Carla Baute, Across the Atlantic: a research itinerary of Raymond Williams’ reception in Latin America.
Abstract: On the occasion of Raymond Williams’ centenary, this presentation aims to discuss a few aspects of an ongoing research regarding the diffusion of his ideas in Latin America. The dissertation will consist of examining selected works from notorious intellectuals located in Argentine, Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico that references the Welsh critic and the mapping and data analysis regarding his book’s translations to Brazilian Portuguese and Latin American Spanish, from the late 1970s until nowadays. I argued that, amidst the left-wing intelligentsia of the second half of the twentieth century, new ways of analyzing society were forged. Ways that, among other things, proclaimed that culture could no longer be left in the hands of purely aesthetic studies, nor could it be seen as a mere reflection of the superstructure. In this context, Raymond Williams became a key figure by proposing a theory that conceives culture as a social and material productive process: Cultural Materialism. In Latin America, with its specific intellectual configurations, distinct developments have led to the refinement of theoretical and methodological tools and the multiplication of approaches and objects of study. It is my understanding that, even though Williams' popularity in this region has not reached the same level as some of his colleagues from the New Left and Cultural Studies, it is a fact that a significant number of references to his work can be verified in the selected time frame. I propose, from Williams' "trail", to understand diverse transformations and complex movements in the Latin American intellectual field. From a sociologically oriented Intellectual History perspective, I intend to detail the circulation and reception of his texts while seeking to uncover the circumstances in which his ideas found both support and resonance within the Latin American context.
Maria Elisa Cevasco, What can we still learn from Raymond Williams today?
Ugo Rivetti, Politics of Place: Raymond Williams in the 21th Century.
Abstract: In this paper I intend to demonstrate in which ways Raymond Williams' conceptions of place and politics -- sketched in early works as Culture and Society (1958) and The Long Revolution (1961) but developed later, through the engagement with the Welsh nationalist movement and in the contact (from the late 1960s onwards) with new ways of political mobilization -- can still be seen in his 100th birthday as important references for Left politics, especially in the periphery of Capitalism (as Brazil and Latin America).
Ana Lúcia Teixeira, A lesson of Raymond Williams: the theoretical challenge posed to the left of the XXI century.
Abstract: This article focuses on one of the challenges faced by Raymond Williams in a renewed way in his work, that is, the intersection between a formal analysis of literary expressions and the political dimension not only of the work in question but also of the analysis undertaken by him. The sense of apprehending this crossroads is to remind the most recent analyses of politically engaged artistic productions that analytical work cannot presuppose that the pertinence of a socially relevant theme is automatically transmuted into a formulated theoretical problem. Otherwise, as Williams did, it is necessary to convert it into such a problem in order to reach, in fact, the political dimension implied in it.
Keywords: Raymond Williams; Cultural Studies; Literature and politics; Culture; Structure of feeling.