Deborah Pacini-Hernandez. Oye Como Va! Hybridity and Identity in Latino Popular Music (original) (raw)

The politics of hybridity and mestizaje in U.S. Latino popular music

Arbor, 2011

Por mucho tiempo, las teorías del mestizaje han sido utilizadas para analizar e interpretar la hibridez de las identidades y culturas latinoamericanas, pero el mestizaje-al igual que sus críticas-no es un concepto adecuado en el caso de los espacios sociales, culturales y políticos que ocupan en los Estados Unidos las comunidades latinas y sus producciones musicales. A través del análisis de las profundas líneas de falla que existen en la intersección de los conceptos latinoamericanos de mestizaje y los conceptos bipolares estadounidenses sobre raza e identidad racial, este ensayo dilucida el impacto concreto y material que estas discrepancias conceptuales tienen en las comunidades latinas estadounidenses y en sus prácticas musicales.

Building Pan-Latino Unity in the United States through Music: An Exploration of Commonalities Between Salsa and Reggaeton

Musicological Explorations, 2009

In 2004, reggaeton exploded upon the U.S. popular music market with its danceable rhythms and catchy hooks. It quickly cultivated a significant pan-Latino audience in the United States composed of youth from a variety of Latino backgrounds – Puerto Rican, Mexican, Colombian, Dominican, Venezuelan, and more. But this is the not the first time that popular music has fostered a sense of pan-Latino pride in the States. In this article, I trace some of the ways in which reggaeton shares commonalities with salsa’s construction of, and engagement with, a pan-Latino U.S. audience in the 1970s. Drawing on an analysis of music, lyrics, and music videos, I argue that both salsa and reggaeton have been specifically designed to reach the widest possible Latino demographic in two significant ways. First, both genres are influenced and composed of a diverse array of musical styles, allowing people from different Latino backgrounds to relate to, and enjoy, the hybrid musical elements. Secondly, both genres feature lyrics that reference issues faced by different Latino communities and explicitly call for the development of pan-Latino unity. This article touches on the relevant ways in which reggaeton has succeeded in fostering a sense of pan-Latino pride by providing a socio-musical community that Latino youth participate in together, highlighting the similarities, rather than the tensions, between different Latino groups in America

Spanish Popular Music through Latin American eyes

En Silvia Martinez y Héctor Fouce (eds). Made in Spain. London and New York: Routledge. Pp. 187-195., 2013

The relationship that Spain has with its ancient colonies in Latin America is a complex one. Unlike the relationship that the United States has with Australia and United Kingdom, for instance, Spain is not a military ally of any of the big Latin American countries. Commercial exchanges are perceived by the common citizen as an affair of the economical elites and the presence of Spanish banks and corporations are seen suspiciously as a neocolonial activity. Asymmetrical economic relations make that immigrants from Latin American countries to are mostly unqualified workers while Spaniards travelling to the Americas do so in search of exoticism or commercial advantages […] Independently of the above considerations, the fact of sharing a common language has facilitated the consumption of cultural products such as literature, music, cinema and television series on both sides without regard to their provenance. Only the characteristics of the product and the entertainment or satisfaction value they offer counts. We have a situation where a web of complex and paradoxical relationships oscillates between the recognition of a common culture and the need of asserting historical differences. It is in this unstable scenario that the diffusion, reception and consumption of Spanish urban popular music takes place. Perhaps for this reason many songs produced in Spain have not been really understood in Ibero-America. Nevertheless some of them have been cultural and vital landmarks for thousands of individuals. They have been a defining element in the mechanisms of construction of the identity and the subjectivity of successive generations in sundry social groups. They are an integral part of the private life of many individuals and of the history of Latin American music. In this article I shall examine some facets of this complex relationship. I will emphasize above all, the processes and types of transnationalism of Spanish music in Latin America in cases that go from the reproduction of stereotypes of Spanish culture to the constitution of real transnational musical scenes lacking any marks of national culture and sharing a mental imagery and worlds of signification.

Pop in Spanish in the U.S.: A Space to Articulate the Latino Identity

Estudios del Observatorio/Observatorio Studies, 2020

Spanish has been fundamental to the definition of Latin music in the U.S. Since the 19 th century, this catchall term has been used to describe a heterogenous catalogue of musical styles that has evolved over time, adapting to the reality of the Hispanic community of each moment. This category's collective imagination, subject matter, and musical practices are in a state of constant transformation, contributing to the rearticulation of the Latino identity for each historic period. This study analyzes the evolution of Latin music from its conception as a category through the current moment. It begins with the pan-Latino context of the 19 th century and pays particular attention to the emergence of pop in the past few decades, including the 'Latino Boom' of the 1990s and through the present day, when a new generation of Latino artists has prompted a number of musical developments broadly referred to as 'urban music.' In this overview, we see how Latin music and its use of the Spanish language have adapted in line with the political, economic, and social status of the Hispanic community in the U.S.

“Popular Musicology in Latin America: Synthesis of its Accomplishments, Problems, and Challenges” in A Latin American Music Reader Views from the South, Javier F. León y Helena Simonett eds, Illinois University Press and the Society for Ethnomusicology, 2016: 120-145.

I will take the term “urban popular music” in Latin America to refer to a music that is a massmediated, a mass-culture phenomenon, and an agent of modernization. It is massmediated in the sense that the music industry and technology structure the relationships between musicians and publics, as well as those between music and musicians, who receive their art primarily by listening to recordings. It is mass-circulated because it reaches millions of people simultaneously, globalizing local sensibilities and creating trans-social and transnational alliances. It is modern because of its symbiotic relation with to the culture industry, technology, and communication, from which it develops its capacity to express the present, a fundamental historical moment for the young audience that sustains it.

An Ethnography of Emerging Latino Music Scenes

Symbolic Interaction, 2009

We report on an ethnographic study of three emerging scenes in which Latino music is produced, performed, experienced, and celebrated in Houston, Texas: rock en Español, gay Latino dance music, and professional soccer supporters' music. Music is an important feature of Latino culture, since it informs migration, citizenship, spirituality, and other aspects of the contemporary Latino experience. Three interactionist concepts inform this study. The concept of scene directs our attention to the comprehensive social worlds driven by Latino music. The concept of idioculture directs our attention to the ways audience members experience Latino music within everyday life small groups. The concept of place directs our attention to how Latino music creates new locations to anchor the self in reference to country of origin, present music communities, or possible symbolic locations such as America or La Raza. We conclude with suggestions for a revised interactionist concept of music scene.