Policarpa by María Ospina Pizano: Instrumentalization of Bodies in Capitalism

• Autor: Leonardo-Loayza, Richard
• Formato: artículo
• Fecha de Publicación: 2025
• Institución: Universidad Peruana de Ciencias Aplicadas
• Repositorio: UPC-Institucional
• Lenguaje: inglés
• OAI Identifier: oai:repositorioacademico.upc.edu.pe:10757/684708
• Enlace del recurso: http://hdl.handle.net/10757/684708
• Nivel de acceso: acceso abierto
• Materia: capitalism; Latin American literature; María Ospina Pizano; resistance to oppression; short stories

The article analyzes the relationship between the body, capitalism and reification or objectification in Policarpa, a story that is part of the collection Azares del cuerpo [Variations on the body] (2017) by María Ospina Pizano. It argues that the narrative illustrates a series of mechanisms used by capitalism to instrumentalize individuals within the framework of capital, including reification or objectification, that is, stripping people of their personhood and turning them into objects or things. To this end, capitalism reduces individuals to bodies. In Policarpa, the story narrates the case of a reinserted female guerrilla who is exposed to this process not only by the system, but also by a publisher who wants to publish the testimony of her escape. The story also highlights the protagonist’s resistance against such mechanisms.