

Designed by Natalie F Smith

Typeset in Caecilia by Westchester Publishing Services

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Anzalduacutea Gloria author

Light in the dark = Luz en lo oscuro rewriting identity spirituality

reality Gloria E Anzalduacutea edited by AnaLouise Keating

pages cmmdash(Latin America otherwise languages empires nations)

Includes bibliographical references and index

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983093983097983095983095-983095 (hardcover alk paper)

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983094983088983088983097-983092 (pbk alk paper)

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983095983093983088983091-983094 (e-book)

983089 Anzalduacutea Gloria 983090 Creation (Literary artistic etc) 983091 Identity(Psychology) 983092 Mexican American women I Keating AnaLouise

983089983097983094983089ndash editor II Title III Title Luz en lo oscuro IV Series Latin

America otherwise

983152983155983091983093983093983089983150983097983093983162983092983094 983090983088983089983093

983096983089983096983093983092983088983097mdashdc983090983091

[B]

983090983088983089983093983088983089983092983088983096983091

Cover art Illustration by Natalie F Smith using details of

Coyolxauhqui (1047297gure FM983089)

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983108983141983140983145983139983151 983141983155983156983141 983148983145983138983154983151 983137 983148983137983155 983149983141983149983151983154983145983137983155 983140983141 983149983145983155 983137983138983157983141983148983137983155 983161

983141983155983152983141983139983145983137983148983149983141983150983156983141 983153983157983141 983156983137983150983156983151 983155983157983142983154983145983141983154983151983150 983161 983137983143983157983137983150983156983137983154983151983150 983161 983137983148983145983149983141983150983156983137983154983151983150

983137 983144983145983146983137983155 983151983155 983137983149983137983150983156983141983155 983161 983137983149983145983143983137983155

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Editorrsquos Introduction ix

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

983137983150983137983148983151983157983145983155983141 983147983141983137983156983145983150983143

Preace | Gestures o the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear 1

1 | Let us be the healing o the wound 9

The Coyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeo

2 | Flights o the Imagination 23

RereadingRewriting Realities

3 | Border Arte 47 Nepantla el lugar de la frontera

4 | Geographies o SelvesmdashReimagining Identity 65

NosOtras (UsOther) las Nepantleras and the New Tribalism

5 | Putting Coyolxauhqui Together 95

A Creative Process

6 | now let us shif conocimiento inner work public acts 117

Agradecimientos | Acknowledgments 161

CONTENTS

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Appendix 1 | Lloronas Dissertation Material 165

(Proposal Table of Contents and Chapter Outline)

Appendix 2 | Anzalduacutearsquos Health 171

Appendix 3 | Un1047297nished Sections and Additional Notes from Chapter 2 176

Appendix 4 | Alternative Opening Chapter 4 180

Appendix 5 | Historical Notes on the Chaptersrsquo Development 190

Appendix 6 | Invitation and Call for Papers Testimonios Volume 200

Notes 205 | Glossary 241 | Bibliography 247 | Index 257

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For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a working

from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporeal abstrac-

tion but on corporeal realities The material body is center and central The

body is the ground of thought983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 ldquo983120983154983141983142983137983139983141 983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161rdquo

What is the theme of my lifersquos work Is it accessing other realities

983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983150983151983156983137983155

In Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity Gloria Anzalduacutea excavates her creative process ( her ldquogestures ofthe bodyrdquo) and uses this excavation to develop an aesthetics of trans-

formation grounded in her metaphysics of interconnectedness1 Fromthe late 983089983097983096983088s when she entered the doctoral program in literature atthe University of California Santa Cruz (983157983139983155983139) until her death in 983090983088983088983092Anzalduacutea aspired to write a book-length exploration of aesthetics andknowledge production as they are in1047298ected through and shaped byissues of social justice identity (trans)formation and healing2 Sheviewed this pro ject both as her dissertation and as a publishable mono-graph although as explained in more detail later she did not follow atypical dissertation process Thoroughly researched and repeatedly

EDITORrsquoS INTRODUCTION

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

AnaLouise Keating

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x | 983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

revised this manuscript underwent numerous shifts in title tableof contents and chapter organization it exists in numerous partialiterationsmdashhandwritten notes outlines chapter drafts e-mail commu-nication conversations with writing comadres and computer 1047297les3 Because of her meticulous revision practices and various complicatedlife issues (including 1047297nancial pressures multiple simultaneous writ-ing projects philosophical changes in worldview and diabetes-relatedhealth complications) Anzalduacutea did not see this book through topublication However she was in the 1047297nal stages of its completion atthe time of her death

Focusing closely on aesthetics ontology epistemology and ethicsLight in the Dark investigates a number of intertwined issues includ-

ing the artist-activistrsquos struggles imagination as an embodied intel-lectual faculty that with careful attention and speci1047297c strategies caneffect personal and social transformation the creative process deco-lonial alternatives to conventional nationalism and more Light in the

Dark also contains important developments in Anzalduacutearsquos theoriesof nepantla and nepantleras spiritual activism new tribalism nosotras conocimiento autohistoria and autohistoria-teoriacutea as wellas additional insights into her writing practice and her intellectual-physiological experiences with diabetes4 In this introduction I show-

case Anzalduacutea as a multifaceted artist-scholar and offer backgroundinformation about the complicated history of this book5 I summarizeAnzalduacutearsquos recursive writing and revision process and situate Light

in the Dark within the context of her oeuvre describe the state of themanuscript at the time of her passing explore Anzalduacutearsquos potentialcontributions to twenty-1047297rst-century continental philosophy and fem-inist thought (especially neo-materialisms object-oriented ontologyand debates concerning the so-called linguistic turn) and speculate

on some of the ways this book might affect Anzalduacutean scholarship Ibegin by summarizing Anzalduacutearsquos complex recursive writing and re-vision process because this process is key to the history of her book

Anzalduacutearsquos writing process

Through a serendipitous series of events I met Gloria Anzalduacutea in983089983097983097983089 and was fortunate to become one of her ldquowriting comadresrdquo Ihad known her only a few days when she gave me a draft of one of her

Prieta stories to read and critique She treated me not as an awestruck

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xi

fan but rather as a colleague with valuable insights6 I was amazedby her gesture There I was an unknown a nobody stumbling throughthe very early stages of my career and yet the creator of three ground-breaking books (BorderlandsLa Frontera This Bridge Called My Back andMaking Face Making Soul) was giving me her manuscripts asking me forfeedbackmdashfor detailed very speci1047297c commentary about her work I wasstruck by Anzalduacutearsquos intellectual-aesthetic humility by her willingnessto share her un1047297nished writings with others and by the partial state ofthe manuscript itself To be sure it was a captivating story (good plotline great characterization interesting ideas powerful metaphorscaptivating dialogue and so on) however the draft was uneven andneeded more work (In fact Anzalduacutea had interspersed revision-

related questions throughout the draft) Because I had assumed thatAnzalduacutearsquos words 1047298owed effortlessly and perfectly from her pen andkeyboard I was startled to realize the extent of her revision process Iam not alone in this type of Anzalduacutean encounter If you look throughher archival materials yoursquoll see that she regularly shared work inprogress with others7

As this anecdote suggests Anzalduacutearsquos approach to writing was dia-logic recursive democratic spirit-in1047298ected and only partially withinher conscious control She relied extensively on intuition imagina-

tion and what she describes in this book as her ldquonagualardquo As sheexplains in the preface

Irsquom guided by the spirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guid-ing spirit) is an inner sensibility that directs my lifemdashan image anaction or an internal experience8 My imagination and my nagualaare connectedmdashthey are aspects of the same process of creativityOften my naguala draws to me things that are contrary to my willand purpose (compulsions addictions negativities) resulting in

an anguished impasse Overcoming these impasses becomes part ofthe process

And what a process it was Anzalduacutearsquos writing process entailedmultiple simultaneous projects numerous drafts of each piece exten-sive revisions of each draft excruciatingly painful writing blocks link-ages and repetition among various writing projects and peer critiquesfrom her ldquowriting comadresrdquo editors and others9

Generally Anzalduacutea began a new pro ject by meditating visualizing

freewriting and collecting diverse source materials these materials

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xxxv

In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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copy 983090983088983089983093 The Gloria E Anzalduacutea Literary Trust

Editorrsquos introduction copy 983090983088983089983093 AnaLouise Keating

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper infin

Designed by Natalie F Smith

Typeset in Caecilia by Westchester Publishing Services

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Anzalduacutea Gloria author

Light in the dark = Luz en lo oscuro rewriting identity spirituality

reality Gloria E Anzalduacutea edited by AnaLouise Keating

pages cmmdash(Latin America otherwise languages empires nations)

Includes bibliographical references and index

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983093983097983095983095-983095 (hardcover alk paper)

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983094983088983088983097-983092 (pbk alk paper)

983145983155983138983150 983097983095983096-983088-983096983090983090983091-983095983093983088983091-983094 (e-book)

983089 Anzalduacutea Gloria 983090 Creation (Literary artistic etc) 983091 Identity(Psychology) 983092 Mexican American women I Keating AnaLouise

983089983097983094983089ndash editor II Title III Title Luz en lo oscuro IV Series Latin

America otherwise

983152983155983091983093983093983089983150983097983093983162983092983094 983090983088983089983093

983096983089983096983093983092983088983097mdashdc983090983091

[B]

983090983088983089983093983088983089983092983088983096983091

Cover art Illustration by Natalie F Smith using details of

Coyolxauhqui (1047297gure FM983089)

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983108983141983140983145983139983151 983141983155983156983141 983148983145983138983154983151 983137 983148983137983155 983149983141983149983151983154983145983137983155 983140983141 983149983145983155 983137983138983157983141983148983137983155 983161

983141983155983152983141983139983145983137983148983149983141983150983156983141 983153983157983141 983156983137983150983156983151 983155983157983142983154983145983141983154983151983150 983161 983137983143983157983137983150983156983137983154983151983150 983161 983137983148983145983149983141983150983156983137983154983151983150

983137 983144983145983146983137983155 983151983155 983137983149983137983150983156983141983155 983161 983137983149983145983143983137983155

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Editorrsquos Introduction ix

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

983137983150983137983148983151983157983145983155983141 983147983141983137983156983145983150983143

Preace | Gestures o the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear 1

1 | Let us be the healing o the wound 9

The Coyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeo

2 | Flights o the Imagination 23

RereadingRewriting Realities

3 | Border Arte 47 Nepantla el lugar de la frontera

4 | Geographies o SelvesmdashReimagining Identity 65

NosOtras (UsOther) las Nepantleras and the New Tribalism

5 | Putting Coyolxauhqui Together 95

A Creative Process

6 | now let us shif conocimiento inner work public acts 117

Agradecimientos | Acknowledgments 161

CONTENTS

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Appendix 1 | Lloronas Dissertation Material 165

(Proposal Table of Contents and Chapter Outline)

Appendix 2 | Anzalduacutearsquos Health 171

Appendix 3 | Un1047297nished Sections and Additional Notes from Chapter 2 176

Appendix 4 | Alternative Opening Chapter 4 180

Appendix 5 | Historical Notes on the Chaptersrsquo Development 190

Appendix 6 | Invitation and Call for Papers Testimonios Volume 200

Notes 205 | Glossary 241 | Bibliography 247 | Index 257

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For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a working

from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporeal abstrac-

tion but on corporeal realities The material body is center and central The

body is the ground of thought983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 ldquo983120983154983141983142983137983139983141 983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161rdquo

What is the theme of my lifersquos work Is it accessing other realities

983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983150983151983156983137983155

In Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity Gloria Anzalduacutea excavates her creative process ( her ldquogestures ofthe bodyrdquo) and uses this excavation to develop an aesthetics of trans-

formation grounded in her metaphysics of interconnectedness1 Fromthe late 983089983097983096983088s when she entered the doctoral program in literature atthe University of California Santa Cruz (983157983139983155983139) until her death in 983090983088983088983092Anzalduacutea aspired to write a book-length exploration of aesthetics andknowledge production as they are in1047298ected through and shaped byissues of social justice identity (trans)formation and healing2 Sheviewed this pro ject both as her dissertation and as a publishable mono-graph although as explained in more detail later she did not follow atypical dissertation process Thoroughly researched and repeatedly

EDITORrsquoS INTRODUCTION

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

AnaLouise Keating

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revised this manuscript underwent numerous shifts in title tableof contents and chapter organization it exists in numerous partialiterationsmdashhandwritten notes outlines chapter drafts e-mail commu-nication conversations with writing comadres and computer 1047297les3 Because of her meticulous revision practices and various complicatedlife issues (including 1047297nancial pressures multiple simultaneous writ-ing projects philosophical changes in worldview and diabetes-relatedhealth complications) Anzalduacutea did not see this book through topublication However she was in the 1047297nal stages of its completion atthe time of her death

Focusing closely on aesthetics ontology epistemology and ethicsLight in the Dark investigates a number of intertwined issues includ-

ing the artist-activistrsquos struggles imagination as an embodied intel-lectual faculty that with careful attention and speci1047297c strategies caneffect personal and social transformation the creative process deco-lonial alternatives to conventional nationalism and more Light in the

Dark also contains important developments in Anzalduacutearsquos theoriesof nepantla and nepantleras spiritual activism new tribalism nosotras conocimiento autohistoria and autohistoria-teoriacutea as wellas additional insights into her writing practice and her intellectual-physiological experiences with diabetes4 In this introduction I show-

case Anzalduacutea as a multifaceted artist-scholar and offer backgroundinformation about the complicated history of this book5 I summarizeAnzalduacutearsquos recursive writing and revision process and situate Light

in the Dark within the context of her oeuvre describe the state of themanuscript at the time of her passing explore Anzalduacutearsquos potentialcontributions to twenty-1047297rst-century continental philosophy and fem-inist thought (especially neo-materialisms object-oriented ontologyand debates concerning the so-called linguistic turn) and speculate

on some of the ways this book might affect Anzalduacutean scholarship Ibegin by summarizing Anzalduacutearsquos complex recursive writing and re-vision process because this process is key to the history of her book

Anzalduacutearsquos writing process

Through a serendipitous series of events I met Gloria Anzalduacutea in983089983097983097983089 and was fortunate to become one of her ldquowriting comadresrdquo Ihad known her only a few days when she gave me a draft of one of her

Prieta stories to read and critique She treated me not as an awestruck

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fan but rather as a colleague with valuable insights6 I was amazedby her gesture There I was an unknown a nobody stumbling throughthe very early stages of my career and yet the creator of three ground-breaking books (BorderlandsLa Frontera This Bridge Called My Back andMaking Face Making Soul) was giving me her manuscripts asking me forfeedbackmdashfor detailed very speci1047297c commentary about her work I wasstruck by Anzalduacutearsquos intellectual-aesthetic humility by her willingnessto share her un1047297nished writings with others and by the partial state ofthe manuscript itself To be sure it was a captivating story (good plotline great characterization interesting ideas powerful metaphorscaptivating dialogue and so on) however the draft was uneven andneeded more work (In fact Anzalduacutea had interspersed revision-

related questions throughout the draft) Because I had assumed thatAnzalduacutearsquos words 1047298owed effortlessly and perfectly from her pen andkeyboard I was startled to realize the extent of her revision process Iam not alone in this type of Anzalduacutean encounter If you look throughher archival materials yoursquoll see that she regularly shared work inprogress with others7

As this anecdote suggests Anzalduacutearsquos approach to writing was dia-logic recursive democratic spirit-in1047298ected and only partially withinher conscious control She relied extensively on intuition imagina-

tion and what she describes in this book as her ldquonagualardquo As sheexplains in the preface

Irsquom guided by the spirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guid-ing spirit) is an inner sensibility that directs my lifemdashan image anaction or an internal experience8 My imagination and my nagualaare connectedmdashthey are aspects of the same process of creativityOften my naguala draws to me things that are contrary to my willand purpose (compulsions addictions negativities) resulting in

an anguished impasse Overcoming these impasses becomes part ofthe process

And what a process it was Anzalduacutearsquos writing process entailedmultiple simultaneous projects numerous drafts of each piece exten-sive revisions of each draft excruciatingly painful writing blocks link-ages and repetition among various writing projects and peer critiquesfrom her ldquowriting comadresrdquo editors and others9

Generally Anzalduacutea began a new pro ject by meditating visualizing

freewriting and collecting diverse source materials these materials

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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983092 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983108983141983140983145983139983151 983141983155983156983141 983148983145983138983154983151 983137 983148983137983155 983149983141983149983151983154983145983137983155 983140983141 983149983145983155 983137983138983157983141983148983137983155 983161

983141983155983152983141983139983145983137983148983149983141983150983156983141 983153983157983141 983156983137983150983156983151 983155983157983142983154983145983141983154983151983150 983161 983137983143983157983137983150983156983137983154983151983150 983161 983137983148983145983149983141983150983156983137983154983151983150

983137 983144983145983146983137983155 983151983155 983137983149983137983150983156983141983155 983161 983137983149983145983143983137983155

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Editorrsquos Introduction ix

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

983137983150983137983148983151983157983145983155983141 983147983141983137983156983145983150983143

Preace | Gestures o the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear 1

1 | Let us be the healing o the wound 9

The Coyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeo

2 | Flights o the Imagination 23

RereadingRewriting Realities

3 | Border Arte 47 Nepantla el lugar de la frontera

4 | Geographies o SelvesmdashReimagining Identity 65

NosOtras (UsOther) las Nepantleras and the New Tribalism

5 | Putting Coyolxauhqui Together 95

A Creative Process

6 | now let us shif conocimiento inner work public acts 117

Agradecimientos | Acknowledgments 161

CONTENTS

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Appendix 1 | Lloronas Dissertation Material 165

(Proposal Table of Contents and Chapter Outline)

Appendix 2 | Anzalduacutearsquos Health 171

Appendix 3 | Un1047297nished Sections and Additional Notes from Chapter 2 176

Appendix 4 | Alternative Opening Chapter 4 180

Appendix 5 | Historical Notes on the Chaptersrsquo Development 190

Appendix 6 | Invitation and Call for Papers Testimonios Volume 200

Notes 205 | Glossary 241 | Bibliography 247 | Index 257

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For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a working

from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporeal abstrac-

tion but on corporeal realities The material body is center and central The

body is the ground of thought983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 ldquo983120983154983141983142983137983139983141 983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161rdquo

What is the theme of my lifersquos work Is it accessing other realities

983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983150983151983156983137983155

In Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity Gloria Anzalduacutea excavates her creative process ( her ldquogestures ofthe bodyrdquo) and uses this excavation to develop an aesthetics of trans-

formation grounded in her metaphysics of interconnectedness1 Fromthe late 983089983097983096983088s when she entered the doctoral program in literature atthe University of California Santa Cruz (983157983139983155983139) until her death in 983090983088983088983092Anzalduacutea aspired to write a book-length exploration of aesthetics andknowledge production as they are in1047298ected through and shaped byissues of social justice identity (trans)formation and healing2 Sheviewed this pro ject both as her dissertation and as a publishable mono-graph although as explained in more detail later she did not follow atypical dissertation process Thoroughly researched and repeatedly

EDITORrsquoS INTRODUCTION

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

AnaLouise Keating

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revised this manuscript underwent numerous shifts in title tableof contents and chapter organization it exists in numerous partialiterationsmdashhandwritten notes outlines chapter drafts e-mail commu-nication conversations with writing comadres and computer 1047297les3 Because of her meticulous revision practices and various complicatedlife issues (including 1047297nancial pressures multiple simultaneous writ-ing projects philosophical changes in worldview and diabetes-relatedhealth complications) Anzalduacutea did not see this book through topublication However she was in the 1047297nal stages of its completion atthe time of her death

Focusing closely on aesthetics ontology epistemology and ethicsLight in the Dark investigates a number of intertwined issues includ-

ing the artist-activistrsquos struggles imagination as an embodied intel-lectual faculty that with careful attention and speci1047297c strategies caneffect personal and social transformation the creative process deco-lonial alternatives to conventional nationalism and more Light in the

Dark also contains important developments in Anzalduacutearsquos theoriesof nepantla and nepantleras spiritual activism new tribalism nosotras conocimiento autohistoria and autohistoria-teoriacutea as wellas additional insights into her writing practice and her intellectual-physiological experiences with diabetes4 In this introduction I show-

case Anzalduacutea as a multifaceted artist-scholar and offer backgroundinformation about the complicated history of this book5 I summarizeAnzalduacutearsquos recursive writing and revision process and situate Light

in the Dark within the context of her oeuvre describe the state of themanuscript at the time of her passing explore Anzalduacutearsquos potentialcontributions to twenty-1047297rst-century continental philosophy and fem-inist thought (especially neo-materialisms object-oriented ontologyand debates concerning the so-called linguistic turn) and speculate

on some of the ways this book might affect Anzalduacutean scholarship Ibegin by summarizing Anzalduacutearsquos complex recursive writing and re-vision process because this process is key to the history of her book

Anzalduacutearsquos writing process

Through a serendipitous series of events I met Gloria Anzalduacutea in983089983097983097983089 and was fortunate to become one of her ldquowriting comadresrdquo Ihad known her only a few days when she gave me a draft of one of her

Prieta stories to read and critique She treated me not as an awestruck

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fan but rather as a colleague with valuable insights6 I was amazedby her gesture There I was an unknown a nobody stumbling throughthe very early stages of my career and yet the creator of three ground-breaking books (BorderlandsLa Frontera This Bridge Called My Back andMaking Face Making Soul) was giving me her manuscripts asking me forfeedbackmdashfor detailed very speci1047297c commentary about her work I wasstruck by Anzalduacutearsquos intellectual-aesthetic humility by her willingnessto share her un1047297nished writings with others and by the partial state ofthe manuscript itself To be sure it was a captivating story (good plotline great characterization interesting ideas powerful metaphorscaptivating dialogue and so on) however the draft was uneven andneeded more work (In fact Anzalduacutea had interspersed revision-

related questions throughout the draft) Because I had assumed thatAnzalduacutearsquos words 1047298owed effortlessly and perfectly from her pen andkeyboard I was startled to realize the extent of her revision process Iam not alone in this type of Anzalduacutean encounter If you look throughher archival materials yoursquoll see that she regularly shared work inprogress with others7

As this anecdote suggests Anzalduacutearsquos approach to writing was dia-logic recursive democratic spirit-in1047298ected and only partially withinher conscious control She relied extensively on intuition imagina-

tion and what she describes in this book as her ldquonagualardquo As sheexplains in the preface

Irsquom guided by the spirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guid-ing spirit) is an inner sensibility that directs my lifemdashan image anaction or an internal experience8 My imagination and my nagualaare connectedmdashthey are aspects of the same process of creativityOften my naguala draws to me things that are contrary to my willand purpose (compulsions addictions negativities) resulting in

an anguished impasse Overcoming these impasses becomes part ofthe process

And what a process it was Anzalduacutearsquos writing process entailedmultiple simultaneous projects numerous drafts of each piece exten-sive revisions of each draft excruciatingly painful writing blocks link-ages and repetition among various writing projects and peer critiquesfrom her ldquowriting comadresrdquo editors and others9

Generally Anzalduacutea began a new pro ject by meditating visualizing

freewriting and collecting diverse source materials these materials

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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Editorrsquos Introduction ix

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

983137983150983137983148983151983157983145983155983141 983147983141983137983156983145983150983143

Preace | Gestures o the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear 1

1 | Let us be the healing o the wound 9

The Coyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeo

2 | Flights o the Imagination 23

RereadingRewriting Realities

3 | Border Arte 47 Nepantla el lugar de la frontera

4 | Geographies o SelvesmdashReimagining Identity 65

NosOtras (UsOther) las Nepantleras and the New Tribalism

5 | Putting Coyolxauhqui Together 95

A Creative Process

6 | now let us shif conocimiento inner work public acts 117

Agradecimientos | Acknowledgments 161

CONTENTS

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Appendix 1 | Lloronas Dissertation Material 165

(Proposal Table of Contents and Chapter Outline)

Appendix 2 | Anzalduacutearsquos Health 171

Appendix 3 | Un1047297nished Sections and Additional Notes from Chapter 2 176

Appendix 4 | Alternative Opening Chapter 4 180

Appendix 5 | Historical Notes on the Chaptersrsquo Development 190

Appendix 6 | Invitation and Call for Papers Testimonios Volume 200

Notes 205 | Glossary 241 | Bibliography 247 | Index 257

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For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a working

from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporeal abstrac-

tion but on corporeal realities The material body is center and central The

body is the ground of thought983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 ldquo983120983154983141983142983137983139983141 983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161rdquo

What is the theme of my lifersquos work Is it accessing other realities

983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983150983151983156983137983155

In Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity Gloria Anzalduacutea excavates her creative process ( her ldquogestures ofthe bodyrdquo) and uses this excavation to develop an aesthetics of trans-

formation grounded in her metaphysics of interconnectedness1 Fromthe late 983089983097983096983088s when she entered the doctoral program in literature atthe University of California Santa Cruz (983157983139983155983139) until her death in 983090983088983088983092Anzalduacutea aspired to write a book-length exploration of aesthetics andknowledge production as they are in1047298ected through and shaped byissues of social justice identity (trans)formation and healing2 Sheviewed this pro ject both as her dissertation and as a publishable mono-graph although as explained in more detail later she did not follow atypical dissertation process Thoroughly researched and repeatedly

EDITORrsquoS INTRODUCTION

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

AnaLouise Keating

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revised this manuscript underwent numerous shifts in title tableof contents and chapter organization it exists in numerous partialiterationsmdashhandwritten notes outlines chapter drafts e-mail commu-nication conversations with writing comadres and computer 1047297les3 Because of her meticulous revision practices and various complicatedlife issues (including 1047297nancial pressures multiple simultaneous writ-ing projects philosophical changes in worldview and diabetes-relatedhealth complications) Anzalduacutea did not see this book through topublication However she was in the 1047297nal stages of its completion atthe time of her death

Focusing closely on aesthetics ontology epistemology and ethicsLight in the Dark investigates a number of intertwined issues includ-

ing the artist-activistrsquos struggles imagination as an embodied intel-lectual faculty that with careful attention and speci1047297c strategies caneffect personal and social transformation the creative process deco-lonial alternatives to conventional nationalism and more Light in the

Dark also contains important developments in Anzalduacutearsquos theoriesof nepantla and nepantleras spiritual activism new tribalism nosotras conocimiento autohistoria and autohistoria-teoriacutea as wellas additional insights into her writing practice and her intellectual-physiological experiences with diabetes4 In this introduction I show-

case Anzalduacutea as a multifaceted artist-scholar and offer backgroundinformation about the complicated history of this book5 I summarizeAnzalduacutearsquos recursive writing and revision process and situate Light

in the Dark within the context of her oeuvre describe the state of themanuscript at the time of her passing explore Anzalduacutearsquos potentialcontributions to twenty-1047297rst-century continental philosophy and fem-inist thought (especially neo-materialisms object-oriented ontologyand debates concerning the so-called linguistic turn) and speculate

on some of the ways this book might affect Anzalduacutean scholarship Ibegin by summarizing Anzalduacutearsquos complex recursive writing and re-vision process because this process is key to the history of her book

Anzalduacutearsquos writing process

Through a serendipitous series of events I met Gloria Anzalduacutea in983089983097983097983089 and was fortunate to become one of her ldquowriting comadresrdquo Ihad known her only a few days when she gave me a draft of one of her

Prieta stories to read and critique She treated me not as an awestruck

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fan but rather as a colleague with valuable insights6 I was amazedby her gesture There I was an unknown a nobody stumbling throughthe very early stages of my career and yet the creator of three ground-breaking books (BorderlandsLa Frontera This Bridge Called My Back andMaking Face Making Soul) was giving me her manuscripts asking me forfeedbackmdashfor detailed very speci1047297c commentary about her work I wasstruck by Anzalduacutearsquos intellectual-aesthetic humility by her willingnessto share her un1047297nished writings with others and by the partial state ofthe manuscript itself To be sure it was a captivating story (good plotline great characterization interesting ideas powerful metaphorscaptivating dialogue and so on) however the draft was uneven andneeded more work (In fact Anzalduacutea had interspersed revision-

related questions throughout the draft) Because I had assumed thatAnzalduacutearsquos words 1047298owed effortlessly and perfectly from her pen andkeyboard I was startled to realize the extent of her revision process Iam not alone in this type of Anzalduacutean encounter If you look throughher archival materials yoursquoll see that she regularly shared work inprogress with others7

As this anecdote suggests Anzalduacutearsquos approach to writing was dia-logic recursive democratic spirit-in1047298ected and only partially withinher conscious control She relied extensively on intuition imagina-

tion and what she describes in this book as her ldquonagualardquo As sheexplains in the preface

Irsquom guided by the spirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guid-ing spirit) is an inner sensibility that directs my lifemdashan image anaction or an internal experience8 My imagination and my nagualaare connectedmdashthey are aspects of the same process of creativityOften my naguala draws to me things that are contrary to my willand purpose (compulsions addictions negativities) resulting in

an anguished impasse Overcoming these impasses becomes part ofthe process

And what a process it was Anzalduacutearsquos writing process entailedmultiple simultaneous projects numerous drafts of each piece exten-sive revisions of each draft excruciatingly painful writing blocks link-ages and repetition among various writing projects and peer critiquesfrom her ldquowriting comadresrdquo editors and others9

Generally Anzalduacutea began a new pro ject by meditating visualizing

freewriting and collecting diverse source materials these materials

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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xxxvi | 983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xxxvii

her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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Appendix 1 | Lloronas Dissertation Material 165

(Proposal Table of Contents and Chapter Outline)

Appendix 2 | Anzalduacutearsquos Health 171

Appendix 3 | Un1047297nished Sections and Additional Notes from Chapter 2 176

Appendix 4 | Alternative Opening Chapter 4 180

Appendix 5 | Historical Notes on the Chaptersrsquo Development 190

Appendix 6 | Invitation and Call for Papers Testimonios Volume 200

Notes 205 | Glossary 241 | Bibliography 247 | Index 257

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For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a working

from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporeal abstrac-

tion but on corporeal realities The material body is center and central The

body is the ground of thought983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 ldquo983120983154983141983142983137983139983141 983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161rdquo

What is the theme of my lifersquos work Is it accessing other realities

983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983150983151983156983137983155

In Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity Gloria Anzalduacutea excavates her creative process ( her ldquogestures ofthe bodyrdquo) and uses this excavation to develop an aesthetics of trans-

formation grounded in her metaphysics of interconnectedness1 Fromthe late 983089983097983096983088s when she entered the doctoral program in literature atthe University of California Santa Cruz (983157983139983155983139) until her death in 983090983088983088983092Anzalduacutea aspired to write a book-length exploration of aesthetics andknowledge production as they are in1047298ected through and shaped byissues of social justice identity (trans)formation and healing2 Sheviewed this pro ject both as her dissertation and as a publishable mono-graph although as explained in more detail later she did not follow atypical dissertation process Thoroughly researched and repeatedly

EDITORrsquoS INTRODUCTION

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

AnaLouise Keating

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x | 983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

revised this manuscript underwent numerous shifts in title tableof contents and chapter organization it exists in numerous partialiterationsmdashhandwritten notes outlines chapter drafts e-mail commu-nication conversations with writing comadres and computer 1047297les3 Because of her meticulous revision practices and various complicatedlife issues (including 1047297nancial pressures multiple simultaneous writ-ing projects philosophical changes in worldview and diabetes-relatedhealth complications) Anzalduacutea did not see this book through topublication However she was in the 1047297nal stages of its completion atthe time of her death

Focusing closely on aesthetics ontology epistemology and ethicsLight in the Dark investigates a number of intertwined issues includ-

ing the artist-activistrsquos struggles imagination as an embodied intel-lectual faculty that with careful attention and speci1047297c strategies caneffect personal and social transformation the creative process deco-lonial alternatives to conventional nationalism and more Light in the

Dark also contains important developments in Anzalduacutearsquos theoriesof nepantla and nepantleras spiritual activism new tribalism nosotras conocimiento autohistoria and autohistoria-teoriacutea as wellas additional insights into her writing practice and her intellectual-physiological experiences with diabetes4 In this introduction I show-

case Anzalduacutea as a multifaceted artist-scholar and offer backgroundinformation about the complicated history of this book5 I summarizeAnzalduacutearsquos recursive writing and revision process and situate Light

in the Dark within the context of her oeuvre describe the state of themanuscript at the time of her passing explore Anzalduacutearsquos potentialcontributions to twenty-1047297rst-century continental philosophy and fem-inist thought (especially neo-materialisms object-oriented ontologyand debates concerning the so-called linguistic turn) and speculate

on some of the ways this book might affect Anzalduacutean scholarship Ibegin by summarizing Anzalduacutearsquos complex recursive writing and re-vision process because this process is key to the history of her book

Anzalduacutearsquos writing process

Through a serendipitous series of events I met Gloria Anzalduacutea in983089983097983097983089 and was fortunate to become one of her ldquowriting comadresrdquo Ihad known her only a few days when she gave me a draft of one of her

Prieta stories to read and critique She treated me not as an awestruck

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xi

fan but rather as a colleague with valuable insights6 I was amazedby her gesture There I was an unknown a nobody stumbling throughthe very early stages of my career and yet the creator of three ground-breaking books (BorderlandsLa Frontera This Bridge Called My Back andMaking Face Making Soul) was giving me her manuscripts asking me forfeedbackmdashfor detailed very speci1047297c commentary about her work I wasstruck by Anzalduacutearsquos intellectual-aesthetic humility by her willingnessto share her un1047297nished writings with others and by the partial state ofthe manuscript itself To be sure it was a captivating story (good plotline great characterization interesting ideas powerful metaphorscaptivating dialogue and so on) however the draft was uneven andneeded more work (In fact Anzalduacutea had interspersed revision-

related questions throughout the draft) Because I had assumed thatAnzalduacutearsquos words 1047298owed effortlessly and perfectly from her pen andkeyboard I was startled to realize the extent of her revision process Iam not alone in this type of Anzalduacutean encounter If you look throughher archival materials yoursquoll see that she regularly shared work inprogress with others7

As this anecdote suggests Anzalduacutearsquos approach to writing was dia-logic recursive democratic spirit-in1047298ected and only partially withinher conscious control She relied extensively on intuition imagina-

tion and what she describes in this book as her ldquonagualardquo As sheexplains in the preface

Irsquom guided by the spirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guid-ing spirit) is an inner sensibility that directs my lifemdashan image anaction or an internal experience8 My imagination and my nagualaare connectedmdashthey are aspects of the same process of creativityOften my naguala draws to me things that are contrary to my willand purpose (compulsions addictions negativities) resulting in

an anguished impasse Overcoming these impasses becomes part ofthe process

And what a process it was Anzalduacutearsquos writing process entailedmultiple simultaneous projects numerous drafts of each piece exten-sive revisions of each draft excruciatingly painful writing blocks link-ages and repetition among various writing projects and peer critiquesfrom her ldquowriting comadresrdquo editors and others9

Generally Anzalduacutea began a new pro ject by meditating visualizing

freewriting and collecting diverse source materials these materials

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a working

from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporeal abstrac-

tion but on corporeal realities The material body is center and central The

body is the ground of thought983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 ldquo983120983154983141983142983137983139983141 983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161rdquo

What is the theme of my lifersquos work Is it accessing other realities

983111983148983151983154983145983137 983105983150983162983137983148983140983290983137 983159983154983145983156983145983150983143 983150983151983156983137983155

In Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity Gloria Anzalduacutea excavates her creative process ( her ldquogestures ofthe bodyrdquo) and uses this excavation to develop an aesthetics of trans-

formation grounded in her metaphysics of interconnectedness1 Fromthe late 983089983097983096983088s when she entered the doctoral program in literature atthe University of California Santa Cruz (983157983139983155983139) until her death in 983090983088983088983092Anzalduacutea aspired to write a book-length exploration of aesthetics andknowledge production as they are in1047298ected through and shaped byissues of social justice identity (trans)formation and healing2 Sheviewed this pro ject both as her dissertation and as a publishable mono-graph although as explained in more detail later she did not follow atypical dissertation process Thoroughly researched and repeatedly

EDITORrsquoS INTRODUCTION

Re-envisioning Coyolxauhqui Decolonizing Reality

Anzalduacutearsquos Twenty-First-Century Imperative

AnaLouise Keating

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revised this manuscript underwent numerous shifts in title tableof contents and chapter organization it exists in numerous partialiterationsmdashhandwritten notes outlines chapter drafts e-mail commu-nication conversations with writing comadres and computer 1047297les3 Because of her meticulous revision practices and various complicatedlife issues (including 1047297nancial pressures multiple simultaneous writ-ing projects philosophical changes in worldview and diabetes-relatedhealth complications) Anzalduacutea did not see this book through topublication However she was in the 1047297nal stages of its completion atthe time of her death

Focusing closely on aesthetics ontology epistemology and ethicsLight in the Dark investigates a number of intertwined issues includ-

ing the artist-activistrsquos struggles imagination as an embodied intel-lectual faculty that with careful attention and speci1047297c strategies caneffect personal and social transformation the creative process deco-lonial alternatives to conventional nationalism and more Light in the

Dark also contains important developments in Anzalduacutearsquos theoriesof nepantla and nepantleras spiritual activism new tribalism nosotras conocimiento autohistoria and autohistoria-teoriacutea as wellas additional insights into her writing practice and her intellectual-physiological experiences with diabetes4 In this introduction I show-

case Anzalduacutea as a multifaceted artist-scholar and offer backgroundinformation about the complicated history of this book5 I summarizeAnzalduacutearsquos recursive writing and revision process and situate Light

in the Dark within the context of her oeuvre describe the state of themanuscript at the time of her passing explore Anzalduacutearsquos potentialcontributions to twenty-1047297rst-century continental philosophy and fem-inist thought (especially neo-materialisms object-oriented ontologyand debates concerning the so-called linguistic turn) and speculate

on some of the ways this book might affect Anzalduacutean scholarship Ibegin by summarizing Anzalduacutearsquos complex recursive writing and re-vision process because this process is key to the history of her book

Anzalduacutearsquos writing process

Through a serendipitous series of events I met Gloria Anzalduacutea in983089983097983097983089 and was fortunate to become one of her ldquowriting comadresrdquo Ihad known her only a few days when she gave me a draft of one of her

Prieta stories to read and critique She treated me not as an awestruck

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fan but rather as a colleague with valuable insights6 I was amazedby her gesture There I was an unknown a nobody stumbling throughthe very early stages of my career and yet the creator of three ground-breaking books (BorderlandsLa Frontera This Bridge Called My Back andMaking Face Making Soul) was giving me her manuscripts asking me forfeedbackmdashfor detailed very speci1047297c commentary about her work I wasstruck by Anzalduacutearsquos intellectual-aesthetic humility by her willingnessto share her un1047297nished writings with others and by the partial state ofthe manuscript itself To be sure it was a captivating story (good plotline great characterization interesting ideas powerful metaphorscaptivating dialogue and so on) however the draft was uneven andneeded more work (In fact Anzalduacutea had interspersed revision-

related questions throughout the draft) Because I had assumed thatAnzalduacutearsquos words 1047298owed effortlessly and perfectly from her pen andkeyboard I was startled to realize the extent of her revision process Iam not alone in this type of Anzalduacutean encounter If you look throughher archival materials yoursquoll see that she regularly shared work inprogress with others7

As this anecdote suggests Anzalduacutearsquos approach to writing was dia-logic recursive democratic spirit-in1047298ected and only partially withinher conscious control She relied extensively on intuition imagina-

tion and what she describes in this book as her ldquonagualardquo As sheexplains in the preface

Irsquom guided by the spirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guid-ing spirit) is an inner sensibility that directs my lifemdashan image anaction or an internal experience8 My imagination and my nagualaare connectedmdashthey are aspects of the same process of creativityOften my naguala draws to me things that are contrary to my willand purpose (compulsions addictions negativities) resulting in

an anguished impasse Overcoming these impasses becomes part ofthe process

And what a process it was Anzalduacutearsquos writing process entailedmultiple simultaneous projects numerous drafts of each piece exten-sive revisions of each draft excruciatingly painful writing blocks link-ages and repetition among various writing projects and peer critiquesfrom her ldquowriting comadresrdquo editors and others9

Generally Anzalduacutea began a new pro ject by meditating visualizing

freewriting and collecting diverse source materials these materials

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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revised this manuscript underwent numerous shifts in title tableof contents and chapter organization it exists in numerous partialiterationsmdashhandwritten notes outlines chapter drafts e-mail commu-nication conversations with writing comadres and computer 1047297les3 Because of her meticulous revision practices and various complicatedlife issues (including 1047297nancial pressures multiple simultaneous writ-ing projects philosophical changes in worldview and diabetes-relatedhealth complications) Anzalduacutea did not see this book through topublication However she was in the 1047297nal stages of its completion atthe time of her death

Focusing closely on aesthetics ontology epistemology and ethicsLight in the Dark investigates a number of intertwined issues includ-

ing the artist-activistrsquos struggles imagination as an embodied intel-lectual faculty that with careful attention and speci1047297c strategies caneffect personal and social transformation the creative process deco-lonial alternatives to conventional nationalism and more Light in the

Dark also contains important developments in Anzalduacutearsquos theoriesof nepantla and nepantleras spiritual activism new tribalism nosotras conocimiento autohistoria and autohistoria-teoriacutea as wellas additional insights into her writing practice and her intellectual-physiological experiences with diabetes4 In this introduction I show-

case Anzalduacutea as a multifaceted artist-scholar and offer backgroundinformation about the complicated history of this book5 I summarizeAnzalduacutearsquos recursive writing and revision process and situate Light

in the Dark within the context of her oeuvre describe the state of themanuscript at the time of her passing explore Anzalduacutearsquos potentialcontributions to twenty-1047297rst-century continental philosophy and fem-inist thought (especially neo-materialisms object-oriented ontologyand debates concerning the so-called linguistic turn) and speculate

on some of the ways this book might affect Anzalduacutean scholarship Ibegin by summarizing Anzalduacutearsquos complex recursive writing and re-vision process because this process is key to the history of her book

Anzalduacutearsquos writing process

Through a serendipitous series of events I met Gloria Anzalduacutea in983089983097983097983089 and was fortunate to become one of her ldquowriting comadresrdquo Ihad known her only a few days when she gave me a draft of one of her

Prieta stories to read and critique She treated me not as an awestruck

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fan but rather as a colleague with valuable insights6 I was amazedby her gesture There I was an unknown a nobody stumbling throughthe very early stages of my career and yet the creator of three ground-breaking books (BorderlandsLa Frontera This Bridge Called My Back andMaking Face Making Soul) was giving me her manuscripts asking me forfeedbackmdashfor detailed very speci1047297c commentary about her work I wasstruck by Anzalduacutearsquos intellectual-aesthetic humility by her willingnessto share her un1047297nished writings with others and by the partial state ofthe manuscript itself To be sure it was a captivating story (good plotline great characterization interesting ideas powerful metaphorscaptivating dialogue and so on) however the draft was uneven andneeded more work (In fact Anzalduacutea had interspersed revision-

related questions throughout the draft) Because I had assumed thatAnzalduacutearsquos words 1047298owed effortlessly and perfectly from her pen andkeyboard I was startled to realize the extent of her revision process Iam not alone in this type of Anzalduacutean encounter If you look throughher archival materials yoursquoll see that she regularly shared work inprogress with others7

As this anecdote suggests Anzalduacutearsquos approach to writing was dia-logic recursive democratic spirit-in1047298ected and only partially withinher conscious control She relied extensively on intuition imagina-

tion and what she describes in this book as her ldquonagualardquo As sheexplains in the preface

Irsquom guided by the spirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guid-ing spirit) is an inner sensibility that directs my lifemdashan image anaction or an internal experience8 My imagination and my nagualaare connectedmdashthey are aspects of the same process of creativityOften my naguala draws to me things that are contrary to my willand purpose (compulsions addictions negativities) resulting in

an anguished impasse Overcoming these impasses becomes part ofthe process

And what a process it was Anzalduacutearsquos writing process entailedmultiple simultaneous projects numerous drafts of each piece exten-sive revisions of each draft excruciatingly painful writing blocks link-ages and repetition among various writing projects and peer critiquesfrom her ldquowriting comadresrdquo editors and others9

Generally Anzalduacutea began a new pro ject by meditating visualizing

freewriting and collecting diverse source materials these materials

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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fan but rather as a colleague with valuable insights6 I was amazedby her gesture There I was an unknown a nobody stumbling throughthe very early stages of my career and yet the creator of three ground-breaking books (BorderlandsLa Frontera This Bridge Called My Back andMaking Face Making Soul) was giving me her manuscripts asking me forfeedbackmdashfor detailed very speci1047297c commentary about her work I wasstruck by Anzalduacutearsquos intellectual-aesthetic humility by her willingnessto share her un1047297nished writings with others and by the partial state ofthe manuscript itself To be sure it was a captivating story (good plotline great characterization interesting ideas powerful metaphorscaptivating dialogue and so on) however the draft was uneven andneeded more work (In fact Anzalduacutea had interspersed revision-

related questions throughout the draft) Because I had assumed thatAnzalduacutearsquos words 1047298owed effortlessly and perfectly from her pen andkeyboard I was startled to realize the extent of her revision process Iam not alone in this type of Anzalduacutean encounter If you look throughher archival materials yoursquoll see that she regularly shared work inprogress with others7

As this anecdote suggests Anzalduacutearsquos approach to writing was dia-logic recursive democratic spirit-in1047298ected and only partially withinher conscious control She relied extensively on intuition imagina-

tion and what she describes in this book as her ldquonagualardquo As sheexplains in the preface

Irsquom guided by the spirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guid-ing spirit) is an inner sensibility that directs my lifemdashan image anaction or an internal experience8 My imagination and my nagualaare connectedmdashthey are aspects of the same process of creativityOften my naguala draws to me things that are contrary to my willand purpose (compulsions addictions negativities) resulting in

an anguished impasse Overcoming these impasses becomes part ofthe process

And what a process it was Anzalduacutearsquos writing process entailedmultiple simultaneous projects numerous drafts of each piece exten-sive revisions of each draft excruciatingly painful writing blocks link-ages and repetition among various writing projects and peer critiquesfrom her ldquowriting comadresrdquo editors and others9

Generally Anzalduacutea began a new pro ject by meditating visualizing

freewriting and collecting diverse source materials these materials

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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were often hybrid and apparently random including some or all of thefollowing dreams meditations journal entries 1047297lms she had seenthoughts scribbled in notebooks and on pieces of paper article clip-pings scholarly books observations from her interactions with humanand nonhuman others lecture notes transcripts from previous lec-tures and interviews and other ldquowriting notasrdquo10 To create a 1047297rst draft(or what she describes in chapter 983093 as her 1047297rst ldquopre-draftrdquo) she wouldpull together various assemblages of these materials following a fewkey headers or topic points as revealed through her free writes Thispre-draft was often quite rough containing very short paragraphs andlacking transitions logical organization and other conventional writ-ing elements After completing several pre-drafts Anzalduacutea devel-

oped her 1047297rst draft which she would then begin to revise She rereadthis draft multiple times making extensive changes that involvedsome or all of the following acts rearranging individual words entiresentences and paragraphs adding or deleting large chunks of mate-rial copying and repeating especially signi1047297cant phrases and insert-ing material from other works in progress

Throughout this process Anzalduacutea focused simultaneously on con-tent and form She wanted the words to move in readersrsquo bodies andtransform them from the inside out and she revised repeatedly to

achieve this impact She revised for cadence musicality nuancedmeaning and metaphoric complexity Anzalduacutea repeated this revi-sion step numerous times at some point re-saving the draft under anew name and sharing it with one or more of her ldquowriting comadresrdquorequesting both speci1047297c and general comments which she then selec-tively incorporated into future revisions After revising multiple timesAnzalduacutea moved on to proofreading and editing the draft At some pointshe would either send the draft out for publication or put it away to

be worked on at a later date11

As this serpentine process suggests for Anzalduacutea writing was epis-temological intuitive and communal Like many authors she did notsit down at her keyboard with a fully developed idea and a logically or-ganized outline She generated her ideas as she wrote the writing pro-cess was itself a co-creator of the theoriesmdasha co-author of sorts Asshe explained in a 983089983097983097983089 interview ldquoI discover what Irsquom trying to say asthe writing progressesrdquo12 She often began with a question a personalexperience or a feeling she worked through these seedling ideas as

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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she wrote and revised and she did so in ways only partially under herconscious control The words took on lives of their own morphing inways that Anzalduacutea didnrsquot expect when she sat down to write In shortshe learned as she wrote she developed her ideas as she revisedAnd for Anzalduacutea revision could be endless One could argue thatcompletionmdash1047297nal satisfactionmdashnever exists in Anzalduacutearsquos writingprocess She has her own version of what Ralph Waldo Emerson callsldquothe Unattainable the 1047298ying Perfect around which the hands cannever meet at once the inspirer and the condemner of every successrdquoEven after publishing her work she continued to revise it13

Nowhere is this process more evident (and more confounding)than in Anzalduacutearsquos creation of Light in the DarkLuz en lo oscuro

History of the Book(s)

Because Anzalduacutea described Light in the Dark as her dissertation andviewed it as a continuation of her earlier dissertation work I anchorthis bookrsquos history in the story of her doctoral education From 983089983097983095983092 to983089983097983095983095 Anzalduacutea was enrolled in the doctoral program in comparativeliterature at the University of Texas Austin where she focused onldquoSpanish literature feminist theory and Chicano literaturerdquo14 Disap-

pointed by the programrsquos restrictions and determined to devote her lifeto her writing she left before advancing to candidacy15 Fast-forwardtwelve years to 983089983097983096983096 when Anzalduacutea then living in San Franciscodecided to return to graduate school and complete her degree Shebelieved that enrolling in a doctoral program would enable her to pri-oritize her intellectual growth while offering protection from beingoverused as a resource (guest speaker consultant editor and so on)for others As she explained in an unpublished 983089983097983096983097 interview with

Kate McCafferty ldquoBeing back in school gives me access to more booksthe latest theories and fellowship while getting credit for it I needthis kind of environment to get a handle on my life After Borderlands I was very much in demand in terms of attending a class or a reading Being too much out in the world was not balanced by my time athomerdquo16 Returning to graduate schoolmdasha location designed to fos-ter the life of the mindmdashenabled Anzalduacutea to prioritize her writingobtain scholarly resources at a 1047297rst-class university library accessa community of scholars who could give her critical feedback on her

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work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xxxv

In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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xiv | 983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

work and hone her academic writing skills17 And so in 983089983097983096983096 Anzalduacuteaenrolled in the doctoral program in literature at the University of Cali-fornia Santa Cruz18

Even before she began taking classes Anzalduacutea had a sense of herdissertation topic which would focus on literary representation eth-nic identity and knowledge production As she asserts in a 983089983097983097983088 inter-view with Hector Torres ldquoMy goal was to put together this book on themestiza and how she deals with space and identityrdquo19 Anzalduacutea movedquickly through the program requirements and in fall 983089983097983097983089 began draft-ing her dissertationbook pro ject I describe this pro ject as ldquodisserta-tionbookrdquo to underscore its liminalitymdashits position ldquobetwixt andbetweenrdquo conventional genres Although Anzalduacutea called it a disserta-

tion and even selected a dissertation committee and chair she did notfollow conventional procedures which typically include 1047297nalizingsubmitting and receiving faculty feedback on a prospectus discuss-ing the pro ject with a dissertation committee submitting chapterdrafts to committee members and receiving feedback from them onthese drafts and revising drafts based on this feedback In no point inher writing process did Anzalduacutea interact with her dissertation com-mittee in any of these ways20 Yet the fact that she viewed this pro jectas both her dissertation and a publishable book subtly shaped her

authorial decisions and voice21

Anzalduacutea viewed her dissertationbook pro ject as an opportunityto return to and expand on several aesthetic-related themes fromher previous work (especially BorderlandsLa Frontera and ldquoSpeaking inTongues A Letter to Third World Women Writersrdquo) As she explainedin a 983089983097983097983093 interview with Ann Reuman

Chapter Six [of Borderlands] on writing and art was put togetherreally fast I felt like I was still regurgitating and sitting on some

of the ideas and I hadnrsquot done enough revisions and I didnrsquot haveenough time to unravel the ideas fully Chapter Six is an exten-sion of ldquoSpeaking in Tonguesrdquo in This Bridge and what Irsquom writingnow in Lloronas some of the concepts Irsquom working with of whichone is nepantla is kind of a continuation of these other two [M]ywriting is always in revision The theoretical work in process Llo-

ronas builds on all those that came before22

Variously titled LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the

Production of Writing Knowledge and Identity Lloronas mujeres que leen

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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y escriben Producing Writing Knowledge Cultures and Identities andLloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking Dreaming Anzalduacutearsquos projecteddissertationbook focused on writing as personal and collective knowl-edge production by the ldquofemale post-colonial cultural Other (particu-larly the Chicanamestiza)rdquo23 As these titles imply la Llorona played asigni1047297cant role in the 983089983097983097983088s versions In chapter drafts notes conversa-tions about the pro ject and public lectures from this time periodAnzalduacutea explored diverse interpretations of Lloronarsquos historicalmythic and rhetorical manifestations She aspired to include and gobeyond the existing stories and analyses to offer both an archeologyand a phenomenology of this multifaceted 1047297gure As she writes in achapter draft titled ldquoLlorona the Woman Who Wails ChicanaMestiza

Transgressive Identitiesrdquo

As myth the nocturnal site of [Lloronarsquos] ghostly ldquobodyrdquo is the placeel lugar where myth fantasy utterance and reality converge It isthe site of intersection connection and cultural transgressionHer ldquobodyrdquo is comprised of all four bodies the physical psychic(which I explore in the chapter ldquoLas Pasiones de la Lloronardquo) mythicsymbolic and ghostly La Llorona the ghostly body carries the na-gual possessing la facultad the capacity for shape-changing and

shape-shifting of identity24

Anzalduacutearsquos shifting mobile Llorona is especially signi1047297cant as weconsider her pro jectrsquos evolution from the twentieth-century to thetwenty-1047297rst-century versions where Llorona becomes partiallyeclipsed by Coyolxauhqui Mexica lunar goddess and Coatlicuersquos eldestdaughter25

Anzalduacutea worked intermittently throughout the 983089983097983097983088s on her ldquoLlo-ronas bookrdquo Despite her extensive research her passion for the pro j-

ect and her commitment to completing her doctoral degree she didnot 1047297nish this manuscriptmdashor even 1047297nalize her prospectus or meetwith her dissertation committee Instead she has left us with a lengthytable of contents lots of ideas jotted notes interview comments andchapter drafts in various stages of completion26 As she observes in ane-mail from June 983090983088983088983090 ldquoI 1047297nished all but dissertation in 983091 years butthen took a huge sabbatical amp didnrsquot return to [the] dissertation untillast Octrdquo27

There are many reasons for this ldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo including

Anzalduacutearsquos health 1047297nancial concerns commitment to multiple writing

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983093

terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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projects (including some with 1047297xed deadlines for completion) hercomplicated revision process and her unrealistically high aestheticstandards In 983089983097983097983090 Anzalduacutea was diagnosed with type 983089 diabetes28 This diagnosis altered her life on almost every level forcing her to re-examine her self-de1047297nition her relationship to her body her writingprocess and her worldview Like many people diagnosed with a chronicillness Anzalduacutea 1047297rst reacted with disbelief denial anger and self-blame29 Gradually she shifted into a more complex understandingand pragmatic acceptance of the disease However processing the di-agnosis researching diabetes learning treatment options and secur-ing adequate health insurance to pay for treatment and medicineconsumed much of Anzalduacutearsquos energy during the mid-983089983097983097983088s

Indeed managing the diabetes was an enormous drain on Anzalduacuteafor the remainder of her life She often spent hours each day research-ing the latest treatments and diligently working to manage the diseaseShe kept up to date on medical and alternative health breakthroughsand recommendations ate healthy food exercised regularly and mon-itored her blood glucose (sugar) levels repeatedly throughout the daycarefully coordinated her exercise and her food intake with her bloodlevels and insulin injections and kept a detailed daily log of her bloodsugar levels and necessary dosages making minute adjustments as

necessary In addition to following a conventional treatment plan(insulin injections and regular medical visits) Anzalduacutea explored avariety of alternative healing techniques including meditation herbsacupuncture af1047297rmations subliminal tapes and visualizations De-spite these strenuous efforts her blood sugar often careened out ofcontrol leading to additional complications including severe gastroin-testinal re1047298ux charcoat foot neuropathy vision problems (blurred vi-sion and burst capillaries requiring laser surgery) thyroid malfunction

and depression Constant worry about her declining health put addi-tional strains on Anzalduacutea intensifying the insomnia that had plaguedher for much of her life This insomnia clouded her thinking and in-terfered with her work leading to even more delays30

Anzalduacutearsquos 1047297nancial concernsmdashwhich were themselves made morechallenging and dire by her costly medical needsmdashalso contributed toher delayed completion of the Lloronas book31 As a full-time self-employed author Anzalduacutea did not have a steady source of incomebut instead relied on publication royalties and speaking engage-

ments to support herself Because she did not have an agent or

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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manager Anzalduacutea generally organized her own speaking engage-ments which entailed booking the gigs negotiating rates makingtravel plans and coordinating all related details with the conferenceorganizers This too took a lot of time

Anzalduacutearsquos complicated multitasking further contributed to herldquohuge sabbaticalrdquo Throughout the 983089983097983097983088s Anzalduacutea worked on mul-tiple writing projects si multaneously moving back and forth amongmanuscripts often juggling more than a dozen projects Thus forexample in a journal entry dated August 983090983088 983089983097983097983088 (written at 983092983090983088 inthe morning) she lists her current ldquoWriting Projectsrdquo ten books sixpapers six additional pieces (short stories autohistorias and essays)she had been invited to submit for publication and 1047297ve grant propos-

als32 Even during a single night Anzalduacutea typically shifted amongseveral projects On February 983089983097 983089983097983096983097 for instance she wrote in her

journal

I feel good myself today Last night I did some work had phoneconf with N[orma] Alarcoacuten for 983089ndash983089983090 hrs worked on Theories by

chicanas notebook making holes amp putting in articles then I spent acouple of hours on Entremuros Entreguerras Entremundos also punch-ing holes switching stories from one section to another consoli-

dating editing suggestions on ldquoThe Crossingrdquo and ldquoSleepwalkerrdquo Ofcourse this was time spent away from [completing the] intro toHaciendo carasmdashmy rebelling again33

This journal entry captures so much about Anzalduacutearsquos multitaskingIn addition to juggling various projects in a single evening she dem-onstrates a stubborn resistance to externally imposed deadlines At atime that she had a speci1047297c due date for one pro ject (the introductionto Making Face Making SoulHaciendo Caras) Anzalduacutea worked instead

on other projects including some with no deadlines at all As her ref-erence to this divergence as ldquorebelling againrdquo indicates this mobilewriting practice organized by desire rather than deadlines was typi-cal34 Moreover Anzalduacutea consistently underestimated the hours re-quired to complete a piece (especially the time her revisions wouldtake) while overestimating her energy levels She got lost in the revi-sion process and held open so many projects at once that 1047297nishinganything to her complete satisfaction was impossible The 1047297nal chap-ter in Light in the Dark represents the closest approximation to com-

pletion that Anzalduacutea achieved and this achievement was possible

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only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xix

of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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xviii | 983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

only because she took an extra year for her revisions35 Is it any won-der then that Anzalduacutea was so delayed in 1047297nishing this book

In 983090983088983088983089 Anzalduacutea recommitted herself to completing her doctoraldegree In the fall of this year she initiated a writing group ldquolas co-madritasrdquo reconstituted her doctoral committee and looked into the

983157983139983155983139 Graduate Schoolrsquos paperwork and other graduation require-ments36 Although she met regularly with las comadritas worked dili-gently on the chapters and aspired to 1047297nish in Winter 983090983088983088983090 or Spring983090983088983088983091 quarter she did not meet these deadlines Nor did she send herdissertation committee any chapters of her pro ject or communicatewith them In spring 983090983088983088983092 Rob Wilson director of the 983157983139983155983139 LiteratureDepartmentrsquos graduate program contacted Anzalduacutea and explaining

that the department had a precedent for this procedure expressedthe view that she be awarded the degree for work completed (speci1047297-cally for BorderlandsLa Frontera)37 After much deliberation and con-sultation with friends Anzalduacutea declined the offer both because shefelt that it would be unfair to most doctoral students (who must writea traditional dissertation) and because she believed she was withinmonths of completing her book As she explained in an e-mail toWilson

Though going the non-dissertation route would be easier I thinkitrsquos unfair to other grad students who have to ful1047297ll all the re-quirements I also donrsquot want a ldquofreerdquo ride But I also feel that thedissertation has to be quality work and I have reservations aboutpulling it off this quarter Irsquoll try my best but my health is shaky(I suffer from diabetes and kidney and other complications) so Icanrsquot push myself too hard I do agree with you that we shouldwork on this while the energyfocus is present

Contigo gloria

Anzalduacutea passed away in mid-May and was awarded the doctoraldegree posthumously

When Anzalduacutea returned to the dissertationbook pro ject in fall983090983088983088983089 she looked over but did not directly take up her Lloronas book(which at this point was titled LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speaking

Dreaming)38 Instead she expanded the focus to encompass ontologi-cal investigations while maintaining several previous themes par-ticularly those related to aesthetics nepantla shifting identities and

knowledge transformation as a decolonizing process The bookrsquos table

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xix

of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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of contents changed multiple times between 983090983088983088983089 and 983090983088983088983092 as Anzalduacuteawrote revised and rethought her pro ject In fall 983090983088983088983089 she planned toinclude three previously published essays (revised to re1047298ect her mostrecent thinking and the bookrsquos themes) several new pieces designedto pull the collection together and ldquonow let us shift the path of con-ocimiento inner work public actsrdquo an extended essay she was writ-ing for our co-edited collection this bridge we call home radical visions

for transformation39 By fall 983090983088983088983091 Anzalduacutea had come closer to determin-ing the bookrsquos table of contents but was still reorganizing the chaptersand making other alterations and by January 983090983088983088983092 she had 1047297nalizedthe table of contentsrsquo organization although she was still consideringvarious chapter and book titles40 Chapters 983089 983091 983093 and 983094 had been pre-

viously published in different form Anzalduacutea revised chapters 983091 and 983093considerably to align them with her current thinking about Coyol-xauhqui and other key themes in this book she made fewer changes tochapters 983089 and 983094 which she had drafted entirely in the twenty-1047297rstcentury and (in the case of chapter 983094) written with her dissertationbook pro ject in mind

As mentioned previously Anzalduacutea did not focus exclusively onLight in the Dark during the last years of her life From 983090983088983088983089 to 983090983088983088983092 sheworked on other projects as well including her foreword to the third

edition of This Bridge Called My Back her preface to this bridge we call

home another co-edited multi-genre collection tentatively titled Bear-

ing Witness Reading Lives Imagination Creativity and Social Change anessay for her friend Liliana Wilsonrsquos art exhibition several short sto-ries an e-mail interview on indigeneity for SAILS American Indian Lit-

eratures an essay on the ldquogeographies of latinidad identityrdquo (based ona talk she gave in 983089983097983097983097 and promised for a volume on Latinidad) and atestimonio about the terrorist attacks of September 983089983089 98309098308898308898308941 During

this time Anzalduacutearsquos health continued to decline Torn in so many di-rections she missed her self-imposed deadlines for completing Light

in the Dark42 However at the time of her death in May 983090983088983088983092 Anzalduacuteaseemed to believe that she would 1047297nish the dissertation within theyear

In editing Light in the Dark for publication I assumed that my taskswould focus primarily on proofreading the manuscript and 1047297nalizingthe bibliographical material which I knew from conversations withAnzalduacutea to be in disarray43 I worked with the chapter drafts and

notes she had saved on her MacBook hard drive her handwritten

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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revisions on paper copies of these drafts and her extensive e-mailcommunication concerning the dissertation I began with the mostrecent version(s) of each chapter as indicated by Anzalduacutearsquos num-bering system and the date stamp on each computer 1047297le However asI delved into her computer 1047297les and examined them in dialogue withher writing notas (also located on her computer hard drive) the edito-rial process became more complex than I had expected especiallyconcerning chapters 983090 and 983092 Chapter 983090 included several un1047297nishedsections and authorial notes indicating places where Anzalduacutea hadplanned to expand and revise and chapter 983092 existed in numerous ver-sions which Anzalduacutea was still collating and revising at the time of herdeath

I had two editorial goals which shaped my process First to adhereto Anzalduacutearsquos intentions as closely as possiblemdashboth by following hermost recent revisions and by upholding her high aesthetic standards(including her desire to ensure that her book was ldquoquality workrdquo)44 Second to provide readers with information about the manuscript thatwould facilitate their analyses interpretations and investigationsBecause Irsquod been working on various writing and editing projects withAnzalduacutea for more than a decade I had a solid understanding of herpersonal aestheticsmdashthe emphasis she placed on how a piece sounds

and feels45 Anzalduacutea took exceptional pride in her work equallyvaluing form and content as I explained earlier she revised eachpiece numerous times honing the images to achieve speci1047297c ca-dences and affects While I did not attempt to replicate Anzalduacutearsquosrevision process I used her standards as I sorted through her chap-ters and evaluated them for publication Drawing on my knowledge ofAnzalduacutearsquos writing process I identi1047297ed the sections in chapters 983090and 983092 that would not have met her publication standards but would

have been further revised or entirely deleted Rather than revise ordelete this material I moved it to the endnotes and appendixes be-cause it contains important clues about Anzalduacutearsquos theories (espe-cially the directions she might have pursued had she been given moretime) and about the concepts she was drawing from but in the pro-cess of rejecting I have also included discursive endnotes through-out Light in the Dark to assist readers interested in tracking the devel-opment of Anzalduacutearsquos theories or other aspects of her writing processincluding some aspects of the choices she made as she produced this

text

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xxi

Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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Tracing Coyolxauhqui chapter overviews

One of the most pronounced differences between the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century versions of Anzalduacutearsquos dissertationbook pro ject is the shift from Llorona to Coyolxauhqui According toAztec mythic history when Coyolxauhqui tried to kill her mother herbrother Huitzilopochtli (Eastern Hummingbird and War God) decapi-tated her 1047298inging her head into the sky and throwing her body downthe sacred mountain where it broke into a thousand pieces Depictedas a ldquohuge round stonerdquo 1047297lled with dismembered body parts Coyol-xauhqui serves as Anzalduacutearsquos ldquolight in the darkrdquo representing a com-plex holismmdashboth the acknowledgment of painful fragmentation and

the promise of transformative healing As she explains in chapter 983091ldquoCoyolxauhqui represents the psychic and creative process of tearingapart and pulling together (deconstructingconstructing) She repre-sents fragmentation imperfection incompleteness and unful1047297lledpromises as well as integration completeness and wholenessrdquo (see1047297gure 983110983117983089)

Drawing from Coyolxauhquirsquos story Anzalduacutea develops a complexhealing process and a theory of writing that she variously namedldquoThe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo ldquoCoyolxauhqui consciousnessrdquo and

ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui togetherrdquo46 She offers one of her most exten-sive discussions of this theoretical framework in chapter 983094 where shedescribes Coyolxauhqui as ldquoboth the process of emotional psychicaldismemberment splitting body mind spirit soul and the creativework of putting all the pieces together in a new form a partially un-conscious work done in the night by the light of the moon a labor ofre-visioning and re-memberingrdquo The product of multiple coloniza-tions Coyolxauhqui also embodies Anzalduacutearsquos desire for epistemologi-

cal and ontological decolonization47

As the following chapter summa-ries suggest Coyolxauhqui hovers over Light in the Dark Appearing inevery chapter ldquoElla es la luna and she lights the darknessrdquo48

In a short preface ldquoGestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idearrdquoAnzalduacutea introduces her book by explaining its multilayered focusand inviting readers to participate in her literary desires Re1047298ectingon her own experiences and struggles as an author Anzalduacutea calls fora new aesthetics an entirely embodied artistic practice that synthe-sizes identity formation with cultural change and movement among

multiple realities As she interweaves theory with practice Anzalduacutea

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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983110983117983089 | Coyolxauhqui

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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brie1047298y touches on issues developed in the chapters that follow Shede1047297nes writing as ldquogestures of the bodyrdquo offers a preliminary de1047297ni-tion of her theory of the ldquoCoyolxauhqui imperativerdquo provides an over-view of her aesthetics introduces her genre theories of autohistoriaand autohistoria-teoriacutea expands her previous de1047297nitions of nepantlato include aesthetic and ontological dimensions and posits the imag-ination as an intellectual-spiritual faculty ldquoGestures of the Bodyrdquo setsthe tone for the entire book and reveals the driving force behind itAnzalduacutearsquos aspiration to evoke healing and transformation her de-sire to go beyond description and representation by using words im-ages and theories that stimulate create and in other ways facilitateradical physical-psychic change in herself her readers and the vari-

ous worlds in which we exist and to which we aspireFirst drafted shortly after the September 983089983089 983090983088983088983089 terrorist attacks

on the United States chapter 983089 elaborates on and enacts Anzalduacutearsquostheory of the Coyolxauhqui imperative illustrating one form the em-bodied ldquogesturesrdquo she calls for in her preface can take EncapsulatingAnzalduacutearsquos aesthetic journey ldquoLet us be the healing of the wound TheCoyolxauhqui imperativemdashLa sombra y el suentildeordquo also explores keyelements in her onto-epistemology (ldquodesconocimientosrdquo ldquothe path ofconocimientordquo) her aesthetics (ldquothe Coyolxauhqui imperativerdquo) and

her ethics (ldquospiritual activismrdquo) Interweaving the personal with thecollective Anzalduacutea uses these concepts to bridge the historical mo-ment with recurring political-aesthetic issues such as US colonial-ism nationalism complicity cultural trauma racism sexism andother forms of systemic oppression She calls for expanded awareness(conocimiento) and develops an ethics of interconnectivity which shedescribes as the act of reaching through the woundsmdashwounds thatcan be physical psychic cultural and or spiritualmdashto connect with

others In its intentionally non-oppositional approach the chapter of-fers a provocative alternative to portions of Borderlands La Frontera and some of Anzalduacutearsquos other work While acknowledging her intenseanger Anzalduacutea converts it into a sophisticated theory of relationalchange Thus ldquoLet us be the healing of the woundrdquo can be read asAnzalduacutearsquos invitation to move through and beyond trauma and ragetransforming it into social- justice work Anzalduacutea simultaneously il-lustrates and instructs offering readers guidelines (a methodology ofsorts) for how to enact this dif1047297cult transformative work how to heed

the Coyolxauhqui imperative

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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Chapter 983090 ldquoFlights of the Imagination Rereading Rewriting Reali-tiesrdquo contains Anzalduacutearsquos most sustained discussion of the imagina-tion as an epistemological-political tool and the most direct statementof her metaphysical framework Likening the Coyolxauhqui processto ldquoshamanic initiatory dismembermentrdquo Anzalduacutea draws on curan-derismo chamanismo shamanism transpersonal psychology an-thropology 1047297ction and her childhood experiences to develop hertheories of artrsquos transformational power and imaginationrsquos role in (re)creating reality49 I bracket the pre1047297x to underscore Anzalduacutearsquos com-plex speculations about ontological issues she posits multiple inter-layered worlds which we discover and co-create ldquodecolonizing realityrdquoThis chapter also provides the ontological foundation for Anzalduacutearsquos

innovative theory of spiritual activism which she further develops inthe chapters that follow As she de1047297nes the term ldquospiritual activismrdquois neither a naiumlve watered-down version of religion nor some kind ofldquoNew Agerdquo fad that facilitates escape from existing conditions It is inmany ways the reverse For Anzalduacutea spiritual activism is a completelyembodied highly political endeavor While Anzalduacutea did not coin theterm ldquospiritual activismrdquo she introduced the term and the conceptinto feminist scholarship50 As she connects her theory of spiritual ac-tivism with her transformational aesthetics Anzalduacutea returns to her

earlier de1047297nition of writing as ldquomaking soulrdquo and expands it linkingit both with mainstream canonical British literature and with Mexi-can indigenous traditions Other topics covered are ldquoshamanic imag-iningsrdquo ldquonagualismordquo as epistemology and writing practice hertheories of the ldquonepantla bodyrdquo and ldquospiritual mestizajerdquo the relation-ship between writing reading and social change and her personalaspirations as a writer

Structured around Anzalduacutearsquos visit in 983089983097983097983090 to an exhibition of Me-

soamerican culture and art at the Denver Museum of Natural Historychapter 983091 ldquoBorder Arte Nepantla el lugar de la fronterardquo builds onand expands the previous chapterrsquos discussion of spiritual mestizajeand aesthetics grounding them in a theory of ldquoborder arterdquomdasha dis-ruptive potentially transformative decolonizing creative practice orwhat Anzalduacutea calls ldquothe Coyolxauhqui processrdquo As she retraces her

journey through the museumrsquos exhibition she explores issues of co-lonialism neocolonialism and the subjugated artistrsquos role in the de-colonization process Emphasizing both the personal and collective

dimensions of border arte Anzalduacutea connects her aesthetics to the

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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work of other border artistsmdashparticularly visual artists such as SantaBarraza Liliana Wilson Yolanda M Loacutepez and Marcia Goacutemez ForAnzalduacutea the term ldquoborder artistrdquo goes beyond geographical bound-aries to include other types of risk takers artists who straddle multi-ple (often oppressive colonized neo-colonized) worlds and use theirnegotiations to decolonize the various spaces in which they existAnzalduacutea connects her revisionist mythmaking with her episte-mology while expanding her previous de1047297nitions of the borderlandsmestizaje and her own mestiza identity This chapter explores otheridentity-related issues as well including questions of authenticityappropriation and the commodi1047297cation of indigenous art debatesbetween indigenous and Chican authors51 and the possibilities of

developing identities that are simultaneously ethnic-speci1047297c andtranscultural ldquoBorder Arterdquo also contains an important discussion ofldquoel cenoterdquo a term Anzalduacutea uses to describe the imaginationrsquos sourceof previously untapped collective knowledge Anzalduacutea concludes thechapter by introducing her innovative theory of ldquonos otrasrdquomdasha theoryshe takes up in the chapter that follows

In chapter 983092 ldquoGeographies of SelvesmdashReimagining IdentityNos Otras (Us Other) las Nepantleras and the New TribalismrdquoAnzalduacutea expands the previous chapterrsquos analysis of border art and

artist-activists to explore nationalism identity formation ldquoRaza stud-iesrdquo decolonizing education and con1047298ict resolutionmdashespecially asthese are enacted by her nepantlera ldquoescritoras artistas scholars [and]activistasrdquo Focusing on ldquoRaza Studies y la razardquo she applies the Coyol-xauhqui process to individual and collective identity (re)formation anddevelops her theory of ldquothe new tribalismrdquo Anzalduacutearsquos new tribalismrepresents an innovative rhizomatic theory of af1047297nity-based identi-ties and a provocative alternative to both assimilation and separat-

ism52

As she explains in an earlier draft of this chapter ldquoThe newtribalism disrupts categorical and ethnocentric forms of nationalismBy problematizing the concepts of whorsquos us and whorsquos other or what Icall nos otras the new tribalism seeks to revise the notion of ldquoother-nessrdquo and the story of identity The new tribalism rewrites cultural in-scriptions facilitating our ability to forge alliances with other groupsrdquo53 With her theories of the new tribalism and nos otras Anzalduacutea devel-ops a careful sophisticated critique of narrow nationalisms and otherconservative versions of collective identity while remaining sympa-

thetic to the identity-related concerns that generate motivate and

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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drive nationalist-in1047298ected politics and desires These theories repre-sent both an expansion of and a return to her earlier theory of ElMundo Zurdomdasha theory she further develops in chapter 98309454 Signi1047297-cantly Anzalduacutea challenges yet does not entirely reject conventionalconcepts of identity and racialized social categories thus offering im-portant interventions into postnationalist thought55 This chapteralso contains extensive discussions of her innovative theories ofldquonepantlerasrdquo and ldquogeographies of selvesrdquo56

As the title suggests in chapter 983093 ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui TogetherA Creative Processrdquo Anzalduacutea presents her most detailed extensivediscussion of the Coyolxauhqui process The chapter invites readersinside Anzalduacutearsquos mind as she writes in her dissertation notes ldquoThis

chapter is my creation story It depicts the psychological dimensionsof the writing process and the angst of creativityrdquo57 Here we see an-other aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos aesthetics her own writing practice playedout on the page This chapter demonstratesmdashin careful detail givingus intimate glimpses into Anzalduacutearsquos daily lifemdashthe deeply embodiedextremely intentional nature of her work Anzalduacutea takes us throughher entire creative process from the original call (in this particularinstance an invitation to contribute to an edited collection) idea gen-eration and the pre-drafting phase (or what she terms ldquocomponiendo

y des-componiendordquo) through writing blocks and multiple revisionsto (non)completion and submission of the essay58 Because writingrsquosembodiment includes a complex emotional dimension Anzalduacutea alsodiscloses the ldquoshadow side of writingrdquo periods of extreme depressiondissatisfaction and despair coupled with self-doubt and feelings ofcomplete inadequacy Shot through the entire writing process how-ever is Anzalduacutearsquos deep love of writing For Anzalduacutea the personal isalways also collective so in typical Anzalduacutean fashion she uses her

experiences to further develop her theories of the Coyolxauhquiimperative nepantla el cenote and the imaginal59 Particularly impor-tant is Anzalduacutearsquos expansion of nepantla to include additional episte-mological dimensions here and elsewhere in Light in the Dark nepantlaalso functions as form of consciousness an actant of sorts As I sug-gest later this expansion has the potential to open new directions inAnzalduacutean scholarship

The 1047297nal chapter ldquonow let us shift conocimiento inner workpublic actsrdquo represents the culmination of Anzalduacutearsquos personal

intellectual-ontological-political journey a powerful example of her

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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theory of autohistoria-teoriacutea and her aesthetics as well as the ldquosisterrdquoto chapter 983093 Anzalduacutea wrote the chapter with her dissertation in mindviewing it as closely related to ldquoPutting Coyolxauhqui Togetherrdquo60 andthus underscoring the intimate interconnections she posits betweenaesthetics ontology and transformation Anzalduacutea builds on her ear-lier theories of ldquoEl Mundo Zurdordquo (983089983097983095983088s) ldquothe new mestizardquo (983089983097983096983088s)ldquonepantlardquo (983089983097983097983088s) and ldquonepantlerasrdquo (983090983088983088983088s) synergistically expand-ing them into her relational onto-epistemology or what she namesldquoconocimientordquo While a literal translation of the word conocimiento from Spanish to English is ldquoknowledgerdquo Anzalduacutea rede1047297nes the termincorporating imaginal spiritual-activist and ontological dimensionsAn intensely personal fully embodied process that gathers informa-

tion from context Anzalduacutearsquos conocimiento is profoundly relational andenables those who enact it to make connections among apparentlydisparate events people experiences and realities These connectionsin turn lead to action61 Drawing on her own experiencesmdashher epi-sodes of deep depression her diabetes diagnosis her declining healthher literary desires and her engagements with various progressive so-cial movementsmdashAnzalduacutea presents a nonlinear healing journey orwhat she calls ldquothe seven stages of conocimientordquo A series of recur-sive iterations Anzalduacutearsquos theory of conocimiento queers conven-

tional ways of knowing and offers readers a holistic activist-in1047298ectedonto-epistemology designed to effect change on multiple interlockinglevels As Anzalduacutea writes in her annotations for this chapter ldquoThe aimof the essay is to transform my personal life into a narrative withmythological or archetypal threads not in the confessional tone of aparticipant in the drama who is seeking another form of order And todo it representing myself without victimization or sentimentalityrdquo62

Following these chapters are six appendixes that I have added to

the original manuscript to provide readers with background infor-mation on Anzalduacutearsquos writing process and the history of this bookAppendix 983089 contains a draft of Anzalduacutearsquos Lloronas dissertation pro-posal LloronasmdashWomen Who Wail (Self )Representation and the Production

of Writing Knowledge and Identity and the table of contents for a ver-sion of her 983089983097983097983088s dissertation book LloronasmdashWriting Reading Speak-

ing Dreaming While Anzalduacutearsquos 983089983097983097983088s proposal and table of contentsexist in numerous drafts Anzalduacutea viewed the material in this appen-dix as most representative of her earlier pro ject63 I include them here

to give readers a sense of the similarities and differences between the

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xxxv

In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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Lloronas book and Light in the Dark Appendix 983090 consists of severale-mails that Anzalduacutea wrote to her writing comadres during the 1047297nalyears of her life at a time when she was working consistently on Light

in the Dark Because these e-mails were composed quickly (as shownby her use of lower-case letters) they offer a less censored moreimmediate entry into Anzalduacutearsquos life illustrating the severity of herhealth-related struggles and their impact on her writing practice Ap-pendix 983091 contains additional material (un1047297nished sections and writ-ing notas) related to chapter 983090 Appendix 983092 is an alternative openingsection that Anzalduacutea considered using in chapter 983092 Appendix 983093 of-fers historical notes on each chapterrsquos development Appendix 983094 con-sists of the call for papers and personal invitation that in1047298uenced the

development of chapter 983089 The appendixes are followed by a glossarywith brief discussions of key Anzalduacutean terms and topics developed inLight in the Dark I hope that this material will enable scholars to retraceAnzalduacutearsquos thinking develop rich analyses and interpretations ofAnzalduacutearsquos words and in other ways build on her workmdashcreatingnew Anzalduacutean theory

While some chapters were previously published Anzalduacutea updatedand revised them in other ways before her death64 As her writingnotes indicate she made these revisions with her dissertation book

pro ject in mind Thus they offer additional insights into the develop-ment of her thinking and open new avenues into her work And be-cause context matters when we read these chapters as parts of thelarger whole each chapter functions synergistically conversing within1047298uencing and building on its sister chapters Even the bookrsquos titlemdashwith its Coyolxauhqui-inspired focus on rewriting identity spiritualityand realitymdashgives us another lens with which to consider the ideaspresented throughout the book In the next section I highlight several

key innovations in Light in the Dark and consider their potential impli-cations Because Anzalduacutearsquos theories take multiple interconnectedforms occur in a variety of contexts (contexts that often subtly re-shape the theories themselves) and invite readersrsquo collaborationthe following is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive I intention-ally focus on those theories that risk being the most marginalizedand ignored I especially highlight Anzalduacutearsquos potential contributionsto twenty-1047297rst-century philosophical thought because I believe thather outsider status leads many scholars to ignore this dimension of

her work65

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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ldquoDecolonizing realityrdquo Implications for the scholarship

Written during the 1047297nal decade of her life Light in the Dark representsAnzalduacutearsquos most sustained attempt to develop a transformational on-tology epistemology and aesthetics Through intense self-re1047298ectionAnzalduacutea creates an autohistoria-teoriacutea articulating her complex the-ory and practice of the artist-activistrsquos creative process she enacts whatSarah Ohmer describes as ldquoa decolonizing ritualrdquo66 that she invites herreaders to share and enact for ourselves As Ohmer Norma AlarcoacutenErnesto Martiacutenez and several other scholars have observed Anzalduacuteaparticipates in the twentieth-century and twenty-1047297rst-century ldquodeco-lonial turnrdquo In Borderlands La Frontera for example her theories of

mestiza consciousness border thinking and la facultad decolonizewestern epistemologies by moving partially outside Enlightenment-based frameworks Anzalduacutea does not simply write about ldquosuppressedknowledges and marginalized subjectivitiesrdquo67 she writes from within them and itrsquos this shift from writing about to writing within that makesher work so innovatively decolonizing

In Light in the Dark Anzalduacutea takes this ldquodecolonial turnrdquo even fur-ther and includes a groundbreaking ontological component (my punis intentional) Through empirical experience esoteric traditions and

indigenous philosophies she valorizes realities suppressed margin-alized or entirely erased by the narrow versions of ontological real-ism championed by Enlightenment-based thoughtmdashversions thatmost western-trained scholars (even those of us committed to facili-tating progressive change) have often internalized and assumed tobe true Anzalduacutea does so by writing frommdash and not just aboutmdashthesesubaltern ontologies

I emphasize these ontological dimensions because this aspect of

Anzalduacutearsquos work has been underappreciated and often ignored Per-haps this desconocimiento is not surprising given the limited at-tention twentieth-century theorists and philosophers have paid toontological and metaphysical issues68 Indeed as Mikko Tuhkanensuggests these ldquo1047297elds [have been] largely exiled from contempo-rary social sciences and the humanitiesrdquo69 Until recently criticalliterary studies and western philosophy have focused almost entirelyon epistemology normalizing ldquoparadigms through whose lensesAnzalduacutearsquos metaphysical assumptions seem naive pre-critical or sim-

ply incomprehensiblerdquomdashand therefore have been ignored70 However

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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Anzalduacutea explores metaphysical and ontological issues throughouther work from ldquoTihuequerdquo ( her earliest publication) to the end of hercareer using them to inspire empower and inform her radical social-

justice vision71

Nowhere are these explorations more evident (and more impossibleto avoid) than in Light in the Dark This book represents the culmina-tion of Anzalduacutearsquos lifelong investigations and demonstrates that forAnzalduacutea epistemology and ontology (knowing and being) are inti-mately interrelatedmdashtwo halves of one complex multidimensionalprocess employed in the service of progressive social change Sheposits a spirit-in1047298ected materialist ontology a twenty-1047297rst-centuryanimism of sorts Anzalduacutea offers her most extensive discussion of

this 1047298uid ontology in chapter 983090 where she asserts

Spirit and mind soul and body are one and together they perceivea reality greater than the vision experienced in the ordinary worldI know that the universe is conscious and that spirit and soul com-municate by sending subtle signals to those who pay attention toour surroundings to animals to natural forces and to other peopleWe receive information from ancestors inhabiting other worldsWe assess that information and learn how to trust that knowing

According to Anzalduacutea the spiritual material physical and psychic areinseparable aspects of a uni1047297ed in1047297nitely complex reality Storiestrees metaphors imaginal 1047297gures and even the essays she writesare ontological beings with lives and various types of agency that atleast partially exceed or in other ways escape human knowledge andcontrol Thus in the preface she distinguishes between ldquotalking with images stories and talking about themrdquo ( her emphasis) positing anepistemological-ontological dialogue between author and text in

chapter 983090 she explains that images can ldquotake on body and liferdquo in chap-ter 983093 she confesses that ldquothings whisperrdquo to her in the night and inchapter 983094 she encounters ldquoensoulment in trees in woods in streamsrdquoTo borrow from European philosophical discourse we could say thatAnzalduacutea is a monist positing a reality that includes but exceeds usexisting beyond human life and outside our heads at best we ldquocatchglimpses of this invisible primary realityrdquo (chapter 983090)

Anzalduacutearsquos complex ontology invites us to situate her writingswithin recent work in continental philosophy and feminist thought

particularly trends in speculative realism object-oriented ontology

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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and neo-materialisms72 Like speculative realists and object-orientedontologists Anzalduacutea sidesteps the Kantian injunction to ldquoadopt anagnostic attitude toward the nature of things-in-themselvesrdquo73 andspeculates deeply about ontological and metaphysical questionsThroughout Light in the Dark she employs a non-anthropocentriclens and a broad de1047297nition of reality in which spirits are as real asdogs cats baseball bats methane gas doorknobs bookshelves andeverything else74 But unlike object-oriented philosophers who gen-erally posit an extreme hyper-individualized realism in which allobjects (including human beings) are ultimately independent andseparated (ldquowithdrawnrdquo) from all others Anzalduacutea insists on theradical interrelatedness interdependence and sacredness of all exis-

tence Like twenty-1047297rst-century neo-materialists who ldquotak[e] matterseriouslyrdquo Anzalduacutea posits ldquothe ongoing mutual co-constitution ofmind and matterrdquo and de1047297nes nature as ldquomaterial discursive humanmore-than-human corporeal and technologicalrdquo75 However unlikethese theorists who often sharply distinguish their work from post-structuralismrsquos ldquolinguistic turnrdquo and thus underestimate (or deny)the concrete material reality of language Anzalduacutea closely associateslanguage with matter In her ontology language does not simply referto or represent reality nor does it become reality in some ludic post-

modernist way Words images and material things are real embody-ing different aspects of realitymdashranging from the ldquoordinary realityrdquo ofeveryday life (in its physical nonphysical and semi-physical itera-tions) to what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983090 as ldquothe hidden spiritworldsrdquo

Language is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos onto-epistemology andaesthetics a linchpin of sorts In chapter 983093 for example she refers toldquoa spiritual beingrdquo who ldquoshares with you a language that speaks of

what is other a language shared with the spirits of trees sea windand birds a language which yoursquoll spend many of your writing hourstrying to translate into wordsrdquo Herersquos where Anzalduacutearsquos transforma-tional aesthetics comes in Because language the physical worldthe imaginal and nonordinary realities are all intimately interwo-ven words and images matter and are matter they can have causalmaterial(izing) force76 The intentional ritualized performance of spe-ci1047297c carefully selected words has the potential to shift reality (and not

just our perception of reality) Anzalduacutean aesthetics enables writers

and other artists to enact materialize and in other ways concretize

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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transformation For Anzalduacutea writing is ontologicalmdashintimately con-nected with physical and nonphysical beings with ordinary andnonordinary realities

Anzalduacutea can make these bold claims because she does not remainentirely within European philosophical traditions As I noted earliershe draws from but also moves partially outside them incorporat-ing indigenous and esoteric traditions77 Because the Enlightenment-based reality we have inherited is too restrictive and prevents us fromenacting (or even envisioning) the radical social change we need shedecolonizes this dominant ontology draws from alternative traditionsand develops a more expansive philosophy embracing spirit indige-nous wisdom alchemy mythic 1047297gures ancestral guides and more

Anzalduacutea uses shamanism curanderismo alchemy and the indige-nous philosophies they re1047298ect to substantiate and illustrate her trans-formational ontology and aesthetics including her insistence on lan-guagersquos material(izing) properties78 By thus moving partially outsideconventional European-based philosophical and scienti1047297c traditionsshe obtains additional insights that embolden her to enact an onto-logical decolonization of sorts Designed to address ldquothe trauma of co-lonial abuses trauma which fragments our psyches pitching us intostates of nepantlardquo Anzalduacutea ldquorewrite[s] realityrdquo in more expansive

terms incorporating Spirit ancestral guides indigenous wisdom imag-ination and cultural-mythic 1047297gures79 She identi1047297es creativity and sto-rytelling with healing and associates both with progressive sociopoliti-cal change on multiple levels De1047297ning ldquoillnessrdquo broadly to include theeffects of colonialism assimilation racism sexism capitalism envi-ronmental degradation and other destructive practices epistemolo-gies and states of being that occur at individual systemic and plan-etary levels Anzalduacutea maintains that artists can assist in the healing

process As she asserts in chapter 983089 ldquoMy job as an artist is to bear wit-ness to what haunts us to step back and attempt to see the pattern inthese events (personal and societal) and how we can repair el dantildeo (thedamage) by using the imagination and its visions I believe in the trans-formative power and medicine of artrdquo

Because the term ldquoshamanismrdquo originated in anthropologyrsquos inter-actions with indigenous peoples some readers might view Anzalduacutearsquosincorporation of shamanic worldviews as an act of appropriation thatromanticizes a homogenous indigenous past downplays the speci1047297c-

ity of contemporary indigenous peoples and oversimpli1047297es (or entirely

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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ignores) questions of land sovereignty80 To be sure in her early workAnzalduacutea sometimes relied on stereotyped thinking about indigenouspeoples While itrsquos important to address these oversimpli1047297cations itrsquosalso important to locate them chronologically in the trajectory of hercareer and acknowledge her intellectual development and subsequentattempts to rectify these simpli1047297cations by offering a more nuancedresponse to indigenous appropriation misrepresentation and con-quest The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark and other latertexts is not synonymous with the Gloria Anzalduacutea who embraced ldquomypeople the Indiansrdquo in Borderlands La Frontera itrsquos inaccurate and mis-leading to con1047298ate the two

Moreover and as Light in the Dark demonstrates Anzalduacutea viewed

indigenous thought as a foundational vital source of decolonialwisdom for contemporary and future life on this planet and else-where She believed that indigenous philosophies offer alternativesto Cartesian-based knowledge systems which we ignore at our perilAs she asserts in her writing notas ldquoWersquove come to the time of a shiftin consciousness when entire civilizations change the way they knowabout the world We need a new and better method of thinking aboutthe world A new mental operation to improve the human conditionWe get hints from the alchemic and shamanistic traditions of the

pastrdquo The Gloria Anzalduacutea who wrote Light in the Dark was not inter-ested in recovering ldquoauthenticrdquo ancient teachings (whether theseteachings had their source in alchemy or shamanism) and insertingthem into twenty-1047297rst-century life Nor did she identify herself as ldquoNative Americanrdquo Rather she learned from and built on indigenousinsights she mixed these hints with other teachings crafting a phi-losophy designed to address contemporary needs Let me under-score this point Anzalduacutea does not reclaim an authentic indigenous

practice but instead develops a twenty-1047297rst-century approachmdashadecolonizing ontologymdashthat respectfully borrows from indigenouswisdom and many other non-Cartesian teachings As she states inher interview with Irene Lara ldquoIrsquom modernizing Mexican indigenoustraditionsrdquo81

Like language imagination is a critical strand in Anzalduacutearsquos decol-onizing ontological pro ject facilitating physical-psychic transforma-tion and knowledge production Anzalduacutea investigates imaginationrsquoscreative power in chapter 983090 where she borrows from transpersonal psy-

chology (particularly James Hillmanrsquos imaginal work) curanderismo

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

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indigenous and esoteric philosophies scholarship on shamanismand neo-shamanism and her own creative process to articulate theimaginationrsquos epistemological ontological and creative functions orwhat Jeffrey J Kripal might describe as the ldquomaterializing capacity ofthe empowered imaginationrdquomdashthe imaginationrsquos ability ldquoto affect bio-logical bodies and the physical environment in extraordinary waysrdquo82 According to Anzalduacutea the imagination enables us ldquoto change orreinvent realityrdquo acquire additional information from previously un-tapped sources (such as el cenote) and move among different di-mensions of reality ldquoImaginationrsquos soul dimension bridges body andnature to spirit and mind making these connections in the in-betweenspace of nepantlardquo

A Nahuatl word meaning ldquoin-between spacerdquo nepantla is arguablythe most expansive (and expanding) theory in Light in the Dark ap-pearing more than one hundred times within and between almostevery aspect of Anzalduacutearsquos autohistoria-teoriacutea Does Anzalduacutea leantoo heavily on nepantlamdashmaking it do too much work circulatingit through too many aspects of her theories Perhaps Or perhapsnepantla leans too heavily onmdashand intomdashAnzalduacutea compelling herto complicate her theories of individual and collective identity forma-tion alliance-building the creative process the imaginationrsquos roles in

knowledge production and spiritual activistsrsquo work as mediators andagents of change (After all Anzalduacutea seriously considered titling herbook Enacting Nepantla Rewriting Identity) Nepantla represents bothan elaboration of and an expansion beyond Anzalduacutearsquos well-knowntheories of the Borderlands and the Coatlicue state (introduced inBorderlands La Frontera) Like the former nepantla indicates liminalspace where transformation can occur and like the latter nepantlaindicates space times of chaos anxiety pain and loss of control But

with nepantla Anzalduacutea underscores and expands the ontological(spiritual psychic) dimensions As she explained in an interview fouryears after Borderlandsrsquo publication

I 1047297nd people using metaphors such as ldquoBorderlandsrdquo in a morelimited sense than I had meant it so to expand on the psychic andemotional borderlands Irsquom now using ldquonepantlardquo With nepantlathe connection to the spirit world is more pronounced as is the con-nection to the world after death to psychic spaces It has a more

spiritual psychic supernatural and indigenous resonance83

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In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

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her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

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Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

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methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4546

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 3546

983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xxxv

In Light in the Dark nepantla extends beyond Anzalduacutearsquos previous the-orization and exceeds her conscious control opening additional epis-temological ontological aesthetic and ethical possibilities in eachchapter As Anzalduacutea acknowledges in her preface ldquoNepantla con-cerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have to will myself todeal with these particular points these nepantlas inhabit me and in-evitably surface in whatever Irsquom writingrdquo

These ldquonepantla concernsrdquo do more than ldquoinevitably surfacerdquo inAnzalduacutearsquos writing they provoke Anzalduacutea pushing her in new direc-tions This agentic quality is what I referred to earlier when I describednepantla as an actant a strange collaborative endeavor Nepantla workswith Anzalduacutea as she invents her theories of las nepantleras nos otras

new tribalism geography of selves spiritual activism conocimientoand the Coyolxauhqui imperative Take for example her theory of lasldquonepantlerasrdquomdashthe word she coined to describe threshold people thosewho move within and among multiple worlds and use their movementin the service of transformation

Nepantleras are born from nepantla During an Anzalduacutean nepantlaindividual and collective self-de1047297nitions and belief systems are de-stabilized as we begin questioning our previously accepted world-views (our epistemologies ontologies and or ethics) As Anzalduacutea

explains in chapter 983089 ldquoIn nepantla we undergo the anguish of chang-ing our perspectives and crossing a series of cruz calles junctures andthresholds some leading to a different way of relating to people andsurroundings and others to the creation of a new worldrdquo This looseningof restrictive worldviewsmdashwhile extremely painfulmdashcan create shifts inconsciousness and thus opportunities for change we acquire addi-tional potentially transformative perspectives different ways to un-derstand ourselves our circumstances and our worlds Itrsquos as if

nepantla shoves us partially outside of our previously comfortableframeworks pushes us into a frictional contradictory clash of world-views challenges us to make some sort of meaning from chaos andthus forces us to change

Some people experiencing nepantla choose to become nepant-leras I emphasize this volitional component to avoid romanticizingthe concept84 Itrsquos not easy to be a nepantlera itrsquos risky lonely ex-hausting work Never entirely inside always somewhat outside everygroup or belief system nepantleras do not fully belong to any single

location Yet this willingness to remain with in the thresholds enables

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xxxvi | 983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xxxvii

her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983091

Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983092 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4546

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 3646

xxxvi | 983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150

nepantleras to break partially away from the cultural trance andbinary thinking that locks us into the status quo Living within andamong multiple worlds nepantleras use these liminal perspectives(or what Anzalduacutea describes in chapter 983092 as ldquoperspective[s] from thecracksrdquo) to question ldquoconsensual realityrdquo (our status quo stories) anddevelop alternative perspectivesmdashideas theories actions and beliefsthat partially re1047298ect but partially exceed existing worldviews Theyinvent relational theories and tactics with which they can reconceiveand in other ways transform the various worlds in which we exist85 Planetary citizens and world travelers nepantleras embody Anzalduacutearsquostheory of conocimiento enact her relational ethics and facilitate thedevelopment of new forms of individual and collective identities alli-

ance making and coalition building (articulated in her theories ofnos otras and new tribalism)

In the context of Anzalduacutean scholarship nepantlarsquos implicationsare immense Whereas scholars generally subordinate nepantla to bor-ders borderlands and focus more frequently on the latter if we takeLight in the Dark seriously we must expand our focus In addition to itsprevious descriptions as a stage in a larger process a state of conscious-ness and a ldquoliberatory spacerdquo nepantla takes on additional meaningsthat complicatemdashwithout negatingmdashprevious interpretations86

How for example might nepantlarsquos onto-epistemological dimen-sions affect our understanding of Anzalduacutearsquos revolutionary borderthinking as described by Walter Mignolo Joseacute David Saldiacutevar andothers If as Saldiacutevar suggests ldquoBorder gnosis or border thinking forAnzalduacutea is a site of criss-crossed experience language and iden-tityrdquo 87 consider the additional crisscrossing that occurs in nepantlarsquosshamanic world traveling

Relatedly by shifting her focus from new mestizas to nepant-

leras Anzalduacutea takes readers beyond debates about new mestizasrsquoethnic-sexual identities Indeed Anzalduacutearsquos ldquodemythologization of racerdquo(which occurs in ldquothe in-between place of nepantlardquo) invites readersto follow her example and go beyondmdashwithout erasing or ignoringmdashthe speci1047297c identity labels that she previously embraced Look for in-stance at chapter 983092 where she declares that ldquobeing Chicana is notenoughmdashnor is being queer a writer or any other identity label I chooseor others impose on me Conventional traditional identity labels arestuck in binaries trapped in jaulas (cages) that limit the growth of our

individual and collective livesrdquo Signi1047297cantly Anzalduacutea does not reject

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xxxvii

her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 3846

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4146

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983091

Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983092 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

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983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983093

terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

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983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

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983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

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983109983140983145983156983151983154rsquo983155 983113983150983156983154983151983140983157983139983156983145983151983150 | xxxvii

her identity as woman lesbian-dyke-patlache Chicana or campe-sina However in Light in the Dark these categories become insuf1047297-cient and she self-de1047297nes ldquoin more global-spiritual terms instead ofconventional categories of color class careerrdquo (chapter 983094) How willreaders answer Anzalduacutearsquos call for new approaches to identity ldquoFreshterms and open-ended tags that portray us in all our complexitiesand potentialitiesrdquo What connections will we make between theseidentity-related expansions and the ontological decolonization onwhich they are based

Light in the Dark Luz en lo oscuromdashRewriting Identity Spirituality Real-

ity invites us to consider these questions and many others This bookbroadens Anzalduacutean scholarship and shifts conversations in new di-

rections demonstrating that Anzalduacutea is a provocative philosopherof the highest caliber weaving together mexicana Chicana indige-nous feminist queer tejana and esoteric theories and perspectivesin ground-breaking ways

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 3846

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 3946

Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4046

983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4146

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983091

Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4246

983092 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4346

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983093

terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4446

983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4546

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 3846

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 3946

Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4046

983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4146

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983091

Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4246

983092 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4346

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983093

terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4446

983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4546

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 3946

Therersquos something epistemological about storytelling Itrsquos the way we know

each other the way we know ourselves The way we know the world Itrsquos also

the way we donrsquot know the way the world is kept from us the way wersquore

kept from knowledge about ourselves the way wersquore kept from understand-ing other people

983105983150983140983154983141983137 983106983137983154983154983141983156983156 983127983154983145983156983141983154rsquo983155 983107983144983154983151983150983145983139983148983141 983158983151983148 983091983090 983150983151 983091 983108983141983139983141983149983138983141983154 983089983097983097983097

When writing at night Irsquom aware of la luna Coyolxauhqui hoveringover my house I envision her muerta y decapitada (dead and decapi-tated) una cabeza con los parpados cerrados (eyes closed) But thenher eyes open y la miro dar luz a los lugares oscuros I see her light the

dark places Writing is a process of discovery and perception that pro-duces knowledge and conocimiento (insight) I am often driven by theimpulse to write something down by the desire and urgency to com-municate to make meaning to make sense of things to create myselfthrough this knowledge-producing act I call this impulse the ldquoCoyol-xauhqui imperativerdquo a struggle to reconstruct oneself and heal thesustos resulting from woundings traumas racism and other acts ofviolation que hechan pedazos nuestras almas split us scatter ourenergies and haunt us The Coyolxauhqui imperative is the act of

PREFACE

Gestures of the BodymdashEscribiendo para idear

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4046

983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4146

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983091

Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4246

983092 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4346

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983093

terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4446

983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4546

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4046

983090 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

calling back those pieces of the self soul that have been dispersed orlost the act of mourning the losses that haunt us The shadow beastand attendant desconocimientos (the ignorance we cultivate to keepourselves from knowledge so that we can remain unaccountable) havea tenacious hold on us Dealing with the lack of cohesiveness and sta-bility in life the increasing tension and con1047298icts motivates me to pro-cess the struggle The sheer mental emotional and spiritual anguishmotivates me to ldquowrite outrdquo my our experiences More than that myaspirations toward wholeness maintain my sanity a matter of lifeand death Grappling with (des)conocimientos with what I donrsquot wantto know opening and shutting my eyes and ears to cultural realitiesexpanding my awareness and consciousness or refusing to do so

sometimes results in discovering the positive shadow hidden aspectsof myself and the world Each irritant is a grain of sand in the oysterof the imagination Sometimes what accretes around an irritant orwound may produce a pearl of great insight a theory

Irsquom constantly struggling with my own ways of cultural productionand the role that I play as an artist I call the space where I strugglewith my creations ldquonepantlardquo Nepantla is the place where my culturaland personal codes clash where I come up against the worldrsquos dic-tates where these different worlds coalesce in my writing I am con-

scious of various nepantlasmdashlinguistic geographical gender sexualhistorical cultural political socialmdashwhen I write Nepantla is the pointof contact y el lugar between worldsmdashbetween imagination and phys-ical existence between ordinary and nonordinary (spirit) realitiesNepantla concerns automatically infuse my writing I donrsquot have towill myself to deal with these particular points these nepantlas in-habit me and inevitably surface in whatever Irsquom writing Nepantlasare places of constant tension where the missing or absent pieces

can be summoned back where transformation and healing may bepossible where wholeness is just out of reach but seems attainable

Escribo para ldquoidearrdquomdashthe Spanish word meaning ldquoto form or con-ceive an idea to develop a theory to invent and imaginerdquo My work isabout questioning affecting and changing the paradigms that governprevailing notions of reality identity creativity activism spiritualityrace gender class and sexuality To develop an epistemology of theimagination a psychology of the image I construct my own symbolicsystem1 While attempting to create new epistemological frameworks

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4146

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983091

Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4246

983092 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4346

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983093

terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4446

983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4546

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4146

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983091

Irsquom constantly re1047298ecting on this activity of idear The desire or need toshare the process of ldquofollowingrdquo images and making ldquostoriesrdquo and the-ories motivates me to write this text

Direct interpretive engagements between artists and their imageshave few precedents Therersquos very little direct personal artistic re-search so Irsquove had to engage with my own experiences and constructmy own formulations Intento dar testimonio de mi propio proceso yconciencia de escritora chicana Soy la que escribe y se escribe I amthe one who writes and who is being written Uacuteltimamente es el es-cribir que me escribe It is the writing that ldquowritesrdquo me I ldquoreadrdquo andldquospeakrdquo myself into being Writing is the site where I critique realityidentity language and dominant culturersquos representation and ideo-

logical controlUsing a multidisciplinary approach and a ldquostorytellingrdquo format I

theorize my own and othersrsquo struggles for representation identityself-inscription and creative expressions When I ldquospeakrdquo myself increative and theoretical writings I constantly shift positionsmdashwhichmeans taking into account ideological remolinos (whirlwinds) cul-tural dissonance and the convergence of competing worlds It meansdealing with the fact that I like most people inhabit different culturesand when crossing to other mundos shift into and out of perspectives

corresponding to each it means living in liminal spaces in nepantlasBy focusing on Chicana mestiza (mexicana tejana) experience andidentity in several axesmdashwriter artist intellectual scholar teacherwoman Chicana feminist lesbian working classmdashI attempt to ana-lyze describe and re-create these identity shifts Speaking from thegeographies of many ldquocountriesrdquo makes me a privileged speaker Ildquospeak in tonguesrdquomdashunderstand the languages emotions thoughtsfantasies of the various sub-personalities inhabiting me and the vari-

ous grounds they speak from To do so I must 1047297gure out which person(I she you we them they) which tense (present past future) whichlanguage and register and which voice or style to speak from Identityformation (which involves ldquoreadingrdquo and ldquowritingrdquo oneself and theworld) is an alchemical process that synthesizes the dualities contra-dictions and perspectives from these different selves and worlds

In these auto-ethnographies I am both observer and participantmdashI simultaneously look at myself as subject and object In the blink ofan eye I blur subject object class gender and other boundaries My

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4246

983092 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4346

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983093

terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4446

983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4546

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4246

983092 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

methodological stances emerge in the writing process as do the the-ories I treat all work including these chapters like 1047297ction or poetry

In formulating new ways of knowing new objects of knowledgenew perspectives and new orderings of experiences I grapple half-unconsciously with a new methodologymdashone that I hope does notreinforce prevailing modes I come to know how to ldquoreadrdquo and ldquowriterdquoI come to knowledge and conocimiento through images and ldquostoriesrdquo Iuse various storytelling formats consistent with the experiences thatI re1047298ect on and I use whatever language and style correspond to theways I do the work I believe that meditation on and conscious aware-ness of the imagersquos signi1047297cance for me its maker and for you itsreader interpreter co-creator furthers (not obstructs) the making of

art I gain frameworks for theorizing everyday experiences by allowingthe images to speak to and through me imagining my ways throughthe images and following them to their deep cenotes dialoguingwith them and then translating what Irsquove glimpsed Sometimes theshadow blocks this process and rules my behavior making the pro-cess painful

I cannot use the old critical language to describe address or containthe new subjectivities Using primary methods of pre sentation (auto-historia) rather than secondary methods (interpreting other peoplersquos

conceptions) I re1047298ect on the psychological mythological aspects ofmy own expression I scrutinize my wounds touch the scars map thenature of my con1047298icts croon to las musas (the muses) that I coax toinspire me crawl into the shapes the shadow takes and try to speakwith them

Methods have underlying assumptions implying theoretical posi-tions and basic premises There are two standpoints perceptual whichhas a literal reality and imaginal which has a psychic reality In put-

ting images together into story (the story I tell about the images) I useimagistic thinking employ an imaginal awareness Irsquom guided by thespirit of the image My naguala (daimon or guiding spirit) is an innersensibility that directs my lifemdashan image an action or an internal ex-perience2 My imagination and my naguala are connectedmdashthey areaspects of the same process of creativity Often my naguala draws tome things that are contrary to my will and purpose (compulsions ad-dictions negativities) resulting in an anguished impasse Overcomingthese impasses becomes part of the process This mode of perception

is magical thinking It reads what happens in the external world in

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4346

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983093

terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4446

983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4546

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4346

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983093

terms of my personal intentions and interests It uses external eventsto give meaning to my own mythmaking Magical thinking is not tra-ditionally valued in academic writing

My text is about the imagination (the psychersquos image-creating fac-ulty the power to make 1047297ction or stories inner movies like Star Trekrsquosholodeck) about ldquoactive imaginingrdquo ensuentildeos (dreaming while awake)and interacting consciously with them We are connected to el cenotevia the individual and collective aacuterbol de la vida and our images andensuentildeos emerge from that connection from the self-in-community(inner spiritual nature animals racial ethnic communities of inter-est neighborhood city nation planet galaxy and the unknown uni-verses) I use ldquodreamingrdquo or ensuentildeos (the making of images) to 1047297gure

out whatrsquos wrong foretell current and future events and establishhidden unknown connections between lived experiences and theoryThis text is about ordeals that trigger thoughts re1047298ections and ima-ginal musings3 It deals indirectly with the symbols that I associatewith certain archetypal experiences and processes

Thoughts pass like ripples through her body causing a muscle to tighten

here loosen there Everything comes in through skin eyes ears She experi-

ences reality physically No action exists outside of a physical context Every

action is the result of a decision internal con1047298ict struggle resolution orstalemate The body always re1047298ects inner activity ldquoEspantordquo in Los En-suentildeos de la Prieta4

For me writing is a gesture of the body a gesture of creativity a work-ing from the inside out My feminism is grounded not on incorporealabstraction but on corporeal realities The material body is center andcentral The body is the ground of thought The body is a text Writingis not about being in your head itrsquos about being in your body The

body responds physically emotionally and intellectually to externaland internal stimuli and writing records orders and theorizes aboutthese responses For me writing begins with the impulse to pushboundaries to shape ideas images and words that travel through thebody and echo in the mind into something that has never existedThe writing process is the same mysterious process that we use tomake the world

Therersquos a difference between talking with images stories and talkingabout them In this text I attempt to talk with images stories to engage

with creative and spiritual processes and their ritualistic aspects In

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4446

983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4546

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4446

983094 | 983120983154983141983142983137983139983141

enacting the relationship between certain images and concepts andmy own experience and psyche I fuse personal narrative with theo-retical discourse autobiographical vignettes with theoretical prose Icreate a hybrid genre a new discursive mode which I call ldquoautohisto-riardquo and ldquoautohistoria-teoriacuteardquo Conectando experiencias personalescon realidades sociales results in autohistoria and theorizing aboutthis activity results in autohistoria-teoriacutea Itrsquos a way of inventing andmaking knowledge meaning and identity through self-inscriptionsBy making certain personal experiences the subject of this study Ialso blur the private public borders

In writing this book I had to 1047297gure out how to imagine create discover certain concepts theories how to shape each essayrsquos structure

and designmdashin other words I had to map out each essayrsquos universe thesweep and body of its terrain I make these discoveries as I write andnot before I uncover and release the energy shaping each piece dis-cover its premise ideas counter ideas controlling ideas and archplot I track what lies beyond the originating idea trace its turningpoint its emotional dynamic and the linking of its parts I treat eachessay as ldquostoryrdquo with antagonism dialogue crisis climax resolutionand poetics I consider various aspects of craft narrative techniqueuse of languagemdashwhen Spanish is appropriate theoretical language

pertinent vernacular language suitableI donrsquot write from any single disciplinary position I write outside

of1047297cial theoretical philosophical language Mine is a struggle of recog-nizing and legitimizing excluded selves especially of women peopleof color queer and othered groups I organize and order these ideas asldquostoriesrdquo I believe that it is through narrative that you come to under-stand and know your self and make sense of the world Through narra-tive you formulate your identities by unconsciously locating yourself

in social narratives not of your own making5

Your culture gives youyour identity story pero en un buscado rompimiento con la tradicioacutenyou create an alternative identity story

This book contains the various kinds of ldquonarrativesrdquo that make upmy life feminism race ethnicity queerness gender and artistic prac-tice It deals with the processes that occur in reading writing andother creative acts Shamanic imaginings happen while reading orwriting a book The controlled ldquo1047298ightsrdquo that reading and writing sendus on are a kind of ldquoensuentildeosrdquo similar to the dream or fantasy pro-

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4546

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4546

983111983141983155983156983157983154983141983155 983151983142 983156983144983141 983106983151983140983161 | 983095

cess resembling the magical 1047298ights of the journeying shamans Myimage for ensuentildeos is of la Llorona astride a wild horse taking 1047298ightIn one of her aspects she is pictured as a woman with a horsersquos headI ldquoappropriaterdquo Mexican indigenous cultural 1047297gures such as Coyol-xauhqui symbols and practices I use imaginal 1047297gures (archetypes) ofthe inner world I dwell on the imaginationrsquos role in journeying to ldquonon-ordinaryrdquo realities on the use of the imaginal in nagualismo and itsconnection to nature spirituality This text is about acts of imaginative1047298ight in reality and identity construction and reconstructions

In rewriting narratives of identity nationalism ethnicity raceclass gender sexuality and aesthetics I attempt to show (and not

just tell) how transformation happens My job is not just to interpret

or describe realities but to create them through language and actionsymbols and images My task is to guide readers and give them thespace to co-create often against the grain of culture family and egoinjunctions against external and internal censorship against thedictates of genes From infancy our cultures induct us into the semi-trance state of ordinary consciousness into being in agreement withthe people around us into believing that this is the way things are Itis extremely dif1047297cult to shift out of this trance

This text questions its own formalizing and ordering attempts its

own strategies the machinations of thought itself of theory formu-lated on an experiential level of discourse It explores the variousstructures of experience that organize subjective worlds and illumi-nates meaning in personal experience and conduct It enters into thedialogue between the new story and the old and attempts to revisethe master story

I hope to contribute to the debate among activist academics tryingto intervene disrupt challenge and transform the existing power

structures that limit and constrain women My chief disciplinary 1047297eldsare creative writing feminism art literature epistemology as well asspiritual race border Raza and ethnic studies In questioning sys-tems of knowledge I attempt to add to or alter their norms and makechanges in these 1047297elds by presenting new theoretical models Withthe new tribalism I challenge the Chicano (and other) nationalist nar-ratives My dilemma and that of other Chicana and women-of-colorwriters is twofold how to write (produce) without being inscribed (re-produced) in the dominant white structure and how to write without

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness

8202019 Light in the Dark Luz en lo Oscuro by Gloria E Anzalduacutea

httpslidepdfcomreaderfulllight-in-the-dark-luz-en-lo-oscuro-by-gloria-e-anzaldua 4646

reinscribing and reproducing what we rebel against Our task is towrite against the edict that women should fear their own darknessthat we not broach it in our writings Nuestra tarea is to envisionCoyolxauhqui not dead and decapitated but with eyes wide openOur task is to light up the darkness