Force of Witness

Rosa-Linda Fregoso is Professor Emerita of Latin America and Latino Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz, coeditor of Terrorizing Women: Feminicide in the AmÉricas, also published by Duke University Press, and author of meXicana Encounters: The Making of Social Identities on the Borderlands.

"Fregoso masterfully and poignantly combines theory, scholarship, and activism in this volume, thereby bearing witness and accompanying others in their struggles for justice. Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty; professionals." - I. Coronado (Choice) "The Force of Witness is a deeply personal testimony that makes a significant contribution in the exploration of bearing witness in regard to the very painful topic of gender-based violence, emphasizing its relational dimension and political value. . . . Fregoso’s approach and call to witnessing gendered violence, resonating with our interconnectedness as human beings, make this book a compelling testament that restores dignity to the countless feminized victims and disappeared while denouncing the brutal killing machine of the Mexican state." - Myriam Lamrani (Journal of Anthropological Research) "Fregoso . . . is investigative and analytical, urgent and reflective; it is also a deeply personal narrative. She compels us to read and-vicariously-witness unspeakable pain and fear, including her own terrifying experience of the sanitised term ‘intimate partner violence’. She reveals institutionalised misogyny, and police indifference to – if not complicity in – male violence against women."- Deborah Eade (Gender & Development) "Moving from the root causes to the remedies, the book is unique in the sense that it analyzes the strengths and shortfalls of various feminist movements in combatting and addressing feminicides. The book illustrates how the remedies for gender-based violence are informed by how the causes are defined. . . . By taking a decolonial feminism perspective, the book offers a full picture of how the legacy of a necropolitical order dictates, on the one hand, the poor national policies that address and seek to end impunity for feminicides and, on the other hand, the unfit international response."- Jelena Pia-Comella (Human Rights Review) "Centering the role of different forms of witnessing through film, art, performance, journalism, and conventional forms of protest, The Force of Witness offers a powerful lens on the ways that feminicide shatters lives and communities and inspires action." - Lynn Stephen (Latin American Research Review) "Fregoso invites us to develop a radical form of solidarity by witnessing and becoming present. The Force of Witness encompasses not only a clear explanation of the framework that helps her expand on the concept of feminicide, but also a critical overview of patriarchal and colonial systems that silence women, feminine, and feminized bodies while upholding the structures that profit from this violence." - Francisco G. Tijerina Martinez (NACLA) "This book would be of great benefit to scholars interested in having a deep understanding of feminicide, violence against women, and activist resistance movements in Mexico and beyond. In addition, Fregoso’s scholarship is an exceptional contribution to Latin American Studies, Gender and Women’s Studies, and Art and Performance Studies. Undergraduate and graduate students can use this text in courses centered on Human Rights, social justice, and anti-violence advocacy courses. Overall, The Force of Witness is a spirited offering to honor the dead and disappeared and all the fugitives who choose to leave and live." - Nathalia P. Hernández Ochoa (E3W Review of Books)

• Acknowledgments  ixPrelude  11. Chronicles of Witness  13Interlude 1: Re-Memory for the Dead  582. Mexico’s Longest War  633. The Artist and Witness  96Interlude 2: Redressing Injustice  1154. The Art of Witness  1195. Witnesses to Mexico’s “Living Dead”  138Interlude 3: Flor de Arena  1596. Stolen Lives and Fugitivity  163Postlude  183Notes  185Bibliography  211Index  229