Year of Peru Lecture Series (2011-2012‪)‬ Institute of Global Initiatives

For centuries, Peruvian literature–with few exceptions, which has generally been male-dominated–has resisted the open treatment of female sexuality and eroticism as natural. Not until the end of the 1970s did women begin to make their own voices heard in this realm. Now, a group of female poets is exploring the role of women as not only the object of desire, but also the subject of desire who seeks to fulfill her own satisfaction. Consequently, they have developed literary innovations that reveal an erotic thematic as they confront their political, economic, and domestic positions in Peruvian society–whether dealing with their own bodies in particular, or those of other women in general.

This presentation will explore their attitudes toward female sexuality in its diverse manifestations, and it will investigate the relationship between sexual conduct vis-a-vis the power structure as well as the socio-cultural norms that impede the total development of Peruvian women. Moreover, it will offer an overview of similarities and differences among these writers’ works and why they are considered the most representatively innovative of this genre.

The extreme poverty in the Andean zone of Central and Southern Peru represents Peru’s most important issue and challenge in becoming a fully developed nation. At more than 10 million people, the Andean population of Peru is significant (37% of the country’s total population) but a large percentage (40%) lack drinkable water and electricity; and even fewer have refrigerators.

Historically, women have played an important role in the evolution of Peruvian society and therefore this presentation emphasizes the crucial role that the women of the Andean region have in improving conditions there. These women have traditionally shown great strength in the most adverse scenarios; children depend on them in almost all aspects of life, especially feeding, clothing, values, work among many other things. The average number of children is around three and only 45% of women use some form of contraception. The overall health of women and children depend on access to basic services, including the number of available hospitals, number of physicians, and public education.

A frank discussion of these issues will attempt to share with the audience a better understanding of the realities of health care in the Andean regions of Peru.

Every few years, the climatic , known as El Niño changes weather throughout the world. Sometimes these changes are positive, such as a reduction in hurricanes. Often, however, El Niño is devastating--nowhere more than its heartland on the coast of Peru. There, torrential rains can ravage the desert landscape, destroying buildings, roads, canals, and fields and bringing plagues of insects and diseases. At the same time, the normally productive fishery is decimated. On the longer term, the synergy between earthquakes, rains, and wind can make agriculture less sustainable. All of these effects of El Niño influence human lifeways today and must have done so in the past. This talk explores the prehistory of El Niño over the 13,000 years that people have lived in coastal Peru, discussing methods used to track ancient El Niños and thoughts on how this phenomenon may have affected cultural development in the region.

In the past, the story of Peruvian cinema has not been precisely characterized as one of the most interesting traditions in the Latin American cinema scene. Since the second half of the twentieth century, vigorous cinema industries from Mexico, Argentina, and Brazil dominated the range of Latin American cinema, through competitive systems of production that resulted in outstanding movies and filmmakers. Peru's own cinema industry lagged behind. However, towards the end of the century, some important figures arose; Armando Robles Godoy, for example, whose film Espejismo (Mirage) was nominated for Best Foreign Film at the Golden Globe Awards in 1973 and a new generation of filmmakers arose thanks, in part, to a new law that promoted the cinema industry -Francisco Lombardi would be the most international exponent. Despite the fact that cinema production in Peru is still precarious and not abundant; it can be said that a young generation of filmmakers has obtained international acknowledgment in the 21st century. For example, the terrorism sequels have been incorporated in movies like Las Malas Intenciones (Rosario García Montero’s The Evil Intentions) or La Teta Asustada (Claudia Llosa’s The Milk of Sorrow,), Berlinale 2009 winner and nominee to Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2010. Let's also mention films like Octubre (Daniel and Diego Vega’s October) and Paraíso (Héctor Gálvez Paradise). Finally, thanks to the new digital technologies, a group of young directors has appeared in Lima and other provinces, inside the cultural and underground circuit, parallel to the commercial one, reaching an artistically valuable production and acknowledgement, as the case of Juan Daniel Fernández (his experimental documentary Reminiscencias -Remembrances- was exhibited at the MOMA in 2011).

For the Year of Per, Luis Herrera and Roger Arakaki make delicious looking entrées in Kennesaw State University’s dinning hall, The Commons. The exotic foods they prepaire are tuna ceiche, lomo saltado, tuna and flounder shashimi, and anticuchos to celebrate the Year of Peru series at KSU.

Peru, as a core country of the Spanish Empire for almost 300 years, had a very difficult time over many decades in overcoming the authoritarian legacy imposed by colonial rule. In fact, Peru is among the Latin American countries with the fewest years of sustained formal democracy since independence. The country has had to face various challenges along the way. These include a devastating War of the Pacific (1879-83) that left Peru economically prostrate, reformist political party (APRA)--military hostility (1932-78) inhibiting civilian political control, institutionalized military rule legitimating the left (1968-80), and a brutal guerrilla war (1980-1992) that almost brought about government collapse. Recent political and economic progress, however, suggest that Peru may finally have found a path to sustained national development, even as local and regional issues continue to challenge elected authorities.