From daughter to mother, back to daughter

Linea Nigra, by Jazmina Barrera

Abstract

In this article, I conduct an analysis of the book 'Linea Nigra' by Jazmina Barrera (2023), in which I seek to understand how affiliation and motherhood intersect through the construction of the narrator/essayist/author as a mother. The work delves into the narrator's pregnancy and the initial months of caring for her child. In this process, she finds herself compelled to revisit her position as a daughter and her relationship with her mother, in an intergenerational exchange that reconfigures affiliation, shifting it from the traditional narrative of the child speaking about their parents. Instead, it positions itself on a constant journey of back-and-forth and role reversals. This study is founded on a close reading of select passages, from which emerge questions about the relationship of affiliation with the body, with abstraction, with gaze, and with imagery. Among the references explored here, I highlight the connection to the works of Tamara Kamenszain (2021), Silvia Frederici (2019), Margo Glantz (1992), Natalia Brizuela (2014), as well as certain dialogues with Isabel Zapata (2021) and Alejandro Zambra (2021).