ABSTRACT
Transa, US-Mexico borderlands slang for “transaction,” is a mobile, border-crossing word. In transa, we hear the echo not only of transaction but also of transnational, transboundary, and many other concepts that have become increasingly popular in cultural studies of the Americas. In this chapter, transa describes alternate forms of borderlands representation that are “transa-national” and “transa-genre.” This chapter explores the varied potential of transa as an alternative border encounter—an approach that theorizes how transactions between the material realities of the US-Mexico borderlands and innovative aesthetics (form) produce experimental, transnational cultural texts. This interdisciplinary perspective considers a photo-textual collage “essay” about Tijuana, the under-theorized connections to the US-Mexico borderlands in Harryette Mullen’s epic poem, Muse & Drudge, and the transa-national rock music of Arizona-based band, Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers. The exciting opportunities for transa to enter into other discourses about the US–Mexico border is precisely its inelegant elegance: transa offers a lens of interpretation that embraces the postmodern and experimental but can never be delinked from lived experiences.
