Published more than a decade after Anzaldua's death, the collection of essays is a welcomed resource for scholars and students of Anzaldua, Chicana/o and Latina/o studies, and American studies. Overall, Anzaldua's chapters and Keating's editorial work are of the highest caliber and great additions to the body of Anzaldua's work. -- Monica Montelongo Flores * Southwestern American Literature *
[T]he publication of a new book of [Anzaldua's] writing provides a glorious new opportunity to revel in her brilliant mind.... In our contemporary world of intense binary thinking and wall building, Gloria Anzaldua's insights provide an inspiring way forward. -- Susan Noyes Platt * Raven Chronicles *
The publication of Gloria Anzaldua's Light in the Dark/ Luz en lo oscuro: Rewriting Identity, Spirituality, Reality eleven years after her death in 2004 is a highly anticipated-and enormously important-event in feminist scholarship, one that takes both philosophy and activism in new directions. The manuscript ... makes significant philosophical contributions to feminism, epistemology, aesthetics, ontology, critical philosophy of race, and social and political thought at the same time that it calls into question how we conceive of and organize these areas of study to begin with. -- Natalie Cisneros * Hypatia Reviews online *
Moving from the intricate Tex-Mex-rootedness of Borderlands to the more spiritual, historical-mythical, liminal negotiation zone of Light in the Darkness, Anzaldua continues her examination of in-between spaces. Her concept of nepantla enables multiple thematic and stylistic lines to intersect, defining possible spaces of cultural transformation.
-- Romana Radlwimmer * Women's Review of Books *
Throughout Light, Anzaldua courageously offers up her lived experiences to argue for the importance of spirituality, theories in the flesh, and the female body.... Scholars invested in intellectual praxis will find a powerful guide to social justice inquiry within this publication. -- Robert Gutierrez-Perez * Women's Studies in Communication *
Perhaps the book's greatest strength is Keating's vast editorial knowledge.... Under Keating's care, Light in the Dark continues Anzaldua's metaphysical philosophies, reiterating, expanding, and inspiring consciousness building and setting innovative directions for future Chicana/o studies.... The text offers a new way of decolonizing the mind, transforming the world, and reaching out into the universe. -- Iracema M. Quintero * Aztlan *
Light in the Dark is not only a previously missing piece of Anzaldua's oeuvre, important to the growing field of scholarship on Anzaldua, but also a text that speaks broadly across disciplines and will surely influence scholarship in women's studies, philosophy, politics, Chicana/o and Latina/o studies, border studies, native studies, sexuality studies and beyond. -- Michelle R. Martin-Baron * International Feminist Journal of Politics *
This text would serve as an excellent book in a literature course, and could be used as the capstone of Anzaldua's other writings. Keating has done an excellent job of editing this piece-she has made it easy to forget that the work was published after Anzaldua's death. -- Fawn-Amber Montoya * The Americas *
