La nación como pronombre: ciudad letrada y fragmentación en el Ecuador regional del siglo XIX

Abstract

This article proposes a definition of literary imaginaries based on two theoretical approaches. On the one hand, Mieke Bal’s proposal to conceive artistic creation and cultural analysis through thinking with images; and on the other, Cornelius Castoriadis’s definitions of social imaginaries and Marina Garcés’s notion of counter-imagination. Both approaches consider the imaginary as a space of collective thought, so cially and historically constructed and transmitted, yet open to transformation through art. The article suggests that lite rature is one of the most powerful artistic forms for creating imaginaries that question collective thought and intervene in reality. Through the survey of several contemporary literary imaginaries, the political potential of literature to reproduce, counter-imagine, and transform today’s society—affected by the crises associated with the Anthropocene—is demonstrated. Finally, Cristina Rivera Garza’s concept of necrowriting is pre sented as a literary strategy that makes imaginaries of death visible in an increasingly violent and desolate society.