Diana Taylor’s discussion in the
section on “Theatricality” adds some dimension to the consideration of
Gómez-Peña’s “Welcome to the Third World.” By supplanting the anonymous faces of
the “indigenous” from various “exotic” lands with the names of famous Western
Europeans who were known for exploitation of non-western culture, Gómez-Peña
quite effectively satirizes the colonialist incentive to use “indigenous bodies
[to] perform as a ‘truth factor; they ‘prove’ the material facticity of an
‘other’ and authenticate the discoverer/missionary/anthropologist’s adventure….”
Taylor also discusses the “unidirectional gaze” involving the “native body” as
an object to be viewed (“discovered”) by the “civilized observer.” I think
there is somewhat of a parallel between this idea and the last words by
Gómez-Peña in this piece: “I talk, therefore I am.” Taylor emphasizes the presentation
of the “native bodies” as “not speaking.” “Voiceless, it lets us speak for it….
‘We,’ those viewers who look through the eyes of the explorer, are (like the
explorer) positioned safely outside the frame, free to define, theorize, and
debate their (never ‘our’) societies.” (162)
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