“There is no messenger of anything”: Andean modernity according to the Zorros of Arguedas

Abstract

This article attempts to understand Arguedas’ writing from his own perspective on the world. His outlook is not cut off from Andean philosophies that Western social sciences and rationality are unable to fully consider. Through the analysis of The Fox From Up Above and the Fox From Down Below (El zorro de arriba y el zorro de abajo) and other texts by Arguedas, as well as the most important literary criticism of his work, this article questions the concept of modernity as it has been understood since the advent of neoliberalism and leftist populist movements.