Foto central e parte superior: Abdias Nascimento fala na sessão plenária, ao lado de duas filhas de santo que participavam do padê de Exu, cerimônia de abertura do 3º Congresso de Cultura Negra das Américas, PUC-SP, São Paulo, agosto de 1982. Abaixo, da esquerda para a direita: Abdias Nascimento; Mãe Hilda do Ilé Axé Ogum, Curuzu (terra do Ilé Aiyê), Salvador, BA; Marcos Terena, líder indígena e conselheiro do Memorial Zumbi; Dom Hélder Câmara, Arcebispo do Recife, com Abdias em 1980; Deoscóredes Maximiliano dos Santos, o Mestre Didi, Alapini do Culto dos Egungun, Ilê Asipa, Salvador, BA. Projeto gráfico de Emmanuel Bellard.

Introduction

TINTA: Research Journal of Hispanic and Lusophone Studies is pleased to present its Autumn 2010 issue.  This edition features a balance of critical studies in Hispanic and Lusophone literature and linguistics and continues to feature, as in our Spring 2009 issue, a broad selection of creative works.

The edition opens with an interview with Rui Zink by Nicola Gavioli and Omar Miranda Flores highlighting the Portuguese writer´s reflections on the writing and teaching of literature and on the practice of literary criticism.  Under Conferences are united the proceeding of the 11^th Conference on Hispanic and Luso-Brazilian Literatures, Cultures and Linguistics at UCSB. Ariel C. Schindewolf offers our only linguistics paper for this issue by exploring repetition as a positive trait in conversations in Spanish and English.  The Brazilian concept of mestiçagem in African American literature is the focus of Marzia Milazzo´s article while Nina Pick lends a new reading of Chilean writer José Donoso´s El obseno pájaro de la noche.   Our critical section concludes with Elizabeth Rush´s analysis of the element of shock in Ramón del Valle-Inclán´s Tirano Banderas and Inês Cordeiro Dias´s study of identity in a novel by Bernardo Carvalho. 

As a creative focus for this Autumn issue we feature writing by translator Suzanne Jill Levine, who provides us with an English language version of Gabriel Magañas´s La Nada en Bruto [Bare Nothing]. This is followed by short stories by Regina Blufstein and Jaime A. Orrego and poetry by Rita Antúnez and Ricardo Fonseca.

We hope that TINTA will continue to receive such varied and original submissions.  The journal welcomes submissions for future issues at any time. Papers should be related to the literature, language, or culture of the Hispanic and Lusophone worlds. We publish once a year, in Fall. Articles received in November or after will be considered for publication in the next issue. 

Last, but not least, we greatly appreciate the collaboration of guest editors Nicola Gavioli and Omar Miranda Flores, who were in charge of the Hispanic and Luso-Brazilian Literatures, Cultures and Linguistics conference papers.

The Editors

Gloria Galindo and Amber Workman