The Ethics of Representation and Nonviolence in Cristina Rivera Garza's El invencible verano de Liliana

This thesis explores the ethical challenges in representing gendered violence by examining the ethical representation of femicide in Cristina Rivera Garza’s El invencible verano de Liliana (2021). Drawing on Karen Barad's concept of intra-action, which emphasises the mutual constitution of entangled agencies, in contrast to 'interaction', which assumes the existence of separate individual agencies, I analyze how the materials, fragmented form and embodied language in the book challenge dominant victim narratives and conventional methods of representing gendered violence. The book's ethicality is underscored by the formal, material and linguistic intra-actions that resist a simplistic narrative of victims of femicide and offer a nuanced understanding of the forces that engage and contribute to the phenomena of femicide in the Mexican context. I explore how these textual intra-actions work to recognise Liliana’s life and humanity, aligning with Judith Butler’s concept ‘nonviolence’ from Frames of War (2010), which is an ethical and political position that is characterized by a recognition of social bonds in the face of violence and subsequent refusal to reify violence in response. My approach illuminates how the book challenges dominant representation, shifting away from reductive narratives of victims of femicide towards a more nuanced understanding, highlighting the urgent need for new ways of addressing femicide in relation to its ongoing crisis in Mexico.