Inter/Viewing from Afar

Abstract

Since 2003, journalists in Venezuela have been censored by the government, either directly or indirectly, through legal and paralegal means. As such, they have learned to tread carefully between self-censorship and retaliation, greatly impacting the way journalism is practiced there. This evocative autoethnography explores the experience of a recent émigré of Venezuela to the United States interviewing journalists in his former home country. The emergence of elements that rearticulate the sense of belonging in the interviewer are used as touch points to a reality presumably left behind, but ultimately lying dormant, ready to resurface at a moment’s notice.