Introduction to the dossier Empty Pedestals

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Published: Jul 15, 2024
Keywords:
Empty pedestals, monuments, public memory, resistance

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Mario Rufer
Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana - Xochimilco. mariorufer@gmail.com
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2335-1335

Abstract

Many Latin American nations, as a foundational genesis, sculpted in bronze some of their eminent infamies: conquerors, encomenderos, slave traders, genocides, military leaders who massacred entire populations and a foreseeable etcetera. If it is true that, as Ernest Renan said, nations are less what they remember than what they are forced to forget, we could ask what is the role of monumentalization and the invention of public memory and national heritages in this founding oblivion? How is this oblivion disputed today in the face of emerging memories, with other languages of authority? This text introduces the dossier and its composing texts, reflecting on its guiding axes.

Article Details

How to Cite
Rufer, M. (2024). Introduction to the dossier Empty Pedestals. Memorias Disidentes. Revista De Estudios críticos Del Patrimonio, Archivos Y Memorias, 1(2), 11-20. Retrieved from https://ojs.unsj.edu.ar/index.php/Mdis/article/view/pedestalesvacios-MarioRufer
Issue
Vol 1 No 2 (2024): Pedestales Vacíos. Memorias disidentes: monumentos intervenidos, iconoclasias y disputas por lo público en América Latina
Section
Introduction
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Author Biography

Mario Rufer, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana - Xochimilco. mariorufer@gmail.com

Rufer was trained as a historian in the National University of Córdoba, Argentina. He earned a PhD in Asian and African Studies, fields History and Anthropology, from El Colegio de México. He is currently Professor-Researcher at the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, Mexico. His fields of research are oriented to cultural studies and postcolonial criticism, and the social uses of the past and temporality: nation and public history, archives, memory, museums, heritage. He has published on critical methodologies in cultural studies and social sciences. He is a member of the National System of Researchers of CONACyT (Mexico). He has been visiting professor at the universities of Bielefeld, Germany, Universidad del Cauca, Universidad de Buenos Aires, University of California, Los Angeles, New York University, among others. His books as author or editor include La nación en escenas. Memoria pública y usos del pasado en contextos poscoloniales (El Colegio de México, 2010); Entangled Heritages. Postcolonial perspectives on the uses of the Past in Latin America (co-edited with Olaf Kaltmeier, Routledge, 2017); Indisciplining Research. Archive, fieldwork and writing (co-edited with Frida Gorbach, Siglo XXI Editores-UAM,2017), The Routledge Handbook to the History and Societies in the Americas (co-edited with Olaf Kaltmeier and Stefan Rinke, Routledge, 2020); Horizontality: Towards a Critique of Methodology (co-edited with Inés Cornejo, CALAS-CLACSO, 2021); La colonialidad y sus nombres (Siglo XXI Editores-CLACSO, 2022); El tiempo de las ruinas (co-edited with Cristóbal Gnecco, UAM-Universidad de Los Andes, 2023). He is a member of the Red de Información y Discusión en Arqueología y Patrimonio (RIDAP), founder and editor in charge of Memorias Disidentes: Journal of critical studies of heritage, archives and memories.

References

Battcock, Clementina y Rufer, Mario (2021). Revolt, condemnation or reparation? Feminist protests agains violence in Mexico. Contemporanea 4, 663-711.

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Renan, Ernest (2010 [1882]). ¿Qué es una nación? En Homi Bhabha (Ed.), Nación y narración. Entre la ilusión de una identidad y las diferencias culturales, (pp. 21-38). Siglo XXI.

Rufer, Mario (2010). La nación en escenas. Memoria pública y usos del pasado en contextos poscoloniales. El Colegio de México.

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