Magical Realism, Latin American Theology, and the Appearance of a Pre-Critical Theory

Abstract

Magical Realism, Latin American Theology, and the Appearance of a Pre-Critical Theory: Mary versus Ideology explores why the greatest boom of Marian apparitions in history, related by poor rural women and children, occurred simultaneously with the rise of urban elites’ secularizing ideologies—and often in the same countries. This unique glimpse goes beyond the simple stories and symbols of the Marian apparitions, revealing a critique of the modern and postmodern social imaginaries that gave life to innumerable ideologies. Utilizing the Latin American hermeneutic lenses of liberation theology and magical realism, this book demonstrates how popular religion, with its mythical-narrative nucleus, is a space of resistance against the totalizing projects of modernity. Modern and postmodern proposals, like those of Marxist or poststructuralist, argue that one must use critical thinking to evade or at least expose ideologies. Alfredo Ignacio Poggi, on the contrary, maintains that a naïve, or more aptly pre-critical, perception of the world is the best starting point for challenging contemporary ideologies.