Estados Unidos
This article examines black and indigenous voices in two of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz’s villancicos: the 1676 Assumption cycle and the 1677 set for the feast of St. Peter Nolasco. Methods of musical and literary interpretation with roots in Western legibility guide prior research on subaltern figures in these pieces. As a result, their unscripted auditory fabric remains difficult to draw out with the critical tools at hand. In response, I propose a framework of ‘un-listening’ that challenges the inscribed bounds of audibility and attunes our critical ear to Afro-Mexican and Nahua auralities in Sor Juana’s villancicos.