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ECORFAN Journal-Republic of Colombia is a research journal that publishes articles in the areas of:
Philosophy, History and Human Sciences

In Pro-Research, Teaching and Training of human resources committed to Science. The content of the
articles and reviews that appear in each issue are those of the authors and does not necessarily the
opinion of the editor in chief.
In Number 1st presented an article Violence in Colombia: between historiography and
genealogy. The construction of an object of study by ARCILA-ARANGO, Mauricio with adscription
Universidad Iberoamericana, in the next section an article Nationalism and otherness in Trump’s
America by BUSTOS-GOROZPE, Fernando with adscription in the Universidad Iberoamericana, in the
next Section an article The paradox of work. A world of losing and winning by RAMÍREZ-
VELÁZQUEZ, Josefina with adscription in the Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historia, in the
next Section an article Non-heterosexual Subjectivities and Subversions: the self-care and pleasure by
GARCÍA-CALDERÓN, Geronimo, with adscription in the Universidad de Guadalajara.
Content
Article Page
Violence in Colombia: between historiography and genealogy. The construction 1-8

of an object of study
ARCILA-ARANGO, Mauricio
Nationalism and otherness in Trump’s America 9-18

BUSTOS-GOROZPE, Fernando
The paradox of work. A world of losing and winning 19-39

RAMÍREZ-VELÁZQUEZ, Josefina
Non-heterosexual Subjectivities and Subversions: the self-care and pleasure 40-51

GARCÍA-CALDERÓN, Geronimo
Instructions for Authors
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1
Article ECORFAN Journal
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 1-8
Violence in Colombia: between historiography and genealogy. The construction of

an object of study
ARCILA-ARANGO, Mauricio*†
Universidad Iberoamericana
Received May 8, 2016; Accepted September 12, 2016
Abstract
This article explores the relationship between historiography and genealogy on the phenomenon of
"The Violence” in Colombia, which came to pass between the years 1946 and 1966. The field of
interest is focused on the discursive productions that allow the configuration of violence as a subject of
study, under an evaluative orientation of economic, political and cultural processes that are inscribed in
forms of symbolic violence. Based on analysis of historiographical and genealogical processes are
reconstructed and however the motivations of the use of violence and its practice concluding that there
are various continuities and discontinuities between the violent action and narrative of political and
partisan institutions that regulate the production of sense in the society.
Violence, Historiography, Genealogy, Politics, Nadaism, Novel
Citation: ARCILA-ARANGO, Mauricio. Violence in Colombia: between historiography and genealogy the construction of
an object of study. ECORFAN Journal-Republic of Colombia 2016, 2-2: 1-8
* Correspondence to Author (mauricio.arcila@observa.org.mx)

† Researcher contributing first author.
© ECORFAN Journal –Republic of Colombia www.ecorfan.org/republicofcolombia

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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 1-8
Introduction “Historiografía de la
Violencia”[Historiography of violence]. "It is
I – A Problem of Historiographical nature not convenient to extend the scope of the term"
violence ", to the point that we cannot
What is “Violence”1?, How the term "Violence" demarcate the field of study with a certain
can do is part of the speech of everyday life?, property". And at least in the "Violencia
The word "The Violence" can be getting to Política" of “los años de la Violencia” (Ortiz
represent a historical period? We evoked the Sarmiento, 1994 , p.372).
questions and the cases of a problem to face,
and that " The Violence" for the history of It is worth “point out (as indicated by
Colombia means a daily life, a word that Ortiz Sarmiento) that we understand the nature
extends from half of century to our days as a of "the violent" as the managed mode to solve
shadow that darkens slowly with coming of the conflict through the total elimination of the
age, dividing and founding the country in other, the sea in the political exercise or in
stories of horrors linked to political another social practice or the interaction in
hegemonies, left and right pamphlets, economic general” (Ortiz Sarmiento, 1994).
interests of local allies strategically with foreign
investors and multinational companies, and to The difficulty that opens here step as a
collisions of ethical and moral values that in "historiographical nature" issue is the
different ways they are recorded in the demarcation of borders and disciplinary
Scriptural memories of history, the novel and approaches with their methods and strategies
poetry. The question of " The Violence" can individuals from "conceptualization of the
lead us to the “history of the Violence” or the violence", in this sense has prevailed in the
story of "the violent" already that it extends Colombian language "the speech" of the
beyond the period called "the Violence", on the "Violence policy" of "the years of violence" is
other hand the multiplicity of social actors who determined by the tendency to the systematic
engage in "the violent" has led to social and effective elimination of the "other-
researchers to speak not radically about of “The individual" and the "other-collective", the limits
Violence”, but of "many violence" that intersect of the fields of study allow to differentiate the
in different directions, meaning “The Violence” Historiography of the Violence, with respect to
as a phenomenon of "causal multiplicity", in the the Political Historiography in general and the
same way as us warns Carlos Miguel Ortiz Social Historiography, which it deals with the
Sarmiento in the (Ortiz Sarmiento, 1994). social movements and struggles in which social
conflict, and not the elimination of the other, is
the central thematic core.
1
“The Violence” is like, it is called the historical period
The theme of “The Violence" would be
of Colombia in the XX century of confrontation between
the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party, which divided into different chapters of the
without having declared a civil war was characterized by Colombian historiography, but the
being extremely violent, including murders, aggressions, phenomenon overflows in its multiplicity of
persecutions, destruction of private property and dimensions of violence all intentions of
terrorism due to political alignment. During this period
representation; in Colombian history, since the
several characters and groups of both sides faced each
other. The conflict caused 200,000 to 300,000 deaths and 40s of the twentieth century has been drawn an
the forced migration of more than 2 million people axis of "political nature" to explain “The
equivalent to almost a fifth of the total population of Violence" from the friend-enemy partisan logic,
Colombia, which at that time reached 11 million represented in binary oppositions:
populations.
ISSN-On line: 2539-1372 ARCILA-ARANGO, Mauricio. Violence in Colombia: between
ECORFAN® All rights reserved. historiography and genealogy. The construction of an object of
study ECORFAN Journal-Republic of Colombia 2016
3
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 1-8
Liberals - Conservatives, The violents - Would allow us to work "on the

The pacifists, Left - Right, Good Violence - muddled, scrawled, often rewritten paths" of
Bad Violence, Modernization - Tradition, “The Violence”, and ask ourselves, What is
"Primitive Rebels" - Regulatory State. “The Violence”?, and with this question "to
perceive the singularity of the events, beyond
However, although to a lesser extent, any monotonous purpose”1; How the term
contributions have been made to the narrative “The Violence” can be part of the everyday talk
of “The Violence” from different disciplines ?, and "find ourselves where you least expect
enriching conceptually and making it possible and what goes unnoticed for having no history -
to delimit the frontiers of discourse, its methods feelings, love, conscience, instincts-"; How can
and strategies, presupposing or not underlying the word “The Violence” come to represent a
principles underlying the construction of historical period?, and "capture its return, but
discourse about of “The Violence" in the not at all to trace the slow curve of an
historical, the economic, the cultural, the evolution, but to rediscover the different scenes
psychological, the poetic, etc. in which they have played different roles; define
even the point of their absence Foucault, 1994).
For this reason, the genealogy2 as
proposed by Foucault (1994), "gray,
meticulously and patiently documentalist". II - The Bibliographic Production
The bibliographical production of “The

2
"(Généalogie).” It speaks of a Foucault Violence”, posted during the nefarious “years
genealogicalperiod is used to refer to those works of Violence”, called “partisan” court, consists
dedicated to the analysis of the forms of exercise of of books that are written from the links with the
power, unlike what happens with archeology and with the sides in public, are liberal, Conservative or in
notion of episteme, Foucault has not written a work
methodological, as happened with L "Archéologie du the “new language” Communist. Many of
savoir. It is necessary to specify that we should not these books are written by the leaders of parties,
understand Foucault's genealogy as a rupture, and even staff of the State (Government officials, judges,
less as an opposition to archeology. Archeology and or trial lawyers or trial lawyers), journalists
genealogy are supported by a common budget: writing attached to the parties and by combatants of
the history without referring the analysis to the founding
instance of the subject (DE3, 147) regular and irregular forces.
On the other handa, the passage of the archaeology to the
genealogy is an extension of the field of the research for Among the different modalities of the
to include in a more precise way the study of non- political speeches of court "partisan" that make
discursive practices and, above all, the non- allusions to “Political Violence” we find
dicursivity/discursivity relation;in other words: to
“compilations of pronouncements (speeches by
analyze knowledge in terms of strategy and power
tactics. In this sense, it is about situate knowledge in the the presidents of the time and national leaders
ambit of struggles. A correct apreciation oucault's of the parties), declarations, conferences,
genealogical work requires following in detail his public missives and exhortative speeches”
conception of power relations (we have dealt with it in generated at crucial moments of the
the articles Power and Government). The struggles aren’t confrontation; among these publications stand
conceived, finally, as a oposition term to term that blocks
them, as a essential antagonism, but as an agonism: a out the anthology of speeches and interventions
relationship of reciprocal incitement and at the same time by the liberal Carlos Lleras Restrepo between
reversible (DE4, 238).In the prepective we could speak 1941 and 1954, which is entitled: From the
about genealogy of knowledge in the field of what Republic to the Dictatorship (testimony on
Foucault calls governability. "(Castro, 2004) Colombian politics).

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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 1-8
On the opposite side, Rafael Azula Likewise, testimonial chronicles can

Barrera and Joaquín Estrada Monsalve also be found on the side of armed rebels like
conservatives write books: De la revolución al Las guerrillas del Llano by Eduardo Franco
orden nuevo: proceso y drama de un pueblo Isaza (1959). and from the perspective of the
(Azula Barrera, 1998). Army3 in the book written by Coronel Gustavo
Sierra Ochoa Las Guerrillas en los Llanos
Orientale (1954).
And Así fue la revolución (Estrada
Monsalve, 1950), both with political office
during the Government of President Mariano
Ospina Pérez between 1946 to 1950; Likewise, III - Historiography of violence
the official publication of the Communist Party
stands out, Treinta años de lucha del Partido
Comunista en Colombia (1960). Following the line drawn up by the
Historiografía de la Violencia, we find
ourselves in the framework of major stages
In the various denunciation publications, traversed by Colombian society, particularly
characterized by their pamphletear court can be since the 1930s as a result of economic, social,
found Historia de una monstruosa farsa (1964). cultural and political changes4.
By Felipe Echavarría; Lo que el cielo no
perdona (1974), of the parish priest Fidel
Blandón (book written under the pseudonym of
“Ernesto León Herrera”), and El basilisco en
acción o los crímenes del bandolerismo, by
Alfonso Hilarión under the pseudonym “Testis
fidelis” (1953).
The writings that point to the historical

clarification “in terms of responsibilities of
authorships -material- and -intelligent-“ focus
mainly on the events that occurred on April 9,
3
1948, the date of the assassination of the liberal “The testimonial bibliography of the counterpart, that of
leader Jorge Eliecer Gaitán known as the the regular forces ascribed to the institutions of the State,
is much more unknown by the academic media and by
"Bogotazo"; on June 13, 1953, the date of the the reading public in general. In the case of historians and
coup d'état sponsored by Conservative and social scientists, this lack of knowledge has been a lack
Liberal leaders to install in the government the that has impeded the development of a critical history of
military Gustavo Rojas Pinilla; and on May 10, institutions and that, in the issue of Violence, has allowed
1957, date of the overthrow of said president to say very little about the internal logic of the
institutions. military, of their transactions with
under the shelter, once again, of the two parties. "paramilitaries", during the long years of confrontations.
Among the books made on these dates are the "(Ortiz Sarmiento, 1994)
works of the journalist Gonzalo Canal Ramírez 4
"From the political point of view, the three great periods
El 9 de abril de 1948, (1948) y, Estampas y of institutional changes would be successively: the
testimonio de la Violencia (1966). Liberal Republic from 1930 to 1945; the Conservative
rescue from 1946 to 1957, and the bipartisan National
Front, beginning in 1958. "Ibid.
5
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 1-8
During these periods the “social”5 The decade of the 60s offers Colombian
disciplines were making their way through historiography discontinuities and part
processes not necessarily rectilinear, but continuities in a diversified panorama of
zigzagging and even contradictory and professions in the field of economic-social
ambivalent, until the middle of the 60s, where sciences, highlighting mainly the “relative”6
these processes have been partially consolidated secularization of the university environment
by imbricating themselves with itineraries that and its politicization outside traditional7
converge in historiography. partisanship.
So that, it is not strange to find in the This discontinuity also means a break
discourse of the intellectuals of these times, with the Catholic confessionalism that
explanations based on economics as the prevailed in the universities; the social
ultimate principle of historical phenomena, disciplines added new secular and "moderns"
under the influence of Marx and the Marxist contents, modifying the old structures of
classics in the understanding of the economic mental(s) representation (s), collective and
as relations of production and struggle of individual character and religious sense.
classes.
5
“Before the Department of Sociology ,the National 6
University had been the scene of the dismemberment of When we say “relative secularization” we refer to the
other branches of social disciplines: in 1952 it was process experienced by the university students during the
transformed into the Faculty of Economics what was the 60s, especially in the second quinquennium
7
Institute of Economics, existing since 1945 as a “Linked to these phenomenas (secularitazions-
dependency of the Faculty of Law. In 1957 the Faculty of politicization) it is possible to register others in turn
Psychology was established, from the Institute of the significant for the social sciences and historiography: a)
same name that, given its clinical orientation, was part of the attempts to establish a scientific-technical rationality
the Faculty of Medicine; precisely for "ideological" on the part of the regime, which leads to the beginnings
reasons one of its first directors was separated from the of the Institutional recognition of investigative work
position. Simultaneously or after the National University, (under the government of Carlos Lleras Restrepoin 1968,
other centers of higher education, many of them private, the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología y el Fondo
opened these same careers; for example, the Sociology Francisco José de Caldas Colciencias although only until
offered, with the same symbiotic profile between the 1987 Colciencias considered among its important lines of
technical and the confessional, in two universities run by research an aspect of social sciences, that of violence); b)
ecclesiastics: the Pontificia Universities Javeriana de the formation of the first, incipient and fragile nuclei of
Bogotá and Bolivariana de Medellín; and a little later it researchers; c) the unionization of professionals in these
was founded, also by the Jesuits, the Center for Research areas (which, incidentally, did not include historians until
and Social Action CINEP, that would take a different seven years ago, and very weakly); d) the takeoff of the
course from the two universities, from the point of view publishing industry, especially in social sciences and
of its social projection. This is how we came to the 60s, history, demanded by the university students; e) the
with a diversified panorama of professions in the field of publication of journals in social disciplines, standing out,
economic and social sciences. Other phenomena will for the case of history, the Colombian Yearbook of Social
occur in this decade, which in our opinion also affect the History and Culture, founded by Jaime Jaramillo Uribe ".
field of historiographical production, phenomena that (Cf. Carlos M. Ortiz, "La producción colombiana de
partly mean discontinuity and part continuity with respect ciencias sociales y las nuevas exigencias de la
to the 50s. We emphasize mainly the "relative" transferencia de información", Paper presented to the
secularization of the university environment and its Seminar on Libraries organized by Icfes, Cartagena,
politicization outside of traditional partisanship. "Ibid . September 1980).
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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 1-8
As Ortiz Sarmiento tells us: “It is not by According to Ortiz Sarmiento (1994).
chance that Sociology is the university career in These factors are:
which the conflict with the establishment
acquires a greater adversative burden, (already) a) The decline of tone in the re-catolization
that in the different universities it was founded crusade of conservative governments, as
for conservative confessional purposes and that a consequence of the bipartisan pact of
is why lives this ambivalence more intensely”8 the National Front, which released the
links that prevented the secularization of
Ortiz Sarmiento also points out that it is education (this was even officially
this politicization of the religious that lends promoted during governments like the
new secular contents along with the new one of Carlos Lleras).
language -revolutionary- to the old mental
structures of representation. This double of the b) The wear of traditional partisanship,
60s phenomenon of the “secularization- particularly the weakening of its
politicization” is what the studies point out as proselytizing ideological force, which
fundamental to understand, among others, the created a great void capable of being
four important factors that characterize the filled by new types of political
historiographic production in its "know-how" adhesions independent of the long-
and, above all, the existing consensus on the standing networks of the liberal and
“Nature of history”, as something invented9 - conservative parties.
or revived10 - by historians.
c) The opening of the university to new
8
“Several of the professors, leaders of great student social sectors, no longer coming from
audience and credibility, were pastors or priests who not
the traditional elites.
abdicate his religious commitment, had undergone a
process of transformation through contact with
sociological theories (which they studied at universities d) Political events of continental impact,
such as the Catholic University of Leuven). and, of such as the Cuban Revolution
course, with recent political events such as the Cuban
Revolution; Camilo Torres was the most prominent of
them, but not the only one”. Ortiz Sarmiento, op. cit. In this sense “the genealogy requires,
9
“Nietzsche says that, at a given point of the tim and ina therefore, thorough knowledge, large amount of
particular place in the universe , intelligent animals stacked materials, patience”; since
invented knowledge. The word he uses, invention - the historiography cannot be reduced to political
German term is Erfindung - reappears frequently in his history or more precisely to political and
writings, and always with polemical intent and meaning.
When he speaks of "invention" he has in mind a word
military history with its “cyclopean
that opposes invention, the word "origin". When he says monuments” in different dimensions of events
"invention" is to not say "origin", when he says (government event, diplomatic event, war
Erfindung, it is to say not Ursprung.” Foucault, op. cit. event) as immovable foundations, therefore we
should not knock them down with “great
10
“The story makes talking to the body that is silent. It
supposes a lag between the silent opacity of reality that it beneficial errors”, but of “small truths without
wishes to express and the place where it produces its
discourse, protected by the distance that separates it from
appearance, established by a severe method”
its object (Gegen-stand). The violence of the body as Nietzsche would tell us in Humano,
reaches the page written by means of the absence, demasiado humano (2005)
through the documents that the historian could see on a
beach where the presence that left them there is no longer
there, and through a murmur that allows us to hear, as historia”, Universidad Iberoamericana, México, 2nd
come from far away, the sound of the unknown vastness reprint, 2006. Foucault, op. cit.
that seduces and threatens to know”. “La escritura de la
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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 1-8
We must not understand genealogy and Since the genealogical perspective the
historiography here as “the eagle's deep vision question about the violence in its dimension of
of the philosopher in relation to the scrutinizing social process, it loses its character of absolute
gaze of the wise” but, on the contrary, as origin in its expression of “Political Violence”
“something opposed to the metahistorical and is evident in its structure, piece by piece, in
display of ideal meanings and the indefinite its discord, in its contrasts, in its contrast, in
teleological” which presupposes the “Political discursive boundaries, as a blur that allow
Violence” and its narrative, what we propose to problematizing the violence since the
see here is the construction of the discursive multiplicity and the difference.
events “opposing the search for (their)
«origin»" (Foucault, 1994)
Conclusions References
To ask about the phenomenon of “The Arango, G., Arbelaez, J., & Olle-Laprune, P.
Violence” in Colombia from the Primer manifiesto nadaísta y otros textos.
Historiographical perspective, we find different
discursive practices of naturalization from the Azula Barrera, R. (1998). De la revolución al
use of symbolic violence, that is, discourses orden nuevo. Bogotá: Fundación Mariano
that enunciate an affective-descriptive Ospina Pérez.
knowledge of the phenomenon, but that they
allow us to approach since the symbolic plane Castro, E. (2004). El vocabulario de Michel
opening the way to problematic questions and Foucault. Bernal: Universidad Nacional de
reflection on violence from the human sciences. Quilmes.
The bibliographical production of Echavarría, F. (1974). Historia de una

violence that was characterized by its marked monstruosa farsa. Madrid: Musigraf Arabí.
partisan cut opens up problematic elements
from the genealogical perspective, as proposed Estrada Monsalve, J. (1950). Así fué la
by Foucault, since it makes us visible the revolución. Bogotá: Editorial Iqueima.
discursive production of the speech of violence
from the different interests and partisan politics, Foucault, M. (1994). Microfísica del poder.
subjective and affective, putting in evidence the Barcelona: Planeta-Agostini.
power relations and interests that these
discursive productions enunciate. Franco Isaza, E. (1959). Las guerillas del llano.
Bogotá: Librería Mundial.
The Historiography of violence from the
genealogical perspective, shows us the León Herrera, E. (1954). Lo que el cielo no
economic-social, cultural and political changes perdona. Bogotá, Editorial Argra.
that frame the phenomenon of violence, making
evident the need to create approaches from the Lleras Restrepo, C. (1955). De la republica a la
practices of the different studies and social dictadura. Bogotá: Editorial Argra.
disciplines, since that the phenomenon of
violence appears in its "nature" as a Oquist, P. (1978). Violencia, conflicto y
contradictory and ambivalent phenomenon, of a política en Colombia. Bogotá.
multicausal and multifactorial character.

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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 1-8
Sarmiento, C. M. O. (1994). Historiografía de

la Violencia. La historia al final del milenio:
ensayos de historiografía colombiana y
latinoamericana, 1, 371.
Sierra Ochoa, G. (1954). Las guerrillas de los

llanos orientales. Manizales: [Impr.
Departamental].
Ramírez, G. C. (1966). Estampas y testimonios

de violencia. Canal Ramírez, Impr. y
Rotograbado.
(1948). Nueve de abril, 1948. Bogotá: Cahur.
Testis fidelis. (1953). El basilisco en acción, o,

Los crimenes del bandolerismo. Medellin:
Tipografia Olympia.
Treinta años de lucha del Partido Comunista de

Colombia. Ediciones Paz y Socialismo, 1960.

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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 9-18
Nationalism and otherness in Trump’s America
BUSTOS-GOROZPE, Fernando†
Received January 7, 2016; Accepted June 15, 2016
Abstract
Because of the arrival to Trump's presidency in the USA, it becomes necessary to make a brief analysis
of why certain nationalisms are resurfacing at an international level, since these attack against all that
that appears as an another: otherness. Then the question about what frames of recognition and
mechanisms they exist to recognize a life and scribble others it becomes necessary to dialogue, since in
the current scenario, the language and the image (especially the meme) have been used like tool to
erase to other.
Otherness, Trump, language, Insult, Meme
Citation: BUSTOS-GOROZPE, Fernando. Nationalism and otherness in Trump’s America. ECORFAN Journal-Republic
of Colombia 2016, 2-2: 9-18

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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 9-18
Introduction A chimera. An oasis. A reality for those

who advocate for that return, but in the end a
The Trump victory in the past elections of the dream that there is to fear and today escape. For
USA, took for surprise to big sector of the as Deleuze mentioned in his conference, ¿What
world population. In spite of the fact that the is the act of creation?:
surveys were made and of that the means with
major renown indicated all the scenarios against “The dream has to do first of all with
them, the result was different. This caused that those who do not dream. The dreams of those
even the Oxford dictionary chose the word who dream have to do with those who do not
'Post-Truth' as that of major relevancy in this dream (...) because as soon as there is the dream
year. It is not a minor thing. The term points at of the other is endangered. To know that the
the decision making motivated more by dream of the people is always a dream
passional factors or belief than by hard data. devorante that can engulf us. And that the
others dream is very dangerous, and that the
Technically the surveys gave victory to dream is a terrible will of potency and that each
Hillary (was reliable information. What do one of us is more or less victim of the dream of
true?) However, Trump won as consequence of the others, even when it comes to the most
a white nationalism that seems to receive every charming girl, she is a fearsome devourer, not
time major validity in different countries and by his soul, but by their dreams. Distrust the
that nevertheless, did not appear registered. dream alien, because if you are trapped in the
other's dream you're lost”2
Even though many people were
incredulous at the triumph of the candidate who Especially if it's a nightmare. What we
had been characterized by strong, aggressive see present is the reification of that delirium
and racist comments, the international scenario, that threatens to devour us. A dream
in abstract terms, already marked the possibility annihilating that pursues the other. That it
of this happening. exiles to the otherness to from a framework
built in which curing a story originating where
Roaming around the world was making the primacy of the white race is the deserving of
it visible. There is a tendency every time bigger the earth, of the opportunities, of the dream.
the resurgence of metaphysical projects that
they claim nacionalisms, esencialisms. Under that story construction, the white
race is erected as the master while the other is
That stops against multiculturalism, the the servant. Rescuing the words of Richard
mainstream and that advocates closing the doors in Spencer, spokesman of the movement Alt-
a kind of nostalgic look at the past: we see it with Right, collective that is defines as an alternative
the campaign slogan of Trump "Make America right but leaving aside euphemisms, is actually
Great Again" or in the posters of the francoists a group that promotes the hegemony of the
sleepless that on November 20 of the same year
white man:
were manifested with banners that in English
(why?) they said: “Make Spain Great Again” while
they raised their hands on the road to that greeting
that characterized national socialism, "a nostalgic 7/american-neoliberalism-cornel-west-2016-election
return to an past imaginary of greatness"1. (25/11/2016).
1 2
Cornel West. Goodbye, America neoliberalism. A new Gilles Deleuze. ¿Qué es el acto de creación?.
era is here. (Reino Unido: The Guardian, 2016), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXOzcexu7Ks
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/nov/1 (25/11/2016).
ISSN-On line: 2539-1372 BUSTOS-GOROZPE, Fernando. Nationalism and otherness in
ECORFAN® All rights reserved. Trump’s America. ECORFAN Journal-Republic of Colombia
2016
11
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 9-18
“America was, until the last generation, "In what conditions do some individuals
a country white designed to ourselves and our acquire a face, a legible and visible face, and
posterity (…) It is our creation, our inheritance others not?”5
and belongs to us”3.
The question becomes necessary to
The movement although it has been a dialogue at reason of the current political
discussion topic from different optics since the scenario, while during years some theorists
beginning of 2015, became visible claimed to live in a stable multiculturalism, far
internationally then that they greeting the now from the ideologies and where one should even
president elected with a 'Heil Trump' at the time speak of the post-feminism and the post-racism,
that in a speech they blame, with a German Reality has been imposed on us to cancel all
term used in the Nazi period 'Lügenpresse' those propositions.
(press sold), to the international press of
constructing a pejorative image of Trump (later The ideologies are still there, the racism
will delve into the use that have made memes to exists, the desire to return to close the doors and
discredit political postures, exclude the other to build walls is not past but present and
and Create white identity). terrifyingly future. And everything seems to be
the product of the same globalization that takes
The discourse of Spencer, denotes a years in frank crisis.
badly calibrated vision, a distortion merely
ideological that needs to create and establish an This has not happened by spontaneous
origin, a starting point that a priori we must generation. It is something that has been
consider falseable, well The "I" cannot tell the kneaded as a result of the benefit that have
story of her own emergence nor the conditions obtained only some groups of power through
of its own possibility without giving testimony the market. Nothing here is excluded.
of a state of things that one might not have Everything is related and is symptomatic.
witnessed, which is prior to its appearance as a
subject capable of knowing”4. The groups of radical right had been
there as embers waiting for oxygen that allowed
The story fundacionista of all these fanning the flame. They unlike the world new
groups of the extreme right in germ, is a sample age that has been characterized by everything
of how the ideology can sometimes kidnap the friendly and by the culture light, by tolerance
thought and establish frames of intelligibility and political correctness, have created a unique
that they determine to other to the effacement and official history that validates and that the
and that they establish a scheme which made it wrapped in a network of meanings in the world.
impossible to recognize the face of the other
where there is and it opens a question very If as Butler indicates "in rigor, it is
important already raised by Butler: probable that to have an origin means precisely
count with several possible versions of him (…)
Any of these versions is a possible story, but
3 none of them I can say with certainty that it is
Joseph Goldstein. Alt-Right Exults in Donald Trump’s
Election With a Salute: ‘Heil Victory’ (EEUU: The New the only true.”
York Times,2016),
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/21/us/alt-right-salutes-
donald-trump.html (25/11/2016)
4
Judith Butler, Dar cuenta de sí mismo (Buenos Aires:
5
Amorrortu editores, 2012), 56. Judith Butler, Dar cuenta de sí mismo, 47.
2016
12
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 9-18
For these groups as Alt-Right the The passional speech that seeks the
allegory is the official, the real. For them there return to the Unreason. About this, just a few
is not a diversity of stories but theirs, where the days ago Charles Kaiser, a writer who was
white class is in danger. trying to make a critique of Trump's speech on
CNN, said in national chain the word "nigger"
The shitlords (since they make be called (the N word)7.
the members of this movement) are dominated
by the fear of that the white people in the USA Immediately was censored by this. He
are dispossessed by the immigrants and by the apologized and said that this is not a word that
multiculturalism.6 he says in its day to day, however it was using
it to reproduce something that now elect
They, the ' barbarians ' for us the ' president had mentioned.
Neoilustrados ', those who take their beliefs too
seriously, have built a sectarian dream: The situation is excessively obtuse and
globalization of anti-globalization. pixelea on having analyzed it. Globalization
tried to solidify the values of liberalism for the
What happened in the USA, as much sake of a better market without actually
has been written, was only the continuation of worrying about minorities, precarious groups,
Putin's rise to power, of the Syrian exodus, the by poverty, by the lives that are extinguished in
Brexit and vote for the 'No' to peace in individual terms, that is to say, disregarded
Colombia. speeches, held them above, never extinguished
the root of the problem, that is why the
Those images of the Syrian exodus, discourse that mobilized the citizens was the
were only the tip of the iceberg. And for vulgar that attacked marginal groups, minority
adverse that the stage seems, should not be or from before already excluded by certain
forgotten that this can still be worse. Does the schemes historical, since it is necessary to tint
fact that Trump, a misogynistic, racist, and that “the proper terms that we use to account,
politically incorrect candidate have won is not and of those that we cost ourselves to become
chilling? The nationalist loop was in the eyes of intelligible for us same and for others, there are
American citizenship. It is the triumph of the no our work.” 8
candidate who through the insult managed to
unify passions. The discourse of Trump, although more
vile and cynical, is enunciatable and sustained
Within politics, this event has been (although not-laughably-on television yes in its
extremely perverse. It is no longer a speech political acts) due to a terms network given
built with great argument. It is the easy speech from earlier against whichSHISH one has tried
of hatred, of the exclusion that seeks to to fight for years, skylight the struggle has
minimize the other and leave it unprotected. come on the part of certain groups that are not
the domineering power, the state.
7
6
Sarah Posner. Meet the Alt-Right 'Spokesman' Who's Daniel Marans. White CNN Guest Says N****r On
Thrilled With Trump's Rise (EEUU: The Rolling Stone Live Television, (Reino Unido: The Huffington Post,
Magazine, 2016), 2016), http://www.huffingtonpost.com.mx/entry/cnn-
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/meet-the- racial-slur-video_us_5834a8d2e4b01ba68ac35270
alt-right-spokesman-thrilled-by-trumps-rise-w443902 (26/11/2016).
8
(26/11/2016). Judith Butler, Dar cuenta de sí mismo, 35.
2016
13
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 9-18
We have to recognize the context. Even Trump enables a whole structure that is
with all the liberal propaganda that continually of power. It is therefore absurd to see on CNN
incites us as citizens of the world and leaving as Brooke Baldwin amolestaba to air Charles
behind closed categories, the orthodox Kaiser by making use of the word 'nigger'.
discourse is still there. The struggle waged in Since it was clear that only reproduced this in
pursuit of civilization seems to have not the form of criticism of the President-elect.
advanced as much as one wanted to believe and Trump makes possible the whole structure that
that was more than anything, a mirage. covers it with power. It is therefore absurd to
see on CNN as Brooke Baldwin admonish to air
This is not to say that there have been Charles Kaiser by making use of the word
no changes. Of course there are in terms of the 'nigger', since it was clear that only reproduced
expansion of concepts that invite inclusion and this in the form of criticism of the President-
participation. However, the bias is significant. elect.
Few have been integrated into these market
dynamics. And it is clear, a difficulty by Thinking the above from its sinister
Inteligir – also – and recognizing all those who aspect: nothing has served the game of the
do not participate. This does not justify the politically correct when you win a presidency
aggression with which now claim some from an with such a speech. Eradicating this word from
essentialist stance. the media, although important, has not made
America less racist.
The worrying thing that Trump has won,
is that he did so by means of the insult. He used It has only kept racism under the rug,
the language to dismantle the other, to injure, and if Trump's speech became relevant to a part
rip, dislocate and frighten him: all those who of the population that was identified is because
are not white, seem, must be afraid, distrust, "the Racial insult is always mentioned from
paralysis. The language is not only a means of somewhere, and when speaking of him, one
expression, it is also condition of possibility of joins a chorus of racist […] In this sense, the
the subject speaker9 and as spine that holds the racist discourse does not originate with the
subject on its axis, is able to manage to subject, although it needs the subject for its
dislocate the other of its center, which is why efficacy, as it surely happens. Indeed, the racist
verbal insult. It is the best weapon to question discourse could not act as such if it were not a
someone. summons of itself.” 10
As the discussion does not imply a Trump is an empty place that has served
balanced intersubjectivity at the same time that as a refuge for this entire network of concepts
it does not open the possibility of an that seek from hate subordinate to the other and
interpellation, at least not in this context. that through the language re-signify relations.
For after the speech of hatred, of the insult,
That Trump has won the presidency, is a there is something that changes in the relational
way in which insult acquires validity within the form. The language of hatred is the closed
political discourse to cope and blur to the other. language that dies. Politically it is necessary
The insult was already there but to the weather. that it remains alive, that the relationship with
the world remains active, full of resignifications
that help to integrate more than to separate.
9
Judith Butler, Lenguaje, poder e identidad, (España:
10
Editorial Síntesis, 2004), 54. Judith Butler, Lenguaje, poder e identidad, 138.
2016
14
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 9-18
If we are beings constituted by language Thus, memes began to appear where

and through it there is restraint, it should be Pepe alluded to different situations of
given under a framework that protects integrity: discrimination or appeared in uniform Nazi.
"The resignification of language requires But perhaps the crucial moment was when he
opening new contexts, speaking in ways that started to link this frog to the candidate Trump.
have not yet been legitimized, and therefore,"
Producing new and future forms of Then Pepe the frog, now used a blond
legitimation.”11 The urgent thing is to achieve toupee that resembled the now President-elect
this resignification that allows to expand certain of the USA. The reason was very evident even
social constructions that make it possible to when the meme subtracted seriousness. The
constitute ontologically groups or people movement had found in Trump a representative
excluded historically , that is, to restitute them and this was the way to back him up.Then the
in a social structure. movement began to manifest itself in the social
networks, jumped of the site 4chan to pages of
However, the trend is contrary. And Facebook or to political forums. The meme
Trump's triumph over Hillary also symbolizes began to be used as a political tool that by
the triumph of hatred over reconciliation. The laughing, subtracted seriousness to proposals.
fall of the foundations of different bridges that
had been tried to build. The members of Alt-Right and all those
who sympathize with the racism that this group
promotes, they quickly understood the message
Alt-Right, the white supremacistas and the and the mission. Their memes were everywhere
use of the meme as strategy for smudge to where they discuss the election and became an
other. enemy of the campaign of Hillary through the
trolling. The foregoing, although ridiculous,
Within all the machinery of exclusion that has recreated in reality a scenario worthy of the
worked to sustain the current hate speech, it is British series Black Mirror. The memes jumped
interesting to dwell on the techniques employed to reality and in Trump's campaigns it was not
by the movement led by Spencer. The Alt-Right unusual to observe Pepe the frog placards as a
group has taken a sinister turn in the Trump symbol of support. That in the opinion of
campaign that has begun to expand on the several could be little thing, transcended and
internet. gained power in the masses, so much that the
team Hillary advised her to play the theme
While the movement dates from 2010 during one of their event12 because the use of
and began to win public stage with Trump, this the meme by Alt-Right was increasingly violent
was mainly because of its incursion into while generating adepts, because although a
different forums and social networks through virtue of the meme is the simplicity with which
the use of memes used as a strategy to you can share ideas or infuriating Ientos
systematize a logic of erasing the other. His through an image, which usually causes
first anti normies memes appeared on the site laughter, this time the use was ideological.
4chan. Its distinctive was the use of the famous Memes have become language.
Pepe the frog meme to cover it with a racial
discourse.
12
Maureen Dowd. The Alt-Right is All Wrong
(EEUU: The New York Times, 2016),
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/28/opinion/sunda
11
Judith Butler, Lenguaje, poder e identidad , 73. y/the-alt-right-is-all-wrong.html (26/11/2016).
2016
15
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 9-18
Appealing to the distinction that Joan Within the visual culture that we
Fontcuberta makes in her book Pandora's inhabit, the image plays an important discursive
Camera, between analogue photography and category as in the baroque. Cannot be separated
digital, where indicated that while the analogue the image of affection, nor forget that before the
photo tends to mean phenomena and digital overpopulation of images, we inhabit the
concepts, the meme keeps similarity with the madness of the vision 14 Where "the strength of
latter in so much so that it inhabits the virtual the abundant and the quantity will decide the
world, that of the screens, that of the form of it is presence in the world, vis-a-vis the
immediate. The meme is not a simple receiver old regime of the singularities sunturarias,
of jokes, is a language still open that perverse exclusive.”15 And that is where the strength of
Alt-Right knew how to manipulate with such of the meme today. Not in it is aurality but in
engaging a young audience that does not seek overcrowding, in it is distribution power.
both speeches profound but something simple
to understand. By this is that its strategy of We are facing a change of image, in
attack on Hillary and support to Trump, also front of a new use that is only possible through
envisaged the use of aesthetics vaporwave in the internet and its new uses. Trump is
some videos in order to envest the candidate of considered the first candidate of 4chan, since
a power simpleton but effective for the masses. big part of its power was generated in the social
networks across a separatist speech with comic
As properly writes TJ Brown on the sheath. Laughter appears here as a technique
Foundation for Economic Education site: "Alt- that erases the other in abstract terms. It is
Right is a meme with mission." Are determined erased from before seeing his face, in the
to do aside everything imposed and replace it distance, without having to confront it.
with a nationalism of right (…) and they plan to
achieve this through the growing appeal of the It is excluded from the virtuality and
comic and daring memes aimed at the from there the insult is incubated. The image
domination of the online political discourse”13 . here is built from the perversity of reason in the
way of objectifying the other and moving it
That is to say, Alt-Right is oriented to from any intelligibility scheme. The meme has
the millennials, that although they are not really ceased to be just a habitacle of laughable ideas
informed, they do follow news sites with and is now language, concept, ideology capable
political content. And that's where they deposit of generating identity and policies of exclusion.
the memes. The meme is used as a visual So much so that today the meme of Pepe the
strategy that discredit political speeches online frog has become politically incorrect to use
and in turn, can generate identity from the even when it is not alluded to Alt-Right, and by
comic. In one of the most viral memes, you the same use of it has accused to figures like
could see Pepe the frog with toupee (Trump) Taylor Swift to be a representative of this
Laugh of a Mexican couple who had been movement that seeks to exalt man White in
deported. The joke appears as a technique of America and do an ethnic cleansing. In these
exclusion that although it softens the message, times of virtual trenches, the meme is more
propagates it and generates a logic of deletion. important than what you want to accept and Alt-
Right has shown.
13
TJ Brown. Hillary’s Crusade against the “Alt-Right”
and Meme Warfare (EEUU: Foundation for Economic
14
Education, 2016), https://fee.org/articles/hillary-s- Martin Jay, Ojos abatidos (España: Akal, 2007)
15
crusade-against-the-alt-right-and-meme-warfare/ José Luis Brea, Las tres eras de la imagen (España:
(26/11/2016). Akal, 2010), 48.
2016
16
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 9-18
The effacement of otherness. Fright before a situation that was

historically considered impossible to repeat, is a
On this we have to rethink the political sphere "sort of subjective defeat, signa the victory of
and how this is affecting outside the virtuality. that economic factor because nothing has
Hatred has not been overcrowded on the prepared the subject for this overflow, nothing
screens. And proof of this was all that could be could be symbolized or" presymbolized "by
observed in the so-called Day 1 in Trump's him.” 16
America. A compilation of tweets showing all
the violent acts perpetuated in the United States It is the subject overflowed in the face
on the first day of winning the Trump elections: of surprise "because one has been taken where I
The realm of the logic of one, the effacement of did not expect." 17
the alterity.
The Post-Truth has left me in a scenario
Once Trump is elected President, what that I had considered unlikely, I find myself
there is an openness to reality, it opens the dislocated, and the insult is now validated by
tunnel that allows the transition of that which the president elect. The danger that runs is
lived in the virtual to the world. The insult is no unimaginable. That's why the horror. Anxiety
longer contained in the screen to peek and did not here prevent this scenario.
pursue the other. What is only expressed by the
language is stay at the physical. Sensibly Butler writes this to the next
day of the election: "Who are they, these people
The verbal violence is possible in who voted for him, but who are we, who did
material terms while it is sheltered by the one not see his power, that we did not anticipate this
who represents the power of the state. in its entirety, that we could not fathom that
people would vote for a man with a racist and
To what we witnessing is at the xenophobic discourse, with a history of sexual
beginning of arbitrariness, to the plunder of the offenses (…)?”18
other without historical memory in the middle,
without the ethical sensibility that it supposes But now that after Trump's triumph has
had gained after the different conflicts that unleashed a wave of racial movements around
humanity has traversed. the world (not only in the USA), it is now
possible to be prevented, now there is space for
The denial of the other is given by the anguish that develops in attack, anguish as
demanding its displacement of the public space, “a reaction opposite to the perception of an
not with the reason but with the ideological exterior danger, that is to say, of an awaited,
passion. The logic is closed even when there is due damage; [and that] is linked to the
not a self but there is always an alterity. reflection of the flight, and it is licit to see in it
a manifestation of the impulse of self-
In a kind of Hegelian site, to the extent preservation.
that the other gives me the virtue of my limits I
fight against him, because I do not accept this 16
Jean Laplanche, La Angustía (Buenos Aires: Amorrortu
limitation, appealing to pop culture: "Only a editores, 2012), 67.
17
Sith deals in absoluts." Jean Laplanche, La Angustía, 66.
18
Judith Butler. A Statement from Judith Butler (EEUU:
The scenario that becomes, that is E-Flux conversations, 2016), http://conversations.e-
inaugurated is that of fright and anguish. flux.com/t/a-statement-from-judith-butler/5215?u=anton
(26/11/2016).
2016
17
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 9-18
In the face of nationalist outbreaks who What is being attended is a to

advocate closing doors, the return to anaesthetize in the face of otherness. If the love
nationalism and the greetings of Hitler, there is requires me to unveiling of another, in the hate
nothing left but the foresight of all possible the sign becomes irrelevant.
scenarios. Not only to be guided by what
appears to be the truth but to reconsider even There is no desire to decipherment, but
the less unlikely scenarios: to be prepared. of effacement: "Whatever it may mean that is
presented to me, I am not interested in knowing
The offense of the other challenges us, it and it is necessary to annihilate it, to
opens us to the world to develop a sort of persecute it, to devour it."
negotiation of the public sphere. The conflict is
presented as the origin of the political. From the position of the other, the
theory is abstract. Days before the election,
All the signs of anger that can be Žižek gave a statement where he said that he
expected will happen to certain groups of the would vote for Trump. His argument follows a
population in the USA, they are a violent similar position to that of the Committee
interpellation of the other, a persecution in the Invisible: "any loss of control is preferable to
literal sense: "persecution is precisely what any of the arguments that maintain control of
happens without the justification of any act on the crisis".
my part".”19
For the Slovenian, Trump means to
The black, the Jew, the Latin American future a frank destabilization to the system that
will begin to be evicted by means of the term of will make it restructured completely, while
abuse that then will be validated under some Hillary meant to perpetuate the crisis. Of course
politics, that in case of the migrants, will seek in theory is suggestive. The problem is to
to throw them out of the country, that is, to support this in real life, especially if it is the
plunge in one indetermination to the other by other.
the dispossession of his house. There the
ontological problems that crosses every exile: There, where the speech of the white
what he lacks is the rest place. nationalist looking for a return to a place
imaginary, a situation opens that the otherness
If as writes Deleuze on purpose of did not choose.
Proust: "To fall in love is to individualize
someone by the signs that it causes or emits." Is The answer should not be a violent
to be sensitized against these signs (...) The struggle, nor the flight, but the effective
loved one appears as a sign, a "soul": it constitution of a new political model that
expresses a world possible unknown to us. The inaugurates the ethical in the recognition of the
beloved implies, envelops, imprisons a world to other, in the responsibility not only of that but
be deciphered, that is to say, to interpret.” 20 of me in relation with him: "This is a situation
that we did not choose. It constitutes the
horizon of the election and founds our
responsibility.
19
Judith Butler, Dar cuenta de sí mismo, 119. In this sense, we are not responsible for
20
Gilles Deleuze, Sobre Proust y los signos (España: her, but that situation creates the conditions in
Anagrama, 1970), 15 -16
which we assume responsibility.
2016
18
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 9-18
We have not created it, and therefore we Laplanche Jean, (2012) La Angustia.
must take it in mind.” Of course, this is in Problemáticas I. Trad. Carmen Michelena.
theory. Buenos Aires: Amorrortu.
And the faces is from the position of the
alternate, to be responsible even when this rests Levinas Emmanuel, (2012) Totalidad e infinito.
responsibility to the one who persecutes me. In Trad. Miguel García-Baró. España: Editions
this tenor, it is worth staying with the words of Sígueme.
Cornel West about it: “for us in these times,
even to have hope is too abstract, too far away,
too expectant. In it is place we must be a hope,
a participant and a force for good while we
confront this catastrophe.”21 It can still be
worse.
References
Álvarez Solíz Octavio, (2015) La república de

la melancolía. Política y subjetividad en el
barroco. Argentina: Editions La cebra.
Brea José Luis, (2010) Las tres eras de la
imagen. Imagen-materia, film, e-image.
Madrid: Akal.
Butler Judith, (2004) Lenguaje, poder e

identidad. Trad. Javier Sáenz y Beatriz
Preciado. Madrid: Editorial Síntesis, 2004.
Dar cuenta de sí mismo. Trad. Horacio Pons.

Buenos Aires: Amorrortu, 2012.
Deleuze Gilles, (1970) Proust y los signos.

Trad. Francisco Monge. Barcelona: Editorial
Anagrama.
Jay Martin, (2007) Ojos Abatidos. Trad.

Francisco López. Madrid: Editions Akal.
21
Cornel West. Goodbye, America neoliberalism. A new
era is here.
2016
19
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
The paradox of work. A world of losing and winning
RAMÍREZ-VELÁZQUEZ, Josefina*†
Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historia
Abstract
The study of work-related illness needs a comprehensive view that goes beyond the analysis of illness
alone. If we are to better understand its causes and effects we should take into consideration what both
illness and work mean to workers themselves. In this paper, I present preliminary results from a
medical anthropological study focused on the social construction of stress among a group of female
phone operators from Telmex: the largest telephone company in Mexico, and until recently the only
one. Ethnographic data on the operators' views and feelings towards their bodies, lives, and
health/illness/attention processes, such as stress, were linked to the accelerated change experienced a
few decades ago in the labor process. Results show that recently there have been changes in operator's
views and feelings in such a way that it may be said that operators create themselves through their daily
work experience. Thus, work may be seen as a world filled with meaning and experience in which the
self, the body, and even life itself, are being continuously transformed through a process that involves
both losing and winning.
Work, Illness, Social meaning, Local Worlds, Narratives
Citation: RAMÍREZ-VELÁZQUEZ, Josefina. The paradox of work. A world of losing and winning. ECORFAN Journal-
Republic of Colombia 2016, 2-2: 19-39
* Correspondence to Author (email: josefinaram@prodigy.net.mx)


20
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
Introduction From my own perspective Braverman´s

view is limited because of his treatment of
In recent decades Mexico has experienced a workers as a homogenous group characterised
continuous transformation towards by identical working relationships, ignoring the
modernisation. A number of private and diversity of labor, social and cultural contexts.
government institutions have contributed In this way failing to consider differences in
significantly to this process by implementing gender, age, and social rolls, rarely taken into
new technologies that have changed working account when analysing the effects of
strategies and social organization. Within this technological change on workers.
context, the telecommunication industry is no
exception. A number of scholars are convinced that
technological transformation results in
Teléfonos de Mexico is one of the most economic, social cultural and political changes
important telecommunication companies in the working environment and have tried to
operating in the country, and was, until very explain these phenomena without considering
recently, the only one. In this way it has the effect of these changes in the individual’s
generated changes at an economic, social, conditions. I would even go so far as to say that
political and cultural level during the last two if the individual is not taken into consideration,
decades. neither is work satisfaction, or even health.
Although work and health relationships are
These changes have been studied by observed to some extent by occupational health
analysts from diverse fields to try to explain, their analysis is still limited.
among other things, the crisis experienced in
the Mexican telecommunications industry in For this reason, I believe it is important
relation to worldwide changes such as the to analyze the effects of technological progress
scientific and technological revolution, from a medical anthropological perspective
economic globalisation, restructuring taking into account work type, labor demands,
procedures in productivity, changes in and above all, individual appreciation of work.
Government, the effect of transnational Only in this way can we expand our research
companies, crises in unionism and alternatives boundaries to go beyond the general and
to more flexible working conditions and conventional idea that technology affects all
technological changes. workers in the same way.
Since the 1980’s, and under the The purpose of this paper is to present
influence of Braverman (1975), many scholars the “work” as a world of meanings and
and unionists have suggested that the change in experiences that would allow us to see the
technology increased managerial control of the construction of the body, the self, and the
labor force, reducing it in size by transferring workers’ life as a process of transformation that
the skills and capacities from the workers on to moves from earnings to losses.
technology, thus reducing the workers skills.
My point of view diverges from the
However, Braverman´s analysis is seen conventional model and recaptures the
as deterministic by some (Linn, 1987) because relationship between work and illness as seen
of his emphasis on the influence of technology from the individual, thus finding its positive
on workers. and negative expression.
ISSN-On line: 2539-1372 RAMÍREZ-VELÁZQUEZ, Josefina. The paradox of work. A

ECORFAN® All rights reserved. world of losing and winning. ECORFAN Journal-Republic of
Colombia ECORFAN Journal-Republic of Colombia 2016
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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
In this way, the relationship <work- This model has a social, emotional and
stress-illness> becomes less mechanic and may psychological focus on the risk of stress, and
be explained in its complexity through a also takes the development of active behaviour
spectrum of circumstances that employees have into account. This is of interest to researchers as
to face. it emphasises the importance of the
characteristics of the work’s social organization
I begin my analysis by mentioning (i.e. social relations) and not only the
briefly the main premises that lead to the study quantitative requirements of the work, which
of stress on a group of telephone operators by allows differentiation between “positive stress”
considering their relationship to work as a and “negative stress” in terms of a combination
world of meanings. I then present the of control and demand.
procedures for collecting the information for
the study and mention the people involved. Nevertheless, the few studies done in
Mexico on workers are more concerned with
I briefly describe the telephone stress from its negative side.
operators’ perception of their work based on
their own words and elaborate on two recurring My background in anthropology has
trends in their descriptions. been enhanced by the theoretical and
methodological tools obtained from medical
The first one is related to the condition anthropology. These tools have helped to define
of their work that is increasingly associated to such concepts as illness/ disease, sickness,
stress perceived as a health problem. From my (Kleinman, 1988, Young, 1982) and
perspective this represents the negative side by health/illness/attention process, (Menéndez,
becoming a “world of loss”. The second, 1990). We see proposals that introduce us to the
corresponding to the positive side offers space analytic conflict between representation and
for recreation, which in this paper we may call praxis through the questioning of conventional
“world of winning”. the opposition “subject-object” (Csordas 1990).
The interpretative-hermeneutic
Framework perspective (Scheper-Hughes y Lock 1986) that
offer a new way of thinking and writing about
In Mexico the analysis of the labour process as the body and its experience, a proposition
a cause of illness has been studied mainly which uses the metaphor as a strategy for
through occupational health, social medicine communication of insincere and unsaid
and psychology. Stress as a work health suffering (Kirmayer, 1992; Low, 2000). As
problem, irrespective of the point of view of well as the dominant analysis metaphors
this study, is more widely analysed through the elaborated by the medical profession closely
model developed in 1976 by Karasek (1998), related to policies of reproduction and ideas on
denominated Contorl/Demand Model. the ageing of the female body (Martin, 1987).
This model’s proposition is to analyse Moreover, Young’s perspective (1980;

the relationships between the psychological 1995) whose further critical revision of stress
demand of work (in quantitative terms), and the studies concludes, among other things, that the
control of tasks and use of capacities (field of concept itself lacks precision because it is
decision-autonomy and utilisation of skills). loaded by ideology.

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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
All of these perspectives converge on The concept of work is treated as a

one point: the interest in the analysis of illness socio-political field, which does not only refer
from the point of view of the patients. to conflict and negativity, but also creativity,
Furthermore, this point of view can be negotiation and benefit of social groups. It is
translated as a form of resistance (Ong, 1988; composed of a hierarchic, ideological, technical
Dunk, 1989; Van Schaik, 1989; Lock, 1990 y and social organization and set of regulations,
Scheper-Hughes, 1992). conceptions, traditions, beliefs, praxis, senses
and meanings prompted by relationships of
From my own perspective (Ramírez, power and of gender.
2010) I suggest that any illness has a social
meaning, and exhibits differences and From this perspective we can also
similarities found in societies and cultures. This understand how workers face subjective
not only in general terms, but also in smaller conditions on a daily basis (hierarchical
social groups formed through shared beliefs, relationships of power loaded with ideology
norms and values that produce a diversity of and meaning) that constitute local worlds, as
notions and attitudes from varied sources Kleinman (1994), points out. In these local
marked by gender, age, class and ethnic origin. worlds beliefs, behaviours, symbols, and
It is because of this that it offers a different conflicts come out to the health analysis arena
viewpoint on illness, from a socio-cultural and include the significance that the illness has
understanding of individual life and experience, to the individual and his/her work, including the
and the way in which personal history and more general aspects of personal, working and
relationships are affected by their presence. family experience.
By broadening the concept of the
This proposal does not attempt to
employee (men and women) as a social and
explain whether a particular affliction is or not
cultural entity we are aware of a number of
a disease, as stipulated by biomedicine, but
social roles which they play. In the case of
rather to understand why certain individuals see
phone operators, as well as workers they are
it as such, as it affects their lives. In addition, I
also: daughter, mother, wife, sister, student,
emphasize that the worker is a social, cultural
friend, head of the household, activist, and
and political being and not another element of
health care practitioner, etc.) roles which have
the working environment; speaking
specific and additional demands for women.
figuratively, the worker does not take his head
off like a hat when he arrives at work. That is to The analysis of these other areas of
say the individuals work capacity, -seen as the development offers us access to their everyday
physical body- and his mind (feelings, emotions life and look at how they perceive themselves
and representation), are inseparable. and the construction of illness.
In this way, the worker conveys his or The study of illness from this
her culture and ideology expressed in every perspective allows us to understand it beyond
scope of life through personal experience and the listing of symptoms, as indicated by Good
social interaction. (1996), and more as a world of experience
which alters life but also allows us to
Despite Fordism and Taylorism, which understand subjective representation of the
tend to disqualify and simplify the content of worker’s body, in order to provide better
work, these individuals will offer a result attention (Csordas, 2000).
depending on gender conditions.
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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
Traditionally biomedicine has not taken The age of the women ranges from 32 to
these factors into account, and often the ill 54 years old, with and average of 41 years. The
worker also fails to consider these facts. This length of time in the company ranges form 6 to
may seem contradictory, but it is this initial 27 years, with an average of 17.5 years. The
stage that intends to explain the anthropological marital status is: 12 operators married, 6
perspective. divorced, 4 single mothers and 3 single women.
All the operators except the single women have
Participants, interview design and children.
procedures
According to the type of work, defined
The 25 phone operators interviewed belong to by the department to which each operator
two traffic departments in the Teléfonos de belongs, the level of education varies. The
Mexico Company, located in Mexico City. operators working in national long distance
Selection criteria included a previous stress have a lower education level (9 years education
diagnose, or have detected signs of stress in the on average) as the company at one time
last year. Other characteristics were taken into required a basic education. On the other hand,
account such as age, seniority, civil status, and the international long distance operators have a
the existence of children. The company was higher level of education (12 years on average),
solicited the possibility of carrying out as they are expected to have basic knowledge of
interviews within the workplace and during English. In this department, all the women have
office hours, with the objective of observing completed high school and three women have
work methods and development during a professional careers.
normal working day.
An interesting point to make of the 25
The first interview was conducted operators is that they have worked from a very
during regular working hours, and took about young age, ranging from 11 to 29 years of age
40 minutes. The women were asked to and averaging 17 years of age. Due to the
generally describe their ideas about stress, importance of labour seniority, which generates
parting from their knowledge and body a higher income, these women are constant in
experience as well as strategies they have used their work. Moreover, it can be said that since
to cope with stress. The following interviews, the labour productivity program was
that lasted one and a half hours on average, implemented, there are rarely absences, even in
were conducted working hours. I suggested to cases of illness, due to the pressure against
each worker that they talk about their life as absenteeism, as well as the economic problems
phone operators, focusing on ailment, and which might follow.
offering specific details regarding first
symptoms, conditions under stress begun, and The purpose of this paper is to present
the first time they heard the word stress. the hegemonic discourse from the operator’s
perspective. The idea is to explain work as a
Working activities of the women world of winning or loosing. The presentation
surveyed include the following: 6 of them work of this article demands a synthesis of
in the national long distance department, (lada information, for this reason I will highlight only
020); 9 in the international long distance some fragments of the operator’s interviews, in
department (lada 090): 4 of them work at the order to illustrate the two directions of their
information department (040); and 6 in the presentations.
claims department (050).
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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
First, as a hegemonic model which Only secondarily could their work be

defines stress as the result of work, and second seen as a mechanism for personal achievement
from the personal experience which shows (self-realization). The perception of work either
particular responses depending on each of the as self-realization or cause of stress depends on
operator’s (individual, family and work) three conditions. One is the transition towards
circumstances. The responses allow us to see modernisation which implies the new
how work not only represents the illness application of technology in the working
negatively, but rather allows us to interpret it as environment, and therefore a new labour
a space for creation, negotiation and freedom. organization which causes a negative notion of
work under stress.
Phone operator work and conventional
knowledge about stress Second, the matter of creativity or
limitations which cause changes in the workers.
The phone operator’s work in Mexico has been Three, the personal response of the workers to
considered a convenient employment for these changes. These must be observed in
women for a long time, since it apparently does relation to their personal lives, including the
not require further preparation. It offers a good roles they play, and the social support, which
salary and working benefits that are extended to they rely on. These can lead them to consider
other family members. Over the last two work as a medium for self-realization or as a
decades, the implementation of personal stress producer; or even as a dynamic pivot
computers (video display terminal VDT) from which both circumstances may be
resulted in greater productivity for the company expressed.
through the increase in the number of phone
calls completed by a single operator in a The technological change which has
working day. This change contributed to taken place in Telmex over the last two decades
maintain a better control of both the service and has lead to the progressive incorporation of the
the customers that lead to a permanent notion of stress through a complex process
surveillance of operators by supervisors. The combining rumour and social reality.
demands imposed by productivity and quality
goals have become central to the development Examples of typical representations
of operator’s working relations and health derived from rumour the following can be
problems. listed:
Despite the predominantly negative - Phone opertor´s work will no longer be

connotations of working roles as stress needed with the progressive
producers there is a positive aspect that ought to introduction of new technology.
be recovered. From the operators own - Use of personal computers –
perspective work organization based on shift representing the new technology- will
rotation allows them to better organize family cause new health problems, among them
and working demands in such a manner that stress will be central.
they are able to manage their personal needs. - Technological change demands
These conditions influence the operator’s changing operator’s “attitudes”. This
perception of work primarily as a source of refers to commitment to service, and
economic assets to satisfy the needs for every amiable attention and comfortable
day life, and also to maintain a certain social solutions readily offered to customers.
status.
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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
During the process of change, the union The stress process and its various
itself persuaded the workers with permanent responses have been comprised by phone
contracts to employ new strategies to negotiate operators, as a working group, throughout two
with employers. Among these, one example decades in a continuous process of changing
was to show willingness to face this new reality roles: from worker to woman. In this process,
and the changing attitudes to seek political and for most of them, stress exists as an entity itself
labour goals. in the working environment that alienates their
lives. From operators to union representatives,
The phone operators associated work stress is considered a consequence of work.
simplification through the use of computers
with the necessary appearance of stress. During the first informal meeting with
workers to explain the purpose of this study, a
However, this idea that expresses a number of operators expressed their agreement,
conventional knowledge of work/stress influenced by their perception of being under a
interaction is exceeded by phone operator’s hostile working environment. A clear example
narratives when seeking an explanation to their was the following expression: “it is great you
doubts about stress within the context of work. will carry out this study because here we are all
very neurotic, yes, truly hysterical!”
I based this study on the narrative
perspective because it provides an opportunity With a very open mind a number of
for phone operators to express their suffering phone operators approached me to show what
through different circumstances, moments and they though to be evidence of stress on their
situations; through other people and even bodies: hair loss, blemishes on skin, digestive
themselves by taking advantage of their and circulatory problems and even insomnia. A
movement back and forth through time. number of them openly volunteered to be part
Narrative represents a powerful tool to of the study.
communicate and to provide experience with
meaning; its richness is expressed in the Stress, related to problems such as
reconstruction of the past, the explanation of “nervousness” or irritability and low self-
the present and anticipation of the future. By esteem, had created broad semantic network
looking at the whole time perspective it is that showed situations, symptoms, and feelings
possible to explain the ailment –which is the that were shaping the meaning behind their
main interest- and also to see the transformation suffering. The expression of stress became
that phone operators experience in their body more objective as represented by the symptoms
and self when facing illness, either real or detailed by the operators.
imaginary.
However, a hidden side was also present
It is possible, from this perspective, to in the worker’s perception, that expressed other
articulate the internal and external dimensions meanings, as stress control, stress of
of the phone operator’s world during illness as supervision, stress as an expression of gender
declared by Mattingly & Garro (1964). This is complaints, conformed by hierarchical
possible because narrative helps us to relationships between operator and supervisor
understand concrete events, as there is a need to and in the daily exchange with their partners.
relate the internal world of understanding and Stress was also defined as the expression of
motive to the external world ruled by hard-worker and a woman.
observable actions and situations of interaction.
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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
As will be seen, the operator’s It is interesting to point out that none of

narratives express the Cartesian dichotomies: the operators mentioned physical ailments such
body/mind, objective/subjective, as head or neck aches or backaches, and their
real/imaginary, found in the illness, making it definitions generally resembled the following:
tangible and allowing for discussion of the “stress is madness”, “it is produced to a large
causes of absenteeism. extent by envy”, “it represents hold range,
producing aggression”, “it is a state of
permanent anxiety”.
Work as a loss
The complex nature of this issue comes
Illness from its social meaning from its own vague definition as expressed by a
number of authors (Vingerhoets y Marcelissen,
Seeking an explanation for stress, the 1988) and presented in the popular anonymous
informants established a direct work/stress proverb "in addition to being itself, and the
relationship beginning with a spontaneous result of itself, is also the cause of itself ".
response determined by their conventional
knowledge of stress. Following these comments, some of
them wanted to be more precise by using their
Only later on when they were required hands to express pressure. Elsa used both hands
to give a more detailed explanation of their to indicate generally: “it is a hole in the
personal experience did this result in a broad stomach." Aura, Lilia, Tina, Regina, Mary
range of circumstances which may define stress shared a similar expression. Although for the
in its various shades. latter, the hole was located in the thorax; for
Norma it was experienced as a feeling of
One of my first observations relates to emptiness. In a similar attitude, Bertha refers to
the type of information received by operators a “wave of fear”, and Nely to a “releasing
through the media (television, magazines, radio, anxiety”.
newspapers, physician/patient interaction)
which provides a popular image of stress that I observed an undeniable influence of
overlaps with that derived from biomedical professional notions of stress, as implied in the
information, promoted also by the media. expression “it is like an adrenaline shot”,
presented by Elsa. This reflected Seyle´s idea,
Therefore the first ideas that come to which outlined three phases: first alarm, when
mind when asked to define stress are those of adrenaline is released, followed by resistance,
greatest resonance. which considers an adaptation of the organism,
and last, fatigue which entails an incapacity for
Their answers, although in different response.
words, appeared hesitant as a tautological
expression, that is “something that makes me These professional notions are shared
tense, which stresses me”. Moreover, there is a by phone operators and become popular as
uniform response that describes stress as an operators develop their own interpretation as in
emotion or an attitude formulated by most of the Nely´s case: “from my point of view stress
the operators as a state of irritation, anguish, is something that helps me in the beginning but
anger, courage, rage, fear, envy, overwhelming later on makes feel like crap”.
anxiety.

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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
Another perspective presents ideas Stress and the notion of separation

offered by those women affected by the disease,
who have received ample information from Other definitions were more difficult to
their physician. understand given the unclear expressions used:
“how can I explain it”. They find it difficult to
Norma shows knowledge derived from express their feelings when describing
her own research, intended to change her themselves as if the person was divided in to
depression diagnosis. Her first image of stress two spheres, one exterior and one interior, with
is one of life experienced from the dark side; different demands.
therefore a stress free condition would be a
cheerful life. On one hand: “being a good worker”
and on the other, the personal, or family related
Maya considers herself an informed need, that is “being a good mother or sister”.
patient, she is one of the oldest operators, who The conflict arises when both roles appear as
suffers from asthma and presents severe crises. unresolved.
She defines stress with confidence: “stress is a
detonator for every other kind of illness, it is Bertha said “there is something that I do
symptomatic”. Moreover, she was the only one not understand and that I can not explain, but
who clearly perceived stress as typical female for me it is like life is divided… outside, things
problem related to menopause, “it is a physical are slow despite of my desire to make them go
manifestation of menopausal women”. faster. Stress is very much like doing things in a
hurry because we are running late, my head is
Nora´s answer: “It is something that breaking apart, it’s as if all of a sudden I were
dominates people´s will and prevents them from no longer myself and then a wave of fear comes
acting with self-control.” also applies elements me”.
from biomedicine and psychology that have
developed from the idea of personality types - Cora declares: “it’s what we perceive as
defined as type A-, which run the risk of a lack of coherence between what you have to
suffering from stress. be and what you can be. I believe in working
well, because I do it for me and for my
Here stress is pictured as an external children, but there is no recognition of these
factor that conveys an individual with some efforts because there is always something else
degree of susceptibility. At the same time, this to be done.
denotes a stigmatising aspect that Nora
expresses sometimes by denying suffering from The same happens with children, as in
stress based on her perception that people who addition we have to leave them alone at times.
suffer from stress are always in a bad mood, What I have experienced as a result of stress is
resulting in constant problems at work. a progressive deterioration of myself, my hair is
falling out, I am loosing weight, and I have skin
Parting from these notions I intend to problems.” Further, she indicated, in regards to
draw attention to the manner in which medical her body, “I am not feeling myself these days
knowledge influences the operator’s ideas to because of the changes in my body, there is no
the extent that they strongly believe they have consistency between what I want to be and I
the right information. can be”.

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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
Lilia also referred to this idea of being Stress is what causes it

divided by indicating that stress is a constant
pressure from family and work demands. It is Immersed in the problem of defining stress, the
an example of duty, she affirms, “I have to help operators chose to speak about the reasons for
to my bothers and I also have to perform well at stress in an attempt to explain, although they
work”. Lilia defines stress from her own were not asked, the motives and causes that
experience. She describes her current situation they considered responsible.
as being very stressful, -anguish, sadness,
defeat, loneliness-, because her “duty” helps her In this sense, some of the answers
brother to obtain housing, as a benefit of her indicated not what stress is, but what they
work, although for her it represents having no believe causes it. They referred to the
money left over, and as a result “working too pathological conditions of society, such as
much”. From her expression “I feel bad violence, noise, agitation, as if they were
because I don’t have any one’s approval”, my natural.
judgment is that she represents a lost and abated
self.
Stress related to the pathological and violent
Norma’s description was quite short, state of society
and among the silent intervals, she formulated
the idea of stress “as being a blast that leaves Elsa´s discourse shows knowledge and interest
one empty and fractures the head from inside”. in the union’s formation and in “political
conscience”. She expresses great interest in the
Socorro said sullenly that, “stress is a remark: “stress is a condition characteristic of
burden that numbs the mind, and then the body capitalism, and a situation of alienation, that
wants one thing, and the mind another.” certainly affects workers more than any other
group of people, which is even more
The external/internal division revealed problematic in the case of women due to the
by Bertha, is expressed in Socorro´s description amount of preoccupations we have…”
as a chasm between body and mind, as felt by
Martha, for whom stress is a load of emotions Norma explains, “stress is the product
(..)…self contained and separated between body of daily life characterised by agitation, violence
and mind; the body may seem well and be at work, but everything seems normal”.
considered by others as having no symptoms,
but the mind cannot stop dwelling on a number Isabel expressed a similar notion:
of things that make her worry. From her “stress is the product of life organization, that
interpretation, the mind keeps passing through we cannot change, full of work and agitation”.
images that she rather erase by keeping herself
busy on crossword puzzles, even if causes Rocío and Jazmín defined stress as
sleeplessness. overwhelming due to the numerous tasks that
have to be undertaken, at the same time stress
But stress as described by most of the was associated to a life, where work occupies
operators could be many different things, most of their time since they must complete
depending on what causes it. Martha both paid work and work at home. They define
emphasises that it can cause a number of this way of life as “agitated”.
problems, from loss of appetite to over eating,
insomnia or hair loss, etc.
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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
This idea portrays a society perceived as This complaint, in addition to the

dangerous due to conditions of repression and control and surveillance applied with the
regulation that set the basis for work, according purpose of reaching productivity goals,
to what the operator’s narratives outline as the supports their mistrust of supervisors and their
general framework for stress production. rage.
Stress is also at times considered to be Other elements that result anger and
normal and unresolved; the answer to the general irritation of the workers who are not
question: how do you imagine life without closely related to supervisors, are inequity,
stress? was primarily “without work!”, this preferential treatment and psychological
response shows a strong feeling of release. The harassment.
most common response among the operators
concluded that absence of stress depends on These conditions added to the
work without pressures and with equity. unqualified, monotonous, tedious and long
lasting work sessions, contribute to
development of the common situation of phone
Stress as a controlling and normative operators, where physical, social and moral
mechanism at work problems prevail.
The strongest and most powerful description of Shift rotation and working hours have a
stress is present in the work microcosms. It double meaning for phone operators because
appears first under a negative perspective since the degree of mobility associated to this
the working environment is seen as cause of schedule gives them some opportunity to
stress. distribute their time between family and
working demands.
By work environment they refer
basically to personal relationships between The way this is organised is follows: if
directors and workers and among piers; this is an operator faces a problem they can exchange
the prime motor relating to stress. Carla, Cora their work schedule for a different time of the
and Mary describe the surveillance and control day, this change is relatively easy, particularly
of bodies as “machines” as the daily if they plan it ahead of time. On the other hand
exasperating routine. overtime is assigned by an informal
organization which is the responsibility of the
Another reason why operators feel their operators not the companies. It consists in
work is not valued is the company´s premise covering someone who is unable to go to work.
that “the customer is always right” even when
the customer has been responsible for the This is a convenient strategy for
problem, and the company does not trust the operators to support each other, by doing their
operators on this argument. partner’s work the operators those who have
been covered do not loose their productivity
The operators also see the unfairness in bonuses, and the operator working overtime
the supervisor’s lack of thrust when they makes extra money. Form the operators’ point
complain about the high number of obscene of view this informal system represents a
calls with which they are threatened. The significant economic advantage (refer to table
supervisors consider this argument 1).
unsupported.
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Table 1 As a control measure for certain

Regular/less expensive Sunday Turns administrative processes, operators they are not
shifts
referred to by name, but by number. The
Monday to Saturday
Morning and Morning and working record on which productivity payment,
Daytime Daytime permissions, days off, shift changing, are all
$450.00 $652.00 based, are registered and referred to only by this
By hours By hours identification number, allocated by the
$57.00 $82.00 company to each operator.
Night Night
$500.00 $702.00
By hours By hours I had begun the fieldwork at the San
$72.00 $100.00 Juan Center when, on a number of occasions I
Table 1 Wages according to working turns tried to find the operators for the interview, the
supervisors would ask me their number while I
insisted on calling them by name.
However they are not aware of the
serious negative effects on their health: by This situation occurred very often and
simply adding the number of hours worked in a therefore I was told: you should ask them their
week we observe that most operators have no number and memorize it will make it easier.
time off. The working week is on average 65 to Then I realised that I systematically rejected
83 hours long. such a way of referring to people probably due
to personal conviction. But I found that the
Summarising, I would like to remark operators also showed resistance to number
that although operators recognize that work system, as a voice inside saying: “machine”.
organization is a condition that triggers stress,
operators give more attention to the deteriorated For example Carla becomes simply
interpersonal relationships, which they blame number 324, during a working day she has to
on their work demands and on jealousy among repeat the phrase at least 500 times. Although
operators. the only time she should indicate her name was
when making the connections. She refuses to
From this perspective the operator’s repeat the “made phrases” including her name.
perception of changing shifts is only seen She chooses a quick answer in passing the call
through its potential for stress production, but through and moves onto the next, and in this
the lack of awareness on the excess of working way fulfils the production demands. The
hours deserves more attention. greatest problem for her at work is perfectly
clear, she dislikes the surveillance and control
system, but more than anything else her
Work, From a perspective of winnings and behavior denotes a consistent rejection to being
losses a machine.
The idea that stress is a generalised threat for She also rejects the supervisor’s
operators overlooking the fine differences that dehumanising treatment which is largely
could be hard to see in an institution such as reflected in the indications of what is forbidden
Telmex. Here the trend is towards at work, such as not being allowed to laugh and
homogenisation, diluting human responses, talk, or show signals of being uncomfortable,
showing rhythms, reasons, and capital needs tired or bored since personal lives have nothing
that together reduce workers to simple numbers. to do with work commitments.

31
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
What is a phone operator’s personal life Carla does not know exactly when it
like? Does it capture the attention of labour began, however she says that as she worked
studies? How could supervisors, who were more hours, her husband began to drink, and
operators once themselves, tell someone that she links these events to her personal
personal life does not count, since they also deterioration. Among the symptoms related
have one? This last question is central to my with this condition, are: dermatitis on her arms,
study because it provides an explanation for neck and lower face. Despite medical
their answers. Nevertheless this is a complex supervision it did not improve.
question to answer immediately; therefore I ask
it only to outline some elements that from my The diagnosis was nervous dermatitis
point of view influence the development of caused by depression. She started drinking as a
ideas about stress (which could also be read as a result to the long silent spells and sour faces
metaphor for resistance) as related to seen from her family members at home, in
technological change. addition to work pressure. At work she was told
to check her behaviour since she was becoming
Carla is 41 years old, she completed irascible and gloomy. Carla traces this period 9
junior high school and studied translation, she to 10 years back. Whereas Carla focuses on
is married and has two children. Her working marital problems as the central cause of her
experience is as international (090) long health deterioration, I reconstruct the context in
distance operator (LD). Her working experience which it developed.
is of particular interest since she has seen the
change of modernisation: she points out that In 1990, for example, modernisation of
determination and preparation were essential to the traffic department began, her first child was
survive the technological change. about 2 years old, and she was expecting her
second child, with risk of abortion. Her mother
Her personal life changed at the time, as also passed away around that time. Although
she got married in the interim. At first she had Carla states that the use of computers at work
to deal with the restructuring of her life as a never troubled her, she is aware that there was a
wife. She had to try and make her husband climate of uncertainty due to the threat of
accept her working schedule due to the rotating layoffs.
shifts, and furthermore, understand the night
schedule. Later on, when her children were The context of this complex situation
born, new arrangements had to be made and she put Carla and her family in an unstable
had to look for the family’s support to care for position. In answer to the questions if she
the small children. She stopped working only suffered from stress and what the symptoms
during the period the company establishes for were, she indicated that she was not the same,
maternity leave. Afterwards she has worked she was very depressed, but at the same time
without rest (except for vacations) and has even her body was restless. She continuously tapped
worked more hours a day to make extra money. her fingers on the desk, and always moved her
legs and feet. She had a lot of anger that she
Carla’s husband saw that as positive at could not release, because she could not talk.
the beginning, but later on when he realised she My stress -she underlines- surfaced when
was making more money than he was, and talking to my husband about changing my work
spending more time away from home, away schedule. I felt every part of my body shaking, I
from the children the problems started. A was nervous, lost my voice and started to feel
vicious circle was underway. angry towards my children.
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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
I recognised that I was alcoholic, and I intended to briefly present Carla’s

this took me and my husband to seek for help at response to stress and how she lives with it. For
AA where I found relief. At present I can talk, I Carla the technological change had less impact
have changed so much that people tell me that that the changes in her personal life which
they it is noticeable. affect every social role she plays: wife, mother,
the cultural implications of being the household
Nevertheless I do not have the caretaker, and her mother’s death. She was
supervisor’s sympathy because I do not comply overwhelmed by the demands of her multiple
with the phrasing and conflicts arise from being roles.
more expressive.
Carla had to deal with a hegemonic
The AA meetings have taught me to say social culture that precipitated in her husband’s
how I feel and here (at work) I would like to be anger, as a consequence of her work
allowed to laugh, to talk, to help the customer responsibilities she overlooked her
the way I know how, without having to use responsibilities as mother, wife and affectionate
unnecessary words. At present my conflicts housewife.
have to do with my dislike of being treated as a
machine. What I want is to be trusted and to I would like to suggest, based on this,
convince then that there is more than simply that the emergence of stress and the health
saying that the customer is right. problems described by Carla, outline a social
context that tends to be ignored at work.
Carla’s current state of stress is
physically expressed as nervousness, anger and This is more evident form the
irritability. She declares her ability to recognize company’s perspective and has a subtle but
it and to control it. It is expressed through persistent ideological profile throughout the
digestive problems, diagnosed as colitis, but for various hierarchical levels (union and
her there is no need to treat it since she knows company): the constant surveillance and
that it is related to an unavoidable state of treatment of workers as computerised
nervousness. machines, just to meet the working goals within
the schedule.
She emphatically asks: how could I
avoid it if every week payday destroys our Furthermore, there is a lack of
expectations due to the unfair salaries? It is not knowledge of family or personal details.
fair that we have to live with this lack of Scholars interested in work health, even within
flexibility when workers are faced with a the widely accepted model of analysis of the
personal problem. Working demands are relationship between stress and work, do not
excessive and you cannot miss a working day include the social component of family life and
even if you child is dying. conflicts as causes of work health problems.
They refuse to believe it is true! They According to Waitzkin (1991) health

also disregard our complains about customers workers often ignore the contextual sources of
abusive behaviour, or when we receive obscene pain, mainly those of the family environment,
phone calls; that there are family emergencies by medicating or implementing social ideology
that prevent you for coming to work, that you to reinforce the message of social roles and
may be ill, we are not allowed to get ill! structural power.

33
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
The social causes of stress appear to be That is, husbands spend more time at
clear from Carla’s example and are verified by home with their children and participate more
Aneshensel’s (1992) hypothesis since the issue in domestic chores, what’s more they assume
is structural rather than generated by a economic domination from their wives.
preceding psychological disorder. However, it
could be said that the emphasis on the motives Therefore, if at some point the situation
is the social change or life event, understood as raises conflict, most women and their husbands
the technological transformation, as has been work on the relationships through time. In some
pointed out by research in work sociology. cases negotiation was not explicit, but it
occurred nonetheless. In this respect Perlin
The motives are derived from a number (1975) states that when there is agreement and
of circumstances brought together as a result of acceptance from the partner, in regards to salary
the interaction of social roles which specifically differences, if there is no perceived
contribute to the problem as Perlin (1983) competition, there is no reason for conflict to
demonstrated in a number of studies of the arise.
problems associated with participation in
institutionalised roles. Even through these social conditions,
Carla’s health deteriorated, and the explanation
It was surprising to find that, over the for her depression and dermatitis is equally that
last decades, this author defended that men and of stress. From my perspective stress is
women may occupy the same role, such as basically the expression of her resistance to
worker, but are exposed to different constraints unjust social factors in the family and unfair
and obligations as a result of gender and unequal working conditions.
stratification (Perlin, 1975a).
Such an expression takes the form of
As illustrated by Carla’s description, anger and irritation that can be observed
social roles are not static, they are naturally persistently in workers. This appears to disturb
dynamic; although there can be negotiation the supervisors but it is a way of expressing
problem is not resolved. resistance “to being treated as a machine”.
For this reason, Perlin (1983) suggests

we explore the dimensions of ongoing role Work as a place for distraction
strains which include the difficulty of satisfying
role demands, interpersonal conflict with others The greatest paradox in the operator's work is
in the role context, incompatible demands maybe that dual perspective which they live:
between roles, role captivity, gains or losses of that of work as a cause of illness, and yet, as a
roles, and restructuring of continuing roles space for self-realization and distraction for a
(Pearlin 1983). "self" that acquires a certain degree of freedom.
I found in several of the interviews that But although the operator’s work has
phone operators often experience role conflicts. been transformed, it has become a repetitive,
Some of them present uneven demands, lack of tedious, excessive activity, irrespective of the
satisfaction and role captivity, but it is also true sense of self-realization that this exercise
that many of them have re-established role entailed. I find two reasons for this
interaction to the extent that in some cases they appreciation.
are completely inverted.
34
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
One is closely linked to that But there is also another figure

monotonous activity lacking creativity and reminiscent of other times, when a woman was
ability that makes the workers consider their decent if she was a housewife and she became
daily activity as less and less pleasing and only nobody for the simple reason of having a job.
redeemable in economic terms, since it is To transgress that limit has been to break the
sustenance for personal and family life. heaviest symbolic burden in woman’s history.
Another is the union activist's role that It is possible to say that phone operators
the operator has played which has also been transgressed this line at an early stage and
transformed because today her political exercise formed that sector of women "of doubtful
has a very different effect than it did 20 years reputation" merely for having a public life; this
ago, given its diminishing strategic position. idea was heightened when the work shifts
became more complicated and night shifts
In fact when they narrating their work appeared.
history, being a phone operator has changed in
the present; before, it filled them with pride to Alicia, one of my first interviewees
know that they belonged to one of the most pointed out that at the end of the 70’s, in full
active unions and that their presence and fight union activity and politics in the country, an
was indispensable. This consideration gave the operator's image apart from being one of
operators a high feeling of self-esteem since, on activist, was generally characterised as “angry,
the whole, they were recognised as spirited crazy and lesbian”. This image was transmitted
women with a “high political and social through her own father (also an operator).
conscience."
Before I took on the task of
But who are phone operators? Why do I corroborating this, the operator’s descriptions
find from the first operators I interviewed, of their work and personal relationships, of
something that makes them distinctive, not only their aspirations and desires offered a view of
in theory, but also in practice? work in Kleinman’s terms: it is a local moral
world.
The first interviews showed open,
articulate, curious and politically involved This world creates its own behaviour
women. They were interested in stress being patterns, expressions, imaginary language
explained, avid to speak of their work desires and a collective enjoyable environment
experience, but also and without pressures, of which in turn builds a shared value system
their personal life experience. whose meaning is not of self-realization, but
rather an escape. It is a place for the self, for “a
They were enthusiastic to learn my own rest from family issues”, for trivial conversation
definition of stress and were thus happy to and expression of desire.
express their own experience, and also openly
interested in sharing information about Each of the operators’s expressed a
themselves, their body, and its transformations. sense of work first as a blessing in these
uncertain times, as the authorities always
The idea that an operator is a woman threaten them with the possibility of being
tied down to her work, with a history of discharged. Then, the meaning of work
personal, social and political fight, is assumed acquired another dimension.
among the group.
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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
Isabel provided one of the clearest At this time, the anonymous voices
metaphors for meaning of work when she said: which generated the expectation of leisure and
"For me, work is like a bubble which you enter desire, of public life, took the possibility of an
and where you rest, and you forget the children, encounter to street life, as Telmex does not
the husband, the house and you only express have normal morning, day and night shifts, but
your own self, the way you want to be....”. rather a number of shifts which begin every half
hour.
Santa mentioned several times that this
work is large part of the family’s sustenance, For this reason the company
but for her it was the possibility of a change of implemented bedrooms, from the 50’s, so that
scenario and this alone, helped her think of operators that finished their shift at dawn, didn't
other things and not always be overwhelmed by have to travel at night, or so that they could rest
problems. and take another shift.
Similarly, Martha emphasised that work Night as a symbolic figure became a

always represented a space for herself, but due frontier impregnated with meaning. As for
to the rotation of shifts and to night work, nurses, whose nights signify sacrifice and
whether single or married, if she wanted to go wakefulness in the fight against human pain, in
dancing with friends she would say she had the case of phone operators, nights are related
night work. to proximity with co-workers and the sharing of
sleeping quarters; these are elements which
In this way, night work and the mobility contribute to the stereotype of lesbianism.
of shifts provides the operators, on one hand, a
space away from family issues which constrain From I observe the importance not only
them; and on the other hand, it allows them to conceiving work from its positive aspects "as a
exercise their sexuality, in a way not so clearly source of sustenance and creativity", or
expressed among other groups of workers. negative one "a space that affects health
directly and deteriorates the physical capacity
Before the technological innovation, the of workers”; but also from a perspective that
operator’s work was more flexible, although a incorporates meaning from the actual
short phraseology existed, there was more individuals.
interaction with the "client”, which could be
good or bad, depending on the operator’s state The notion of work that I elaborate,
of mind. On occasion the conversation could taking into account that the implementation of
even be a possibility for an encounter, or new technology has come to transform the
simply fantasy. It is certainly true that many gender division of work, creating contradictions
operators met their husbands in this way. in the process of gender definition, are seen in
family and work relationships and in the
At present, that fantasy has gone, due to necessity of the expression of sexuality.
the use of on-line terminals. Operators can no
longer choose on a whim to take a call from In this conception, sexuality has no
Guadalajara, or small unknown town; they have importance or significance in the natural and
to answer all calls they receive and merely fulfil biological expression, but in its historical and
their requirements, looking to achieve the sociocultural construction (Vance, 1991;
productivity goal for one working day. Weeks, 1998) seen in practice in the expression
of sexual identity and individuality.
36
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
This highlights that although operators Some speak more openly of their
carry these social etiquettes, their practice is in experience, although contrary to the male
constant negotiation due to their personal counterparts, the feminine dominate speech
freedom (achieved precisely through their doesn't reward, it punishes. Others include their
work, salary and shifts) and social interaction, “Toños” (husband, partner…) in this game and
which transforms sexual impulse and desire comment on the pleasure of their company, but
beyond its reproductive function. also on their problems, reasons for which they
come to work, which they consider a protective
For in their own codes dictated in this haven.
environment, there is no rigid morality that
punishes for having more than one partner, or Although sexuality is not the object of
for sexual preference. Not here, within the analysis of my study, its constant reference in
center, among them, which suggests an the operator’s narrative is important because it
atmosphere with particular codes different to constitutes in a sensitive fibber that is
social expectations of women, mothers, connected to stress, in several transgressing
daughters, etc.; in this sense it is a different images.
world.
At this moment, many were
These annotations emphasize the way in experiencing completely fragmented
which operators behave at the work: they are a partnerships, due to working hours, as well as
product of these comments. Their expectations personal problems from stereotypes in
are contained when the hegemonic discourse expressing a different sexual preference.
that demands certain behaviours (for example,
monogamy, education and the children's Other causes of stress are events in the
attention, care of the health) is formulated in past which do not find expression; when they
their narratives, while answering a question: cannot be put into words this causes pain and
they answer simply what their duty is. Work is, language becomes only whining and
in this sense, a space for desire, though screeching.
imaginary. If I motivate conversation, someone
shows off, they speak openly, reflecting the Observing the structure of work,
topics of the moment, expressing their more through it’s many shades, and considering it’s
rustic side with comments that some are meaning conveyed through society allows us to
"hysterical", "neurotic", "wound up", if they broaden our interpretation. As Del Vechio
don’t have a sex life. (1994) wisely states, studying patients with
chronic pain may lead us to see work as a
In their daily life I observed the painkiller, or a defence against illness; an
expression of open sexuality, and a process of escape and a means for self-esteem and self-
reassignment of values that are transmitted realization, despite the chronic pain.
through conversation where the operators'
choice and decisions regarding their bodies, In the case describe, work acquires
their lives, their sexual partners stand out. meaning in terms of its exercise, one which, as I
There is always one who boasts being free of highlighted, comes closer to a space of
prejudice or who openly parade garments in the recreation and personal decision. When I asked
hand proof of an unexpected encounter before the operators the meaning of their work, most
arriving at work; others only listen nodding and of the answers highlighted those many shades.
laugh but they don't chastise.
37
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 19-39
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June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 40-51
Non-heterosexual Subjectivities and Subversions: the self-care and pleasure
GARCÍA-CALDERÓN, Gerónimo*†
Universidad de Guadalajara
Abstract
This paper explores Michel Foucault's notion of "self-care" under two aspects. The first, as constructor
of subjectivities and its relation to the notion of "technologies of the self". And the second, as a
possibility of creation of the subject of himself through the use of pleasure. At the same time, it aims to
outline how mechanisms of power are constituted in the non-heterosexual (and the emulation of
heterosexual normativity) and to envisage an ethics that does not depend on the prevailing subjections,
based on the idea of "life as Artistic creation".
Subjectivities, Pleasure, Ethics, Homosexuality
Citation: GARCÍA-CALDERÓN, Geronimo. Non-heterosexual Subjectivities and Subversions: the self-care and pleasure.
ECORFAN Journal-Republic of Colombia 2016, 2-2: 40-51
* Correspondence to Author (email: gerogracia25@hotmail.com)


41
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 40-51
Introduction It is necessary to emphasize that the

"homosexual subject" that emerges in the
The One of the last reflections that Michel twentieth century is a subject marked mainly by
Foucault approached before his death, turned on a set of technologies of diverse nature and
the constitution of the subjects in a particular whose relational form, whether political, sexual
time / space. This constitution, which Foucault or emotional is crossed by a certain knowledge-
defines as a "historical ontology ", is a game of power hetero-Sexual.
relations between to know, the power and the
morality, where they emerge: subjects of Even more, the obligation of the
knowledge, fastened that act on other subjects heteronorma has particularly marked this
and ethical agents. Of these three "domains" the homosexual subject, to the degree, which great
last one will take a major importance in the of the "distinctive" of the homosexual (either in
twilight of the thought foucaultiano1 behavior or identity) is an emulation of the
imperative of the heterosexual norm (the How it
Since, precisely it is in the morality, is understood, expresses and empowers such a
where "they" "come together" and the domains standard).
"materialize" of to know and of the power.
Foucault emphasized that it is, in this " relation On the other hand, one of the forms in
with it itself that I consider to be moral and that which the power is incorporated in the subjects,
determines how he must be constituted the appears as a device of knowledge and of power
individual in all that moral subject of his own that, by means of diverse technologies, they are
actions2” conforming both the standardization and the
normalization in the social practices and
Although, the morality would have a especially, the subject himself in a seemingly
double level in the construction of subjects. On private and individual praxis, as is sexuality.
the other hand, it would mark a relationship of
the subject with himself by means of self- In addition, as several authors3 have
monitoring, an overconsciousness of himself pointed out, this eminently heterosexual and
and the constant review of his actions before compulsory enforcement device has been
the others. And for other one, of this constituted under an idea of "naturalness". In
relationship of self-government, would emerge this sense, the homosexual identity has operated
the possibility of governing others (by learn a under certain parameters of behavior and
certain type of knowledge-power), a notion that attitudes whose axis is heteronorma.
Foucault would call "governmentality." And it
is in sexuality where it would operate morality For example, if a man has relations with
for the creation of subjects. another man, he would automatically have to
recognize himself as "homosexual" and adapt to
the established parameters about what it is to be
1
"homosexual" (and if it does not suit such a
Which does not mean that there are “stages” in thing: or it feels "out of place" or feels
Foucault’s thinking, but the reflection on the construction
of Subjectivities was “shifting” towards the construction
rejected).
of the subject oh himself under various La tecnología del
Yo. Such displacement is more clearly seen in the courses
taught at the Collége de France between 1971 – 1984. 3
For example, the idea of thre heterosexual sex-gender
2
Foucault, Michel. La Inquietud por la Verdad: escritos system of Gayle Rubin, the heteronorma de Monique
sobre la sexualidad y el sujeto. Siglo XXI, Avellaneda, Wittig or the obligatory heterosexuality of Adrienne
2013. p. 136. Rich.
ISSN-On line: 2539-1372 GARCÍA-CALDERÓN, Geronimo. Non-heterosexual
ECORFAN® All rights reserved. Subjectivities and Subversions: the self-care and pleasure.
ECORFAN Journal-Republic of Colombia 2016
42
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 40-51
Thus, since the Heteronorma, a series of The answer, we will find it in the notion
sexual identities have been created which, as of "technologies of the Self". These
"signatures", mark and impose a "unique" idea technologies:
of sexual exercise. It is, from the
lack/restriction where the subjects are known as Allow individuals to carry out, on their
objects of desire of the other. own or with the help of others, a number of
operations on their body and soul, thoughts,
These identities seek to homogenize the conduct, or any form of being, thus obtaining a
experience of human sexuality and if any transformation of themselves in order to attain a
subject is not "subjected" to such norms and certain state of Happiness, purity, wisdom or
ideas, then it is pointed to suffering both immortality.6
symbolic and physical violence.
And it would be moral, the most
On the other hand, for Foucault, the powerful producer of subjectivities for the
subject is not a transcendental entity outside the regulation and control of subjects, where they
world, but this is a historical construction. It is impose patterns of behavior in the subjects
to be emphasized that this construction arises (called Morales) and that these, in addition,
from the formation of a knowledge prior to the reproduce such norms as a result of the
subject, because the conceptualization of interiorization of them. In addition, the whole
rational objects implies the emergence of a system of current social organization in the
certain subject able to understand such object. culture called Western becomes of "to be
For example, "The construction of the Madness heterosexual" and to behave as such (in the way
object corresponded to that of a rational subject of dress, express oneself, to relate, etcetera),
who had the pertinent knowledge about it and and in this way, will constitute a certain type of
understood it”4 . In addition, the subject makes Subjectivities that respond (or react) to this
sense to the extent that it is held by something. heterosexual norm.
These fastenings constitute their own

ontological horizon: whether by knowledge, Technologies of the self as constructors of
power or moral norms imposed, which would subjectivity
imply that not only is there a single restraint,
but multiple fastenings: it is what Foucault The conformation of moral subjects consists of
called as Subjectivities. three elements that relate to each other, but
historically they are expressed and developed in
Nevertheless, subjects tend to be subject different ways, namely; The desire, the restraint
to a single type of discourse, knowledge or mode and the ascesis. It is important to point
moral looking in a single constituted identity. out that, for Foucault, desire has not changed in
"It is not satisfactory to say that the subject is the West since antiquity because the vision of
constituted in a symbolic system." It is desire (and therefore morality) as monosexual7:
constituted in historically analysable practices5”
.But what is the origin of the social practices 6
FOUCAULT, Michel. Las Tecnologías del Yo. Paidós,
that make possible the constitution of these Barcelona, 1990. p. 49.
subjectivities? 7
That is, it finds that there is only a sexuality exerted and
regulated only for and by the males, since, the women
4
from the Greek thought, do not possess own sexuality,
Michel Foucault, La Inquietud, p. 50. but only exist as an extension of the sexuality of the
5
Michel Foucault, La Inquietud, pp. 154 – 155. male, being able to infer that that Sexuality is
43
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 40-51
It is a moral of men: a Moral thought, Homosexual Heteronormado is one who

written, taught by men and directed to men, has internalized the patterns of behavior that
obviously free. Virile morality, therefore, in imposes heterosexuality: condemns the
which women only appear in the quality of effeminacy of homosexual males or the
objects or, at the most, of companions to which "masculiniamiento" of lesbian women; believes
it is advisable to form, to educate and to in "monogamy" as the only form of relationship
supervise when one has them under their between two homosexuals;
power, and of which, instead, we must abstain
when they are under the power of another It punishes "ambiguous" forms in the
(father, husband, tutor)8 expression of gender, such as "androgynous",
transgender or transgendered; defend "socially
On the other hand, both the ascesis and accepted" values as the traditional family;
the mode of restraint, would change according reduces the sexual experience to roles fixed as
to the worldview of each epoch, demanding "passive" and "active" and does not conceive
new patterns of behavior and imposing new how two people, can not have sex without the
forms of subject over time. Ascesis is an act in penetration is the "main act" in such exchange
relation to the idea of desire or pleasure itself. sexoafectivo.
The mode of restraint "is the way or On the other hand, it is very common
mode by which people are invited and this form of subjectivity between the
encouraged to recognize their moral homosexuals in western culture, since
obligations”9 . Thus, Ascesis is the way to act practically heterosexuality as a device, is
according to pleasure, and the mode of restraint, usually the only form in the Constitution of
is the means of regulating the subject to the homosexual subjects, since the knowledge,
pleasure: it is as a prohibition, it is as a which constitutes Subjects are now
"conviction" that certain pleasurable practices heterosexual.
(linked to the exercise of sexuality) are
reprehensible or not. This, because the idea of gender tends to
be mounted in a certain "naturalness" in the
In this way, I propose two ways in sexual division and with it, to think that there
which the "technologies of the Self" mold the are only heterosexual subjects and whose
homosexual subject today: the subject from the practices, also they are.
"closet" (or heteronormado) and the figure of
the gay (as Homonormado), but both figures Moreover, this knowledge established
depend on the heterosexual axis and the way in around sexuality and certain practices that the
how they He has internalizeded or resisted (in subject does in accordance with such
an indirect dependency relationship) to knowledge, would create an identity to judge
heterosexual desire: Understood as a device that himself, where if what he does and knows
allows liberation, but at the same time about himself, is concordant 10.
oppression, of hegemonic ideology and operant
in western thought and culture.
phallocentric and heterosexual, although Foucault does

not expose it as.
8
Michel Foucault, La Inquietud, 177. 10
As if, at the entrance, the subject could say who he is
9
Michel Foucault, La Inquietud, 137. and what he wants clearly, expressing a truth.
44
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 40-51
For example, individuals are constantly Let us first consider that sexual
required to "account" for their sexual behavior difference is often invoked as a matter of
in relation to heterosexuality; Be it explicitly, as material differences. Nevertheless, sexual
when you ask someone if you are gay or difference is never simply a function of material
lesbian; So implicitly, as when you qualify for differences that are not in any way marked and
sexual exercise (outside the heterosexual shaped by discursive practices […]The category
standard11 ) as something dirty, bad or of "sex" is, from the beginning, normative; it's
identified as promiscuity. what Foucault called a "regulatory ideal."
[…]"sex" not only functions as a norm, but it is
In the background, subjects are expected also part of a regulatory practice that produces
to act and behave with regard to the ideas and the governing bodies, that is, whose regulatory
speeches installed (understood as true) in the strength is manifested as a kind of productive
exercise of their sexuality. You would also be power, the power to produce-demarcate,
questioned whether your sexual practices circumscribe, Differentiating-the controlling
correspond to the "socially established"12 bodies […]In order to consolidate the
regarding a certain "sexual nature" and if this is heterosexual imperative.13
ambiguous, you will be required to conform to
the binary system, that is to say as your sex That is, heterosexual knowledge
requires. constructs bodies, mutilates genitals, or
"reconstructs" the same. Since, that
Respect to this last point, feminist "naturalness" in the Bodies Frames
authors such as Kate Millet, Gayle Rubin and performative Acts (act as "man" or "woman"
later, Judith Butler, will realize that this according to their genitality), and when a
montage, that is to say, this idea that there is a creature is born, that same knowledge,
naturality in the division of the sexes and, determines material and discursively whether it
therefore, of the genres and of the practices will be male or female: there can be no
Sexoafectivas, it's fictional. individuals Sexually ambiguous.
Since, while there is a certain Fortunately, it cannot be determined or

"materiality" that has been devalued by the detected if a child will be homosexual, because
bodies, it does not imply that the relationship if so, there would be no doubt that medical and
between the two genera is equally "natural". biological science would have already designed
But what about those bodies where genitalia is mechanisms for the "correction"14 of these
ambiguous? Since it passes, that these individuals diverted in their (heterosexual)
individuals are usually corrected and should nature, Although there will be other forms of
assign them a sex by then be treated as children persuasion already being greater.
(assigning at a time, a gender).
13
BUTLER, Judith. Los Cuerpos que Importan: sobre
11
Whether it be for non-reproductive, be it outside the los límites materiales y discursivos del “sexo”. Paidós,
relationship par excellence, the monogamy. Buenos Aires, 2002. pp. 17 – 18.
12 14
Among the most important ideas and practices in However, have existed in the medical history,
relation to sexuality could be emphasized: sex is only for treatments of various kinds for the correction of
reproduction, desire is only heterosexual, sexual act is homosexuality, and although in most Western countries
only through penetration, any other practice is seen as have been eliminated such practices, still persists among
"unnatural", the Autoeroticism is accepted, but it is not some psychological currents, Psychiatric and religious
recommended to spread it, talk about sex "will guide" attempts to "change the deviant and unnatural nature" of
individuals to perform it, therefore should not talk about homosexuals .
45
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 40-51
For his part, the homonormado his Becoming homosexual, would imply
behavior will be guided by ideas he considers to "being doing" in the care of oneself and others:
be "own" of homosexuals. For example, modify, change, accept that there is no such
consider that to be "truly homosexual" you need thing as an "identity ” homosexual, transgender,
to know fashion, hate sports (and more if they bisexual, etcetera, but everything is a construct
are physical contact), have a certain sensitivity and historical becoming. And it would be, the
or creativity for ornament, have "good taste", be notion of Foucault's self-care, a means to
refined or emulate those Characteristics he critically glimpse, a possible alternative to the
considers important of his opposite sex. creation of oneself as an ethical subject, without
entirely giving up the creation of a certain
There are some speeches that indicate "identity"16, but avoiding "fixating" on a single
that a transsexual, For example, to be "truly reality , and that would help the understanding
transsexual," I should have gone through the of oneself and the other. So in the next section,
sex resignation operation, because, without this, I will delve into the notion of self-care and how
it is not a transsexual "completely”. In other it could help in creating oneself.
words, homonormatividad is usually an ideal
reconstruction of a certain "being homosexual",
but on other occasions, it is a refined form of The care of the self as "creative act”
the heterosexual idea as opposed, it highlights
the "best qualities" of the gender binary Could it be a form of self-Constitution of the
heterosexual. But, in both cases, there is a subject that is outside the imposition of the
certain dependence on what heterosexuality "sexuality device" prevailing? To try to answer
points to as "must be”. From there, that many that question, I need to clarify what is the care
effeminate men or male lesbian women, leading of yes 17 in Michel Foucault and present some
to the extreme expression of opposite sex, are brief reflections on how would place the non-
thought as the archetypal models of heterosexual before the desire/pleasure,
homosexuality. comparing between the forms of praxis ancient
and contemporary. It is pertinent to remember,
Nevertheless, it seems to me that, while that ethics18 emerge in the act linked to pleasure
the homonorma opens a certain field of or desire that a moral prescription has
possibility for empowerment, the questioning of established, and that revising the act of the
social conventions or to satirize mechanisms subject, this would be in the possibility of
and compulsory sexual and generic roles. I modifying them.
think, nevertheless, that it should be only one
stage and that "one has to use sexuality to 16
Nor hinted that should disappear the political identities
discover, invent new relationships." To be gay as the collective LGBTQ nor that disappears the own
is to be in becoming”15 . identity, but that these identities of which I speak belong
to another order, belong to the order of the same sense
In other words, the Homonorma would that the subject gives his life and to their sexual practices,
although the political identities and individual are related.
set a certain homosexual identity (just as stiff as 17
Seen as the practice itself and not as the "builder" of
heterosexual) and it would be necessary, to use the "I".
pleasure or desire as a mechanism of creation in 18
For Foucault ethics and morality are equivalent in
relation to the body itself and the body of some texts, in others there is a distinction; Morality is
others. often seen as a social construct and ethics, oscillates
between the actions of the subject towards his own
desires and sometimes, in the questioning of his actions
15
Michel Foucault, La Inquietud, p. 112. before the moral.
46
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 40-51
On the other hand, the Constitution of That is to say, it was a dietary of

the contemporary subject becomes a "self- pleasure20. And on the other, these reflections
monitoring" that the subject performs to the were about the scopes in social life that
internalize the moral standars. That is to say, to emerging in the relationship and interaction of
assimilate and implement those rules that a both oneself and others, since the care of itself
society has established as "good", "desirable" or was "one of the main principles of the cities,
even "natural", both on the pleasure and the one of the most important rules for the social
desire without mediation or reflection some. behavior and staff and for the art of life21”.
And although the notion of self care is a Since govern self, he was in the capacity
technology of the self, it opens a possibility that to govern the others. Thus, the care of Yes
of this "restlessness" by oneself, can serve as a would have four general characteristics,
mechanism of creative construction of namely: a) as a mode of the self facing the
desire/pleasure, or at least, be the germ of world, B) as reversal of the master's gaze (as
resistance to morals (heterosexual) prevailing. look on the other) towards oneself22, c) as a
transformation of oneself, and (d), as a "corpus"
In the volumes of the "History of of reflections around care. Thus, the notion of
Sexuality:" The use of pleasures and the self care in antiquity corresponded not only to a
restlessness of oneself, "Michel Foucault sexual praxis, but above all was a lifestyle, a
describes that the practice on the care of oneself commitment to itself. On the other hand, the
between Greeks and Romans has prevailed until self-care operated, along with the idea of "know
today (modified in some respects) and that has Yourself", as a device that constituted a
little to do with the practiced in antiquity. subjectivity different from the contemporary,
because, who was constantly checking to know
At present, when you think of "self who it was and what it was doing, avoided the
care" it is more a matter that deals with the interiorization, and With it, passivity in the face
physical appearance, the so-called wellbeing of external discourses”.
(mental or physical) or the procuring of certain
palliatives or exercises of the type of "perfect It is neccesary to indicate that the
body worship, healthy or beautiful”19 . Delphic mandate of the "Know Yourself" was
subordinated to the notion of self care, that is, it
On the other hand, the old conceived the was more important to revise, by means of
care of oneself in a deeper and more dynamic regular and constant registration (as Praxis),
sense, where not only was it a simple what one did, and thus better understand the
"examination of conscience", but involving a self-knowledge of one himself, and thereby,
double dimension. On the one hand, it was a better elucidating the own desire/pleasure.
constant reflection on pleasure and its
20
interference not only in the life of each subject In this diet of pleasure, Michel Foucault would
(as a ascetic exercise), but included a whole recognize that it is an active way of constituting desire
and pleasure. Since sexual pleasure is not isolated from
reflection on food, exercise, study, etc. other pleasurable forms, being the important practice
itself..
21
Michel Foucault, Las Tecnologías del Yo, p. 51.
22
19
The master philosopher played a fundamental role in
In other words, this "self care" is installed as a device the care of himself, for he was the "most qualified" to
of desire as a lack, the other becomes only an object that guide in the constant process of this care, since the
<contiene> to desire.. philosopher understood the complexity and depth of the
"I" and the others.
47
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 40-51
From this restlessness of yes, they Foucault said: "An imperative was
proliferated in the thought Greco-Roman raised: not only confess the acts contrary to the
various forms of ethical speeches (such as law, but try to convert desire, all desire, in
epicureísmo, stoicism or cynicism), but which discourse”25 .
had in common the constant review of oneself
in the form of "restlessness" (of something that This turning all desire into discourse, is
does not remain Still, nor is it stable). Thus, the negative form of the desire, desire as lack,
they operated (even now) several ethical homogenization of the experience and its
speeches, without necessarily are a expression. This imperative becomes
contradiction. accountable of the "desire" that remains hidden
and veiled to the other, is to express by the
Nevertheless, as Foucault points out, in confession something that no one else possesses
the course of time the importance of "know and therefore becomes covetable and, at the
Yourself" was reversed on the "worry about same time, reprehensible; that releases, but
yourself", and with that, the construction of the oppresses at once.
subject became more a "accountability" (in a
convert what you want in a speech) than in a Nevertheless, despite the existence of
solicitation (and creation) of oneself. Foucault this imperative, the subject could establish a
affirmed: relationship with himself and know what
forces, speeches or ideas constitute it in the
The «Know yourself» has darkened the present, and once being aware of this
«Worry about yourself», because our morality relationship, become an active subject, creator
insists that what should be rejected is the of their own rules, free of moral judgments
subject … In the Greco-Roman culture the imposed on him and the normatizan. Foucault
knowledge of itself was presented as the affirmed: “[with genealogy] I refer to analyzing
consequence of the concern itself. In the the practices that pushed individuals to pay
modern world, knowledge of oneself constitutes attention to themselves, to decipher themselves,
the fundamental principle.23 to recognize themselves and to confess as
subjects of desire”26.
Thus, the importance in the
contemporary thinking of "Know Yourself" is It would seem that by deciphering his
more than”vigilance" about the acts themselves practices, the non-heterosexual would be
in order to "tell the truth about oneself"”24. accepting that there is a truth that it sublies in it
is being and has to be confessed as a desire. It
This "truth" of oneself is, on the one should be clarified that, while accountability is
hand, the internalization of the dominant for both heterosexuals and non-heterosexuals,
morality and the obligatoryness of a single the weight and the demand for the second with
sexuality (which is heterosexual), and on the respect to their practices and "desires", it is
other, the use and sense that subject gives to the major. In addition, this surrender of non-
pleasure (or of how it is accessed) and its heterosexual desire sustains a subordinate
relation with the different speeches and N relationship.
around sexuality (such as medical,
psychological, punitive, etc.).
25
FOUCAULT, Michel. Historia de la Sexualidad I: la
voluntad de saber, Siglo XXI, México D.F., 2014. pp. 20
23
Michel Foucault, Las Tecnologías del Yo, p. 55. – 21.
24
Michel Foucault, Las Tecnologías del Yo, p. 46. 26
Michel Foucault, La Inquietud, 161.
48
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 40-51
This accountability allows "to be Knowing where and when to use

possessed", to belong to the other, to categorize pleasure makes us more free, but this choice
it and to delimit its actions, desires and must be based on a deep and constant reflection
practices. Nevertheless, we would have to of our actions. The current error is to confuse
"rebel" and "refuse" the forms and styles of life the use of pleasure with hedonism, ie, to pursue
that the structures of power impose, through the pleasure for pleasure without measuring the
different speeches around sexuality. That is, to possible scope or consequences of it. The
convert the desire as creation/producer and to slogan of today takes root in "cosificar" the
be active subjects of our forces and not simple desire and to see it like a cumulative good,
"objects of the other". In this respect Judith producible, marketable.
Butler highlighted:
The self-care should be a constant
When we talk about my sexuality or my exercise and review of what we are and do and
gender, as we do (and as we should) we want to implies, a certain degree of autonomy, freedom
say something complicated. Neither my and creation on the part of the subject. And to
sexuality nor my gender are precisely a possess a degree of self-knowledge and the
possession, but both must be understood as permanent care of both the body and the soul,
ways of being possessed, way of being for the subject would be more "master of himself"
another or, in fact, under another27. and of their own pleasures. Foucault said:
Dealing with oneself is not simply a

Subverting the Technology of heterosexual necessary condition for access to philosophical
me life, in the strict sense of the term ... this
principle has become general terms in the basic
Precisely, the technologies of the self are the principle of any rational behavior, in any way
formations to capture the singularity of the of active life that aspires to be governed by the
subjects (and to some extent to return object to principle of moral rationality30
the other) by means of various mechanisms of
subordination. "Dealing with one himself" is a form of
experience, of approaching our own being,
But, "there will always be a relationship through the transformation of our actions.
with himself that resists codes and powers"
[and] the relationship with oneself is one of the Foucault said: "The attitude of the
origins of those points of resistance”28. individual about himself, the way he assures his
own freedom from his desires, the form of
Even more, "are we today able to have a sovereignty he exerts on himself are a
morality of acts and pleasures that might take constituent element of the happiness and good
into account the pleasure of the other?" Is the order of the city 31”. In other words, taking care
pleasure of the other something that can be of oneself is not about subtracting oneself and
included in our pleasure, without reference to a moving away from the other.
law, marriage or I do not know what?”29
27
BUTLER, Judith. Deshacer el Género. Paidós Studio, 30
FOUCAULT, Michel. La Hermenéutica del Sujeto.
Barcelona, 2006. p. 38. Piqueta, Madrid, 1994. p. 34.
28
DELEUZE, Gilles. Foucault, Paidós, Barcelona, 1987. 31
FOUCAULT, Michel. Historia de la Sexualidad II: el
p. 136. uso de los placeres. Siglo XXI, México, D.F., 2013). p.
29
Michel Foucault, La Inquietud, p.127. 88.
49
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 40-51
Nor is it an aesthetic care or "self- Relationships formed, formalized in the

esteem", it is above all a vital attitude in the strata (to know); The force relationships at the
procuring of our own well-being in a rational diagram level (power); And the relationship
way, to be aware of what we do and are, to with the outside, that absolute relationship, as
leave the oppressive structures and assimilate Blanchot says, which is also unrelated
us, to rethink the forms of relationship far from (thought). Does that mean it doesn't exist
the conventionalities or social “tags”. inside? […]The outside is not a petrified
boundary, but a changing matter animated of
It is, above all, an ethical exercise in a peristaltic movements, of folds and folding that
time/space of creation of our own individual constitute an inside: not anything but the
self, of active and free subjects. It is, a call of outside, but exactly the inside of the outside34.
responsibility of the subject with his own
pleasures, trying to "deconstruct" what has been So pleasure is the fold of external and
imposed. Bernini highlighted that: internal forces that every individual experiences
in his relationship with himself and with others.
The sexual freedom is not the recovery It is an exercise not only instinctive (as has
of the truth of a desire <<natural>> Since been thought for a long time), but is a conscious
always present in all individuals of the human (or unaware) positioning of the bodies,
species, nor in the release of a multiplicity of rationalizations and relationships that we hold
desires that would constitute the truths that are with the other. Sexuality is not an intimate act,
specific to each, but the creative use that every but it is the exposure of each subject's self to
human being can make the own body in search and with the other.
of pleasures <<artificial>> and therefore neither
true nor false32. Moreover, it is an experience (and as
such a transformer) that allows to know how
That is to say, the use of pleasure would the different subjectivities are constituted35.
lead to a series of implications not only in the Foucault affirmed:
individual field, but would transcend the
"public" space. Moreover, the forces that make To speak of sexuality as a singular
up the subject become of a material reality, historical experience also meant that
where the participation of the bodies and the instruments capable of analysing, in their own
sensations emanated from it, transcend the character and their correlations, could be
public space, and with that, it could be said that available, the three axes that constitute it: the
the use of pleasure is political33. formation of the knowledge that refers to it, the
Power systems that govern their practice and
In addition, Deleuze stresses that, in the the ways in which individuals can and should
thought of Foucault, these forces are expressed be recognized as subjects of that sexuality36.
in a triple relationship:
34
32 Gilles Deleuze, Foucault, p. 128.
BERNINI, Lorenzo. Apocalipsis Queer: elementos de 35
una teoría antisocial. Egales, Madrid, 2015, p. 30. Las It is necessary to remember that for Foucault there is
negritas son mías. no "transcendental subject" but changing forms of
33 subjectivities that depend on the domains of knowledge,
Understood as a space of antagonistic forces in
power and morality.
constant tension, transformation and modification,
distinguishing itself from "the policy" that would be the
36
institutionalization of those forces. Michel Foucault, La Inquietud, p. 160
50
June 2016 Vol.2 No.2 40-51
Finally, Foucault would think that Finally, the subject being active and
pleasure makes possible the transformation of conscious with his desire/pleasure and his
the mechanisms of power, since, when the practices, then he could constitute himself as a
social practices are transformed, the devices subject of desire, regardless of the speeches and
should be modified around the sexuality. In devices turned and imposed from an "outside"
other words, the notion of "self care" would (which was noted as fictional). That is why
allow the subject to know in his singularity and Foucault was interested in sadomasochistic
become an active subject in terms of the use of practices, because in these practices he saw new
pleasure, creating a new form of subjectivation. ways of relation of the subject with the
pleasures and of his practices, generating
In this way, a new form of ethical "different" subjects in relation with himself and
exercise could be created not only by with the others.
reaffirming itself as something that is not
classifiable, but by creating pure strength. It
would open a new path to strengthen the References
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“Violence in Colombia: between historiography and genealogy.

The construction of an object of study”
ARCILA-ARANGO, Mauricio
“Nationalism and otherness in Trump’s America”

BUSTOS-GOROZPE, Fernando
“The paradox of work. A world of losing and winning”

RAMÍREZ-VELÁZQUEZ, Josefina
Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historia
“Non-heterosexual Subjectivities and Subversions: the self-care

and pleasure”
GARCÍA-CALDERÓN, Gerónimo
Universidad de Guadalajara
ISSN-On line: 2539-1372

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Volume 2, Issue 2 – January – June - 2016

QUIMI-POZO, Victoria. BsC.

CATALINA-ARANGO, Selen. PhD.

CAISEDO, Andrés. MsC.

CUARTAS-ACOSTA, Fernando. MsC.

ACEVEDO-ARANGO, Daniel. MsC.

ROJAS-BUSTAMANTE, Nataly. BsC.

POSADA-PEREZ, Natalia. BsC.

GIRALDO-FLOREZ, Gabriel. BsC.

BUSTAMANTE, Ana. BsC.

VELEZ-PUERTA, Juan. BsC.

GUTIERREZ, Diana. BsC.

HUERTA-ROSAS, Abigaíl. PhD.

MORALES-GONZALES, David. PhD.

BARRERA-SANCHEZ, Oscar. PhD.

CASTILLO-PORRAS, Mary. MsC.

GUERRERO-SALINAS, Claudia. MsC.

FLORES-CASTELLANOS, Jesús. BsC.

RIVERA, Ulises. BsC.

GARCIA-ESPINOSA, Gerardo. BsC.

AGUILAR-NOGUEZ, Johanna. BsC.

LOZANO-MUÑOZ, Karla. BsC.

Philosophy, History and Human Sciences

Violence in Colombia: between historiography and genealogy. The construction 1-8

Nationalism and otherness in Trump’s America 9-18

The paradox of work. A world of losing and winning 19-39

Non-heterosexual Subjectivities and Subversions: the self-care and pleasure 40-51

Instructions for Authors

Violence in Colombia: between historiography and genealogy. The construction of

Received May 8, 2016; Accepted September 12, 2016

Violence, Historiography, Genealogy, Politics, Nadaism, Novel

* Correspondence to Author (mauricio.arcila@observa.org.mx)

© ECORFAN Journal –Republic of Colombia www.ecorfan.org/republicofcolombia

Liberals - Conservatives, The violents - Would allow us to work "on the

The bibliographical production of “The

ISSN-On line: 2539-1372 ARCILA-ARANGO, Mauricio. Violence in Colombia: between

On the opposite side, Rafael Azula Likewise, testimonial chronicles can

The writings that point to the historical

The bibliographical production of Echavarría, F. (1974). Historia de una

ISSN-On line: 2539-1372 ARCILA-ARANGO, Mauricio. Violence in Colombia: between

Sarmiento, C. M. O. (1994). Historiografía de

Sierra Ochoa, G. (1954). Las guerrillas de los

Ramírez, G. C. (1966). Estampas y testimonios

(1948). Nueve de abril, 1948. Bogotá: Cahur.

Testis fidelis. (1953). El basilisco en acción, o,

Treinta años de lucha del Partido Comunista de

ISSN-On line: 2539-1372 ARCILA-ARANGO, Mauricio. Violence in Colombia: between

Nationalism and otherness in Trump’s America

Received January 7, 2016; Accepted June 15, 2016

Otherness, Trump, language, Insult, Meme

† Researcher contributing first author.

© ECORFAN Journal –Republic of Colombia www.ecorfan.org/republicofcolombia

Introduction A chimera. An oasis. A reality for those

If we are beings constituted by language Thus, memes began to appear where

The effacement of otherness. Fright before a situation that was

In the face of nationalist outbreaks who What is being attended is a to

Álvarez Solíz Octavio, (2015) La república de

Butler Judith, (2004) Lenguaje, poder e

Dar cuenta de sí mismo. Trad. Horacio Pons.

Deleuze Gilles, (1970) Proust y los signos.

Jay Martin, (2007) Ojos Abatidos. Trad.

The paradox of work. A world of losing and winning

Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historia

Bogota, Republic of Colombia , 20_

Bogota, Republic of Colombia , 20_