Class Year

2020

Document Type

Student Research Paper

Date of Creation

Spring 2019

Department 1

Spanish

Department 2

Latin American Studies

Abstract

Florence Jaugey’s La Yuma was the first feature-length Nicaraguan film in twenty years when it was released in 2009 (Adams 172). Not only does the film constitute an effort by the director to establish the Nicaraguan film genre, but it also narrates a realistic vision of Nicaraguan society (Murillo 235). In this way, La Yuma can be considered both the dawn of the Nicaraguan film genre and an indictment of the actual social asymmetries present within the country’s capital, Managua. The film exposes the audience to the challenges that the protagonist, Yuma, faces due to the complex intersections between various forms of social exclusion caused by gender and class discrimination. In the film, Yuma utilizes work and boxing as two forms of resistance to these social asymmetries. For Yuma, work is a way to abandon a life of crime that social inequality often perpetuates against the lower classes of society. Boxing constitutes both a temporary freedom from her conditions within society and a way to resist gender discrimination. At the end of the film, Yuma obtains freedom from these social asymmetries by uniting her two methods of resistance into a position as a boxer in the circus. Although the journey may be difficult, Yuma’s story reflects the human capacity to fight against inequality and adversity through willpower. Therefore, La Yuma symbolizes hope for the citizens of Managua that face the difficulties that are represented in the film.

Comments

Written for SPAN 360: After the War: Memory, Violence and the Body in Contemporary Central American Literature and Film

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

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