Conference Presentations by Valeria Villegas Lindvall
Cine-Excess 15. Bodies as Battlegrounds: Disruptive Sexualities in Cult Cinema, 2021
Latin American erotic horror set 1969 on fire: in times of dictatorships and extreme conservatism... more Latin American erotic horror set 1969 on fire: in times of dictatorships and extreme conservatism, filmmakers in Mexico, Brazil and Argentina found in erotism, horror and excess various sites of negotiation. In Mexico, El vampiro y el sexo (dir. René Cardona), exemplified the cutting of double versions with risqué contents and titles for audiences in the United States and Europe. The same year, Brazilian genre pioneer José Mojica Marins, Zé do Caixão, directed O despertar da besta / O ritual dos sádicos, a drug-addled, subversive foray into the "terrors" of hedonism that challenged containment in the middle of a dictatorship. Fomented in the entrails of the Argentinian dictatorship was Isabel Sarli and Armando Bo's Embrujada, one of the case studies of my doctoral dissertation.
Cine Excess XIV: Representations as weapons: Cult film and the politics of resistance, 2020
This paper discusses my collaboration for The Body Onscreen in the Digital Age-edited by Dr. Sus... more This paper discusses my collaboration for The Body Onscreen in the Digital Age-edited by Dr. Susan Flynn, forthcoming with McFarland-which addresses the politics of representation regarding the sex worker in Cam, directed by Daniel Goldhaber and scripted by Isa Mazzei (2018). The film follows the story of Alice, a camgirl whose online persona, Lola, becomes a self-sufficient cyber doppelgänger, an avatar of extreme forms of simulacra (Baudrillard 1987). I contend that, framed by Mazzei's experience as a former camgirl, the narrative resists the notion of the sex worker as a passive agent and allows her to instrumentalize voyeurism and weaponize the screen as she fights, in a gruesome standoff, to get her own likeness back. While it invites a wider discussion regarding the horrors of digital surveillance and the normalization of violence on the female body via digital images (Irigaray 1985, Rancière 2009, Backman Rogers 2019), the film also articulates the possibility of reclaiming the screen as a place of self-fashioning (McRobbie 2015; Horeck 2018). Hence, Cam poses a fruitful discussion regarding the act of seeing as an act of power, and teases how its dynamics can be challenged on the digital screen.
Cine Excess XIII: Independent Visions of Excess, 2019
This is the abstract for my presentation at Cine Excess 13 (4-6 November, 2019) at Birmingham Cit... more This is the abstract for my presentation at Cine Excess 13 (4-6 November, 2019) at Birmingham City University.
Folk Horror in the 21st century, 2019
This is the abstract for my presentation at Folk Horror in the 21st Century, conference held from... more This is the abstract for my presentation at Folk Horror in the 21st Century, conference held from 4-6 September 2019 at the University of Falmouth - which discussed the myth of La Llorona and its appropriation by The Conjuring's La Llorona, as well as the politics of representation in regards to suffering of the racialized body.
Queer Fears Symposium, 2019
This paper was presented at the Queer Fears Symposium (June 28, 2019. St Albans Film Festival) - ... more This paper was presented at the Queer Fears Symposium (June 28, 2019. St Albans Film Festival) - Organized by the University of Hertfordshire.
Drag. Filth. Horror. Glamour. The "gospel" that, in combination with the new-found faith in the artificiality of drag heralded by performers from Sharon Needles to the Tranimal collective, has been championed throughout the two seasons of the alternative The Boulet Brothers' web drag competition Dragula. This paper follows up on my assessment for CATHCon 2018 at DeMontfort University, where I explored the first season's political possibilities in its handling of abjection (Kristeva 1982) and filth (Douglas 1984) to facilitate transgression as a way to both upset and reflect on a certain order (Jenks 2003). Now I turn to specific instances in which waste, filth and abjection are centered for their visual representation as inseparable from drag performance. Inspired by the notion that camp can be read as a reparative gesture (Sedgwick 2003), this paper aims to explore the possibility of camp as a practice that, beyond parodic sensibilities, can highlight waste in its materiality (Schaffer 2015) and in so doing, can reframe abjection and trash (both literally and figuratively) as a means of producing knowledge (Sedgwick in Shaffer 2015) far away from the frivolity that the term evokes. I am interested in elaborating on the ways in which Dragula does not only turn its gaze back to the monster's capability of thriving in its inbetweenness, but also underscores filth in a decisive move to re-signify and rewrite its significance to uplift other ways of being and knowing by making the most out of the affordances of horror and sci-fi drag.
Queer Fears
This is the abstract to my presentation at Queer fears: A symposium on new queer horror film & TV... more This is the abstract to my presentation at Queer fears: A symposium on new queer horror film & TV (June 28th, 2019), organized by Dr. Darren Elliott-Smith (University of Herts) and part of the program for St. Alban's Film Festival.
Film Philosophy , 2018
Abstract from my presentation at Film Philosophy 2018, hosted at University of Gothenburg, Sweden.
“It is true, we shall be monsters”: New perspectives on horror, sci-fi and the monstrous on screen (DeMontfort University), 2018
Contemporary audiovisual culture, full of horror references and iconography has, as Hart points o... more Contemporary audiovisual culture, full of horror references and iconography has, as Hart points out (2014), tamed the monster to remove it from the transgression it entails in readings such as Cohen’s (1996), which subscribes to a vision of monstrosity as a possibility to expose and thrash arbitrary categorization and highlight the myriad ways in which averting the gaze from it implies to avert the gaze from ourselves. By championing the promises of drag, filth, horror and glamour, The Boulet Brothers’ web drag competition Dragula poses a thought-provoking vehicle that reframes abjection as an empowering tool to re-think monstrosity. Here, not only is transformation reframed, but it also enables these bodies to inhabit various spaces and categories simultaneously, unapologetically underlining the inbetweenness where the monster both thrives and suffers. This paper aims to explore the political possibilities of horror/sci-fi oriented alternative drag as presented in selected instances of Dragula’s first season. This, in relation to the ways in which its embrace of camp sensibility to reclaim the good old-fashioned revolting allure of the monster questions not only cis-hetero-normative views of gender presentation, but also the way in which drag pageantry finds itself steeped into the order it is supposed to upset. By supersizing the monster, Dragula advocates for super queer, super shocking, super horrific embodiment that challenges and toys within categories such as male/female, human/animal, clean/abject, and even proper/obscene behavior. Could this amalgamation of pop culture references unveil a political nature by privileging transgression and rejecting homogenizing normalcy, letting the monster roam free?
Don't Look: Representations of Horror in the 21st Century Symposium (Edinburgh University), 2018
In accounts by theorists like Kristeva (1982), Creed (1993) or Stamp Lindsey (1996), menstrual bl... more In accounts by theorists like Kristeva (1982), Creed (1993) or Stamp Lindsey (1996), menstrual blood has been largely connected to abjection, and thus, menarche underlines the nature of womanhood as inherently impure. Present in films such as The Exorcist (1973), Carrie (1976) and Ginger Snaps (2000), monstrosity takes over pubescent girls as they transition to womanhood. Yet, the element of empowerment that menstruation can provide raises a thought-provoking approach to blood in horror films made by women. Elizabeth E. Schuch’s The Book of Birdie (2017), with an all-female cast, an unapologetic queer romance and an adolescent main character fascinated with her bloody flow takes the central drive of crimson red to another level. I argue that, by flirting with sainthood and profanity alike, Schuch offers a provocative view of blood as simultaneously abject and purifying, with a profound element of transgression towards the taboo of menstruation in Christian belief, toying with the creation of a form of inherently female ritual behavior opposed to traditional displays of purification and defilement, such as those discussed in Douglas’ seminal historical account (2002). This can allow for a unique opportunity to dig deeper into the connection between menstruation, womanhood and horror as subverted and rewritten in comparison to classical horror film features, re-exploring the female body by reclaiming what has previously been constructed as outspokenly abject.
Papers by Valeria Villegas Lindvall
Monstrum Journal, 2022
This short essay approaches the ways in which Menarca’s
amplification of the creature’s inscrutab... more This short essay approaches the ways in which Menarca’s
amplification of the creature’s inscrutability highlights the transmogrification
of difference and facilitates its understanding as resistance. I suggest that in
Menarca, the horror elicited by the creature turns into a promise of reckoning,
intimating that coalition is possible in the bond that Nanã and Baubo
develop. I explore the film’s implications behind the veiled suggestion of a
vagina dentata turned something other, which finds productive kinship in
Patricia MacCormack’s theory of the becoming vulva (2010). Moreover, I
draw a link between MacCormack’s formulations and the vision that Rosi
Braidotti (2021) articulates towards a liberation that challenges views of
binarism imposed to hierarchize gender and animality/humanity.
Sheffield Gothic , 2019
This post is written by Valeria Villegas Lindvall (PhD candidate at the University of Gothenburg,... more This post is written by Valeria Villegas Lindvall (PhD candidate at the University of Gothenburg, Sweeden) and reflects on her paper ¡Ay, mis hijos! The undying colonial trauma of La Llorona, presented at Reimagining the Gothic with a vengeance, vol. 5: Returns, Revenge and Reckonings (10-12th May), where it was awarded a paper prize.
Grim Magazine, 2019
This is my article for Grim Magazine 5 (Living Dead Girls), which addresses the figure of the zom... more This is my article for Grim Magazine 5 (Living Dead Girls), which addresses the figure of the zombie in drag performance, concentrating in Dragula, Search for the world’s first drag supermonster, web reality series created by the Boulet Brothers.
Grim Magazine , 2019
This is my article in Grim Magazine 4 (Our bodies, our hells), which discusses the ambiguous poss... more This is my article in Grim Magazine 4 (Our bodies, our hells), which discusses the ambiguous possibilities of feminist appraisal of Alucarda (Juan López Moctezuma, Mexico, 1975)
Screen Queens, 2019
This essay approaches the possibilities of reframing monstrosity by conflating the shewolf and th... more This essay approaches the possibilities of reframing monstrosity by conflating the shewolf and the man-eater as vindication in Tamae Garateguy's Mujer Lobo (Shewolf. Argentina, 2013)
Screen Queens, 2018
This essay approaches the implications of abortion and the impossibility of body sovereignty in A... more This essay approaches the implications of abortion and the impossibility of body sovereignty in Adrián García Bogliano's Habitaciones para turistas (Rooms for tourists. Argentina, 2004)
MAI Journal (ISSN 2003-1673), 2019
Talks by Valeria Villegas Lindvall
This is my portion of the collaborative presentation carried out with ethnologist Kristina Öman (... more This is my portion of the collaborative presentation carried out with ethnologist Kristina Öman (Department of Cultural Sciences, University of Gothenburg) in the Book Fair (Bokmässan 2018), celebrated in Gothenburg (Sweden).
Carrie (regisserad av Brian de Palma år 1976) är det kanske bästa exemplet på hanteringen av menstruation på ett överdrivet sätt, då den framhäver kvinnokroppen som en entitet som inte kan kontrolleras eller hållas tillbaka, och därför också som ett hot. När Carrie White får sin första mens i omklädningsrummet blir hon inte bara rädd, hon skäms över det. I stället för att få gemenskap eller stöd från sina tjejkompisar upplever hon det som en förödmjukande händelse: tjejerna kastar tamponger och bindor på henne, en scen som upprepas genom andra versioner av filmen (som Kimberly Peirces version från 2013) samt som andra referenser till scenen (till exempel, i Lloyd Kauffman's Return to Nuke Em High Vol. 2, från 2017): det blev en ikonisk stund i filmhistorien. Viktigast av allt är att här uttrycker mens inte bara en stor och meningsfull förändring i hennes kropp, utan det representerar ett tillfälle som markerar frigörelsen av ondska. Kvinnokroppen associeras därför med en kapacitet att smitta eller skada alla i sin omgivning. Andra överdrivna exempel kan också hittas i filmer som Ginger Snaps (skriven av Karen Walton men regisserad av John Fawcett år 2000): när Ginger får sin första mens upptäcker hon att hon har blivit en varulv; även i The Exorcist (regisserad av William Friedkin år 1973), när Reagan onanerar med ett krucifix och förvirrar tittaren om huruvida övergången till tonåren är kopplad till hennes ny hittade sexuella lust. Nyare exempel finns i bland annat den nyutkomna versionen av It (Andy Muschietti, 2017) och Paco Plaza's Verónica (2017), som kopplar ihop ondska och kvinnokroppen som oskiljbara i patriarkala framställningar av kvinnlig makt som ett hot om kontamination eller undergång: då blir vaginan till ett blödande sår som gör oss obekväma. Men varför blir man så obekväm när menstruationsblod visas i skräckfilm? En filosofisk och feministisk tolkning av anledningen bakom den sortens representation kan hittas i Elizabeth Grosz's arbete, som diskuterar Julia Kristeva's formuleringar som handlar om "the abject" (i hennes välkända bok Powers of Horror): kanske det är för att menstruationsblod påminner oss om omöjligheten för kvinnokroppen att vara ren och riktig när den jämförs med manliga kroppar som en universell referens, ett tecken på ett representationssystem som är baserad på en patriarkal grund. Blod och dess anslutning till en hotande makt ger oss en möjlighet att ifrågasätta representationssystemet inom vilket den sortens föreställning är möjlig och normaliserad. *** FRÅNVARO *** Man kan föreslå att häxan är den figur som mest manifesteras av menstruationens frånvaro i skräckfilm. I samma idéskola (där mannen är den universella referensen, som Grosz skrev), representerar häxor i form av kärringar kvinnor som har inte mer att erbjuda: ingen sexuell attraktion och ingen möjlighet att få barn. Då är hon representerad som en figur att avsky när hon visar sexuell lust (till exempel, Baldungs häxor från 1500
Esta charla en el Instituto Mora de Difusión Histórica (Ciudad de México) abordó la importancia d... more Esta charla en el Instituto Mora de Difusión Histórica (Ciudad de México) abordó la importancia del cine de terror en el establecimiento, reproducción y re-imaginación de la figura de la Llorona y su conexión con Malintzin/Malinche. ¿Es la vituperada madre indígena un fantasma condenado a vagar eternamente? Esta exploración busca establecer la relevancia de la figura de la madre como un sitio figurativo de negociación entre la facción colonizada y el colonizador, a fin de entender los horrores de una nacionalidad fragmentada que busca reconciliarse con su pasado.
Books by Valeria Villegas Lindvall
Folk Horror. New Global Pathways / Dawn Keetley, Ruth Heholt (eds,), 2023
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Conference Presentations by Valeria Villegas Lindvall
Drag. Filth. Horror. Glamour. The "gospel" that, in combination with the new-found faith in the artificiality of drag heralded by performers from Sharon Needles to the Tranimal collective, has been championed throughout the two seasons of the alternative The Boulet Brothers' web drag competition Dragula. This paper follows up on my assessment for CATHCon 2018 at DeMontfort University, where I explored the first season's political possibilities in its handling of abjection (Kristeva 1982) and filth (Douglas 1984) to facilitate transgression as a way to both upset and reflect on a certain order (Jenks 2003). Now I turn to specific instances in which waste, filth and abjection are centered for their visual representation as inseparable from drag performance. Inspired by the notion that camp can be read as a reparative gesture (Sedgwick 2003), this paper aims to explore the possibility of camp as a practice that, beyond parodic sensibilities, can highlight waste in its materiality (Schaffer 2015) and in so doing, can reframe abjection and trash (both literally and figuratively) as a means of producing knowledge (Sedgwick in Shaffer 2015) far away from the frivolity that the term evokes. I am interested in elaborating on the ways in which Dragula does not only turn its gaze back to the monster's capability of thriving in its inbetweenness, but also underscores filth in a decisive move to re-signify and rewrite its significance to uplift other ways of being and knowing by making the most out of the affordances of horror and sci-fi drag.
Papers by Valeria Villegas Lindvall
amplification of the creature’s inscrutability highlights the transmogrification
of difference and facilitates its understanding as resistance. I suggest that in
Menarca, the horror elicited by the creature turns into a promise of reckoning,
intimating that coalition is possible in the bond that Nanã and Baubo
develop. I explore the film’s implications behind the veiled suggestion of a
vagina dentata turned something other, which finds productive kinship in
Patricia MacCormack’s theory of the becoming vulva (2010). Moreover, I
draw a link between MacCormack’s formulations and the vision that Rosi
Braidotti (2021) articulates towards a liberation that challenges views of
binarism imposed to hierarchize gender and animality/humanity.
Talks by Valeria Villegas Lindvall
Carrie (regisserad av Brian de Palma år 1976) är det kanske bästa exemplet på hanteringen av menstruation på ett överdrivet sätt, då den framhäver kvinnokroppen som en entitet som inte kan kontrolleras eller hållas tillbaka, och därför också som ett hot. När Carrie White får sin första mens i omklädningsrummet blir hon inte bara rädd, hon skäms över det. I stället för att få gemenskap eller stöd från sina tjejkompisar upplever hon det som en förödmjukande händelse: tjejerna kastar tamponger och bindor på henne, en scen som upprepas genom andra versioner av filmen (som Kimberly Peirces version från 2013) samt som andra referenser till scenen (till exempel, i Lloyd Kauffman's Return to Nuke Em High Vol. 2, från 2017): det blev en ikonisk stund i filmhistorien. Viktigast av allt är att här uttrycker mens inte bara en stor och meningsfull förändring i hennes kropp, utan det representerar ett tillfälle som markerar frigörelsen av ondska. Kvinnokroppen associeras därför med en kapacitet att smitta eller skada alla i sin omgivning. Andra överdrivna exempel kan också hittas i filmer som Ginger Snaps (skriven av Karen Walton men regisserad av John Fawcett år 2000): när Ginger får sin första mens upptäcker hon att hon har blivit en varulv; även i The Exorcist (regisserad av William Friedkin år 1973), när Reagan onanerar med ett krucifix och förvirrar tittaren om huruvida övergången till tonåren är kopplad till hennes ny hittade sexuella lust. Nyare exempel finns i bland annat den nyutkomna versionen av It (Andy Muschietti, 2017) och Paco Plaza's Verónica (2017), som kopplar ihop ondska och kvinnokroppen som oskiljbara i patriarkala framställningar av kvinnlig makt som ett hot om kontamination eller undergång: då blir vaginan till ett blödande sår som gör oss obekväma. Men varför blir man så obekväm när menstruationsblod visas i skräckfilm? En filosofisk och feministisk tolkning av anledningen bakom den sortens representation kan hittas i Elizabeth Grosz's arbete, som diskuterar Julia Kristeva's formuleringar som handlar om "the abject" (i hennes välkända bok Powers of Horror): kanske det är för att menstruationsblod påminner oss om omöjligheten för kvinnokroppen att vara ren och riktig när den jämförs med manliga kroppar som en universell referens, ett tecken på ett representationssystem som är baserad på en patriarkal grund. Blod och dess anslutning till en hotande makt ger oss en möjlighet att ifrågasätta representationssystemet inom vilket den sortens föreställning är möjlig och normaliserad. *** FRÅNVARO *** Man kan föreslå att häxan är den figur som mest manifesteras av menstruationens frånvaro i skräckfilm. I samma idéskola (där mannen är den universella referensen, som Grosz skrev), representerar häxor i form av kärringar kvinnor som har inte mer att erbjuda: ingen sexuell attraktion och ingen möjlighet att få barn. Då är hon representerad som en figur att avsky när hon visar sexuell lust (till exempel, Baldungs häxor från 1500
Books by Valeria Villegas Lindvall
Drag. Filth. Horror. Glamour. The "gospel" that, in combination with the new-found faith in the artificiality of drag heralded by performers from Sharon Needles to the Tranimal collective, has been championed throughout the two seasons of the alternative The Boulet Brothers' web drag competition Dragula. This paper follows up on my assessment for CATHCon 2018 at DeMontfort University, where I explored the first season's political possibilities in its handling of abjection (Kristeva 1982) and filth (Douglas 1984) to facilitate transgression as a way to both upset and reflect on a certain order (Jenks 2003). Now I turn to specific instances in which waste, filth and abjection are centered for their visual representation as inseparable from drag performance. Inspired by the notion that camp can be read as a reparative gesture (Sedgwick 2003), this paper aims to explore the possibility of camp as a practice that, beyond parodic sensibilities, can highlight waste in its materiality (Schaffer 2015) and in so doing, can reframe abjection and trash (both literally and figuratively) as a means of producing knowledge (Sedgwick in Shaffer 2015) far away from the frivolity that the term evokes. I am interested in elaborating on the ways in which Dragula does not only turn its gaze back to the monster's capability of thriving in its inbetweenness, but also underscores filth in a decisive move to re-signify and rewrite its significance to uplift other ways of being and knowing by making the most out of the affordances of horror and sci-fi drag.
amplification of the creature’s inscrutability highlights the transmogrification
of difference and facilitates its understanding as resistance. I suggest that in
Menarca, the horror elicited by the creature turns into a promise of reckoning,
intimating that coalition is possible in the bond that Nanã and Baubo
develop. I explore the film’s implications behind the veiled suggestion of a
vagina dentata turned something other, which finds productive kinship in
Patricia MacCormack’s theory of the becoming vulva (2010). Moreover, I
draw a link between MacCormack’s formulations and the vision that Rosi
Braidotti (2021) articulates towards a liberation that challenges views of
binarism imposed to hierarchize gender and animality/humanity.
Carrie (regisserad av Brian de Palma år 1976) är det kanske bästa exemplet på hanteringen av menstruation på ett överdrivet sätt, då den framhäver kvinnokroppen som en entitet som inte kan kontrolleras eller hållas tillbaka, och därför också som ett hot. När Carrie White får sin första mens i omklädningsrummet blir hon inte bara rädd, hon skäms över det. I stället för att få gemenskap eller stöd från sina tjejkompisar upplever hon det som en förödmjukande händelse: tjejerna kastar tamponger och bindor på henne, en scen som upprepas genom andra versioner av filmen (som Kimberly Peirces version från 2013) samt som andra referenser till scenen (till exempel, i Lloyd Kauffman's Return to Nuke Em High Vol. 2, från 2017): det blev en ikonisk stund i filmhistorien. Viktigast av allt är att här uttrycker mens inte bara en stor och meningsfull förändring i hennes kropp, utan det representerar ett tillfälle som markerar frigörelsen av ondska. Kvinnokroppen associeras därför med en kapacitet att smitta eller skada alla i sin omgivning. Andra överdrivna exempel kan också hittas i filmer som Ginger Snaps (skriven av Karen Walton men regisserad av John Fawcett år 2000): när Ginger får sin första mens upptäcker hon att hon har blivit en varulv; även i The Exorcist (regisserad av William Friedkin år 1973), när Reagan onanerar med ett krucifix och förvirrar tittaren om huruvida övergången till tonåren är kopplad till hennes ny hittade sexuella lust. Nyare exempel finns i bland annat den nyutkomna versionen av It (Andy Muschietti, 2017) och Paco Plaza's Verónica (2017), som kopplar ihop ondska och kvinnokroppen som oskiljbara i patriarkala framställningar av kvinnlig makt som ett hot om kontamination eller undergång: då blir vaginan till ett blödande sår som gör oss obekväma. Men varför blir man så obekväm när menstruationsblod visas i skräckfilm? En filosofisk och feministisk tolkning av anledningen bakom den sortens representation kan hittas i Elizabeth Grosz's arbete, som diskuterar Julia Kristeva's formuleringar som handlar om "the abject" (i hennes välkända bok Powers of Horror): kanske det är för att menstruationsblod påminner oss om omöjligheten för kvinnokroppen att vara ren och riktig när den jämförs med manliga kroppar som en universell referens, ett tecken på ett representationssystem som är baserad på en patriarkal grund. Blod och dess anslutning till en hotande makt ger oss en möjlighet att ifrågasätta representationssystemet inom vilket den sortens föreställning är möjlig och normaliserad. *** FRÅNVARO *** Man kan föreslå att häxan är den figur som mest manifesteras av menstruationens frånvaro i skräckfilm. I samma idéskola (där mannen är den universella referensen, som Grosz skrev), representerar häxor i form av kärringar kvinnor som har inte mer att erbjuda: ingen sexuell attraktion och ingen möjlighet att få barn. Då är hon representerad som en figur att avsky när hon visar sexuell lust (till exempel, Baldungs häxor från 1500
Written by Isa Mazzei, directed by Daniel Goldhaber and distributed via Netflix, Cam is a horror film that follows the story of Alice, a camera girl whose online persona, Lola, performs increasingly violent sessions for her patrons. The carefully crafted persona is young Alice's gateway towards profit and perceived success as she ascends on the ladder of top camgirls on the website that hosts her channel. However, the eerie turn comes when the mirror image of Lola takes a life of her own, inhabiting the screen on her own terms.
This thesis accrues to the growing field of Latin American horror scholarship in relation to gender and sexuality, discussing the implications of the representation of the feminized, racialized and/or impoverished monster in relation to Mexican and Argentinian national identity discourses. The thesis looks at two distinct iterations of gendered monstrosity in Mexican and Argentinian visual culture: La Llorona and the bruja (witch), respectively. Through six case studies, the thesis examines the ways in which these monsters shore up and negotiate the roles allotted to their bodies in the larger process of national identity writing. This study ascertains the usefulness of these monstrous entities in perpetual categorical inbetweenness, a position from which they enable critique on the colonial optic that has informed their depiction. These distributions of power, it is argued, are worked through foundational conflicts that embroil La Llorona and the bruja, namely: Mexico’s reckoning with a colonial past turned colonial present and Argentina’s foundational opposition between the redeeming potentialities of “civilization” over “barbarism.” In order to tackle the transmogrification and hierarchization of sexual difference as vital to the writing of national identity discourses, this thesis draws from feminist philosophy and decolonial thought. From the former, it recuperates Luce Irigaray’s writing on fluidity and her critique of the constraints of patriarchal languages in the articulation of gender and sexuality and the hierarchization of difference. I envision fluidity as a faculty that allows us to better understand the ways in which patriarchal organizations of knowledge, time and sexuality reveal cracks in their configuration. These organizations, I posit, can be readily ascertained as the foundation of national projects written from colonial, patriarchal predominance. However, this thesis also acknowledges the limitations of psychoanalytical frameworks to account for racial difference and its relation to gender. Therefore, I turn to decolonial thought, reflecting on race and gender as co-constitutive, colonial fictions that inform representations of La Llorona and the bruja. In addition, this thesis relies on contextual readings that account for the importance of the political, cultural and historical circumstances in which each case study is embedded. Chapter One offers and overview of the ways in which Mexico and Argentina have followed similar tracks in terms of horror filmmaking, arguing for the parallel evaluation of their industrial, cultural and historical contexts, to present a novel way of reading the fashioning of their national identities by looking at their genre films. Chapter Two focuses on the figure of La Llorona (The Weeping Woman) as a presence that evinces the painful colonial wound over which mestizo nationalism has encroached, voicing the trauma of oppression and exploitation of racialized and feminized bodies in service of colonial patriarchy. The chapter tracks the origins of the myth to La Llorona (dir. Ramón Peón, 1933), its subversion to La Maldición de La Llorona (dir. Rafael Baledón, 1961) and its updating as a figure of resistance in the era of feminicidio and gore capitalism in Vuelven (dir. Issa López, 2017). Lastly, Chapter Three explores the possibilities of the Argentinian bruja as the embodiment of all that stands outside of “civilization,” resisting the violence of its project in the advancement of colonial modernity by denouncing the regulation of the body and its knowledges. The chapter offers the hypersexual witch of Embrujada (dir. Armando Bó, 1969) as an affront to the policing of the body, its pleasures and knowledges and as a way to negotiate normative models of femininity and family in accordance to nationalist values. It then approaches the policing and governance of the body, birth and reproduction in two contemporary pieces: Habitaciones para turistas (dir. Adrián García Bogliano, 2004) and Luciferina (dir. Gonzalo Calzada, 2018). These case studies, I argue, find in the bruja a figure that either challenges or enacts the oppressions of extreme coloniality embodied in dictatorial necropolitical projects, always functioning as an enabler of critical thought.