SOUNDING SALVADORAN: POPULAR MUSIC AND POSTWAR IMAGINARIES OF SALVADORAN IDENTITY IN THE WASHINGTON, D.C. METROPOLITAN AREA

Abstract

This dissertation explores the role of popular music genres in constructing and enacting an imaginary of national and diasporic community among the Salvadoran diasporic community in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area. Two music genres with rich transnational histories, rock de las buenas épocas and cumbia salvadoreña, are central to the analysis. The research investigates how cumbia salvadoreña may be considered representative of El Salvador by D.C.-based members of Departamento 15, an “imaginary” additional state of El Salvador formed by its citizens living in the diaspora. The genre aligns with the myth of the perseverant and patriotic immigrant, one who stays connected to their home country through remittances. Before the reign of cumbia salvadoreña, rock de las buenas épocas served as an avenue for Salvadoran youth to imagine alternative realities to those of mainstream Salvadoran society—a parallel of the counterculture movement of the 1960s in North America and Europe. Despite aesthetic differences, both genres are performed at events for the Salvadoran community in the Washington D.C. area, as emblems of nostalgia. I also explore how, in the diaspora, these narratives are reaffirmed and contested. For instance, second-generation Salvadoran Cindy Zavala (also known as La SalvadoReina), performs cumbia salvadoreña with a twist. She presents the stories that have surrounded her as the daughter of immigrants to showcase a "bitter" alternative to the joy and perseverance usually conveyed through the genre. Another example I present is 1.5-generation Lilo González, Jr., a musician who is part of the renowned D.C. punk scene, who has integrated cumbia into his socially committed music. This study is based on intermittent ethnographic research conducted from 2019 to 2022 in the D.C. area, before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. Key events I participated in included the Salvadoran Independence Day festivals in Maryland, which reaffirm the nostalgia that maintains the diaspora as a key player in the economy and national imaginary of El Salvador. The music performed at these festivals, especially cumbia salvadoreña and rock de las buenas épocas, strategically support this narrative, what has been referred to as the mythology of los hermanos lejanos (Rodríguez 2019, 170-174), the “heroic figure of the migrant entrepreneur” Pedersen (2012, 8), and the “model transnational citizens in the global division of labor” (Rivas 2014, 21). Throughout this dissertation, I refer to these mythologies as the narrative of the perseverant immigrant, stemming from the lyrics that describe an immigrant who is facing hardships and misses El Salvador, but nevertheless persists in their endeavor to succeed financially in a foreign country. Overall, this dissertation contributes to the understanding of the role of music in diasporic communities and the complexities of transnational cultural production.