CURRENT ISSUE
Volume 2, Number 1
Spring 2023
Editor's Introduction (Vol 2, No. 1): "Plan de San Miguel"
Robert Eli Sanchez Jr. & Carlos Alberto Sánchez
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Citation
Sanchez Jr., Robert; Sanchez, Carlos Alberto (2023):
Plan de San Miguel
DOI: 10.6084/m9.figshare.22285750
ISSN 2831-4190
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Articles – Artículos
FILOSOFÍA MEXICANA:
UN LUGAR DE OBSERVACIÓN
In this paper I recommend a new answer to an old question, namely, whether there is something that can be properly called ‘Mexican philosophy,’ understood as a philosophical tradition that revolves around a set of authors, works, and problems that provides a certain continuity over time. I argue that the key to this question is the meaning we assign to the term ‘tradition.’ When one claims that there is a need to rescue a tradition, whether it has been underrepresented or simply forgotten, the underlying assumption is that a tradition is something to be discovered. On the other hand, when one claims that no tradition exists objectively, but is forged through an active endeavor to make associations and engage in story-telling, then a tradition is something to be constructed or invented. Based on several examples, I demonstrate, not only that the latter conception is closer to the actual development of Mexican philosophy, but that for several reasons it’s also more fruitful.
Aurelia Valero Pie
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DECOLONIALIZATION DEGREE ZERO: ON EDMUNDO O’GORMAN, PHILOSOPHICAL ADJACENCY AND THE GENEALOGIES OF MEXICAN THOUGHT
This essay discusses the work of Edmundo O’Gorman in connection to the idea of “philosophical adjacency,” that is, the work of a historian who engages philosophers and philosophical questions in the effort of thinking the historical being of Mexico and Latin America. The essay speaks of a “decolonization degree zero” in O’Gorman, claiming that his work provided a philosophical opening to challenge the epistemology and ontology of coloniality in a way that would foreground and render possible a genealogy of work in this line. The essay engages these matters moving through the formation of the disciplines of history and philosophy in Mexico and navigating the influence of figures like Martin Heidegger and Arnold Toynbee in Mexican thought.
Ignacio M. Sánchez Prado
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WHEN WE DIE, WE BECOME MUERTOS: CHILDREN’S PHILOSOPHICAL PERSPECTIVES ON DEATH IN TIANGUISTENGO, HIDALGO
In this essay, I explore the philosophies of death and dying presented by preschool and kindergarten-aged children in a pre-college philosophy class in Tianguistengo, Hidalgo before, during and after the Xantolo celebrations in the region. I describe, and then analyze philosophically, how some Tianguistengan children described death as “convertirse en un muerto,” or “becoming, transforming and converting into a muerto.” While muertos transcend the boundaries of the realm of the living, they are nevertheless concrete, material beings that living humans perceive in various ways. I argue that Tianguistengan children’s philosophies of death also emphasize the silliness of death, as well as the significance of non-human animal deaths. Their philosophical views inspire, I contend, fresh ideas about death that people of all ages should consider carefully.
Amy Reed-Sandoval
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TWO MODELS OF DELIBERATIVE DEMOCRATIC MULTICULTURALISM:
BENHABIB AND VILLORO
In this paper, I contrast two different models of deliberative democratic multiculturalism: one defended by Seyla Benhabib in The Claims of Culture (2002) and one proposed by Luis Villoro in Estado Plural, Pluralidad de Culturas (1998) and Los Retos de la Sociedad por venir (2007). Specifically, I contend that, despite the presence of similarities, both models exhibit important differences since Benhabib views the relations that obtain between different agents in a democratic multicultural society through an adversarial lens while Villoro views these relations through an educative and collaborative lens. I show that this difference can be traced back to different understandings that Benhabib and Villoro have of the notions of culture, identity and deliberation. Finally, I argue that Villoro’s model is better than Benhabib’s because Benhabib’s model entails a progressive erosion of the trust required for the very institutions that mediate democratic deliberation in multicultural societies.
Sergio Gallegos Ordorica
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ROSARIO CASTELLANOS AT PHILOSOPHY’S DOORSTEP
Rosario Castellanos is known as a literary author (not a philosopher), even though she studied philosophy and worked closely with el grupo Hiperión (the Hyperion Group), an important school of philosophy in mid-twentieth-century Mexico. In this essay I claim that her work—as often happens with female philosophers—has unjustly been kept out of the philosophical canon, largely because of gender bias. I argue further that we ought to approach her literary contributions as valuable albeit untraditional sources of philosophical thought. To make my case, I offer a reading of Castellanos’s autobiographical novel Rito de Iniciación.
Fanny del Río
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Translation
A DECLARATION OF RELIGIOUS FREEDOM (1999)
Author: Arturo Gómez Martínez
The translator of this declaration places it within the context of a revitalized, growing indigenous resistance in Mexico in the 1990's, alongside the Zapatista uprising and the many declarations by subcomandante Marcos and comandante Rosa.
Translator: James Maffie
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