The intricate relationship of women and nation in nineteenth-century Latin America can be assessed through the study of the literary production of women writers. My dissertation studies the complex undertaking of the female author through the works of Soledad Acosta de Samper, a well-connected upper class woman with a long career as writer and historian as well as a pioneer of female journalism in Colombia whose works remain largely understudied. Through the incorporation of gender, colonial and post-colonial theories along with close readings of her literary and historical texts, my dissertation evaluates how Acosta de Samper took part in the Colombian national-building project through her work, simultaneously advocating the inclusion of women while maintaining strict hierarchical and conservative views. I argue that the author's trajectory from fictional to historical writing reflects these ideological tensions and the difficulty of her endeavor. Her prolific writing allows for the study of key topics of the time period such as French liberal thought versus the Hispanic tradition, the place of racial and class hierarchies, the enduring dynamic of colonialism in post-independence nations, often presented as a clash between civilization and barbarism, and women's education.

The works analyzed in this dissertation are organized in chronological order. The first two chapters focus on two fictional works, Dolores (1867) and Una holandesa en América (1876). The author's turn towards history is studied in chapters three and four with the historical novel Piratas en Cartagena (1886) and the collective biography La mujer en la sociedad moderna (1895). Together these works reveal her growing preoccupation with providing the historical narratives that would inform the nation as well as carving out a place for women's participation in society and lettered discourse.