(Un)veiling Bodies
A Trajectory of Chilean Post-Dictatorship Documentary

Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto

Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Cultures 20

Legenda

23 September 2019  •  234pp

ISBN: 978-1-781887-01-1 (hardback)  •  RRP £80, $110, €95

ISBN: 978-1-781884-29-4 (paperback, 13 December 2021)  •  RRP £10.99, $14.99, €13.49

ISBN: 978-1-781884-30-0 (JSTOR ebook)

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Documentary plays an essential role in the struggles over memories of Latin America’s dictatorial pasts. Ever since Chile’s military coup of 11 September 1973, whether inside the country or in exile, filmmakers have passionately and incessantly documented, created, and reenacted memories from this traumatic event and its aftermath.

(Un)veiling Bodies analyses the rich landscape of Chilean documentary during the first two decades after the restoration of civilian rule in 1990. Ramírez-Soto proposes a trajectory that shifts from revealing the bodies of direct victims to unveiling the body of the film itself. This is a journey deeply intertwined with the country’s own democratic transition.

Informed by the affective turn in film studies, this book offers a novel approach to this largely unexplored field of Chilean cinema by arguing that these heterogeneous works shift from a ‘cinema of the affected’ to a ‘cinema of affect’. By doing so, these documentaries contribute to Chilean society’s own restoration of the senses.

Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto is Assistant Professor in the School of Cinema at San Francisco State University. Her articles have appeared in Quarterly Review of Film and Video, Rethinking History, and Journal of Latin American Cultural Studies. She is also the coeditor of Nomadías: El cine de Marilú Mallet, Valeria Sarmiento y Angelina Vázquez (2016).

Reviews:

  • ‘Estas reflexiones finales apuntan a que nos en-contramos ante una obra que no solo está llama-da a convertirse en lugar de paso obligado para investigaciones posteriores sobre el documental chileno contemporáneo inserto en el devenir de las políticas del pasado y la memoria, sino que ofrece intersticios para lecturas productivas en otros ámbitos y periodos.’ — María Luisa Ortega, Secuencias 51, 2020, 178-80
  • ‘Impeccably documented and researched... the book works with over 100 films (an impressive corpus) and includes a filmography that will undoubtedly serve as an important resource for students and scholars... The book also rescues for/from the archive a vast group of nearly forgotten directors and films that open the reader’s mind to appreciate the breadth of what Chilean documentary film both has been and is. This is an especially important gesture for international readers... Pushes the conversation on documentary far beyond the stale, though classic debates about objectivity and subjectivity; it shows that documentary film is not only a medium capable of capturing memories but also of actively creating and triggering them through sensory experience.’ — Michael Lazzara, A Contracorriente 18.2, 2021, 271-78
  • ‘Más allá de esto, no cabe duda que (Un)veiling Bodies. A Trajectory of Chilean Post-dictatorship documentary, se trata de un libro importante para futuros estudios sobre cine documental chileno, estableciendo un verdadero “piso” investigativo, que habrá que considerar al momento de acercarse a él.’ — Iván Pinto Veas, Imagofagia 24, 2021, 689-96
  • ‘En la intersección de diversos ámbitos teóricos, la obra de Ramírez-Soto forma parte, al fin, de una tendencia fecunda que busca establecer puentes entre la historia, la ética y los estudios de la imagen. Desmarcándose prudentemente de los trauma studies y prefiriendo situar su reflexión bajo el signo del “giro afectivo”, (Un)veiling Bodies logra dar cuenta exitosamente de un periodo sensible de la producción documental en Chile, otorgando una nueva visibilidad a un corpus a menudo ignorado por los investigadores.’ — Ignacio Albornoz Fariña, Cinémas d'Amérique Latine 28, 2020, 170-71 (full text online)

Contents:

ix-xi
Acknowledgements
E.R.
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.3
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xii-xii
Explanatory Notes
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.4
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xiii-xiv
Abbreviations
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.5
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1-32
Introduction
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.6
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33-61
Chapter 1 Contextualizing Chilean Documentary and the Memory Struggles
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.7
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62-95
Chapter 2 (un)veiling Bodies: From Human Remains To Torture Survivors
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.8
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96-124
Chapter 3 Chilean Documentary Wanderings: Journeys of Desexilio
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.9
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125-149
Chapter 4 On Glimpses of Childhood and Other People’s Memories
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.10
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150-177
Chapter 5 Extending the Circle: Nostalgia For the 1980s and Unsettling Accounts
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.11
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178-182
Conclusion
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.12
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183-201
Bibliography
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.13
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202-205
Filmography
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.14
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206-220
Index
Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto
doi:10.2307/j.ctv16km03h.15
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Bibliography entry:

Ramírez-Soto, Elizabeth, (Un)veiling Bodies: A Trajectory of Chilean Post-Dictatorship Documentary, Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Cultures, 20 (Legenda, 2019)

First footnote reference: 35 Elizabeth Ramírez-Soto, (Un)veiling Bodies: A Trajectory of Chilean Post-Dictatorship Documentary, Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Cultures, 20 (Legenda, 2019), p. 21.

Subsequent footnote reference: 37 Ramírez-Soto, p. 47.

(To see how these citations were worked out, follow this link.)

Bibliography entry:

Ramírez-Soto, Elizabeth. 2019. (Un)veiling Bodies: A Trajectory of Chilean Post-Dictatorship Documentary, Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Cultures, 20 (Legenda)

Example citation: ‘A quotation occurring on page 21 of this work’ (Ramírez-Soto 2019: 21).

Example footnote reference: 35 Ramírez-Soto 2019: 21.

(To see how these citations were worked out, follow this link.)


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