The objective of this project is to study the diverse manifestations and representations of the post-colonial and post-modern discourses in Latin America narrative, theatre, as well as in fields such as sociology, history, philosophy, politics, etc. This study will be carry out from an intercultural and interdisciplinary approach, based on certain topics, authors and on a given number of countries.

Against the outlined background, the project aims at representing, analyzing and interpreting the knowledge and thought in Latin America, also taking into consideration the dialogue with Europe and North America. The research will be based on the study of particular disciplines which belong to literary studies, historiography, philosophy and sociology and attempts at developing interdisciplinary relations.

The selection of the cultural contexts results from the different relations between the subjects to be discussed. Latin America, North America and Europe share the discussion about Post-Modernism as well as "Centre and Periphery". The particular points of discussion in narrative and theatre, however, have developed in an international, i.e. intertextual and intercultural, context (see annex).

A close analysis of the intercultural dialogue that goes beyond countries and continents shall help us to outline a broader correlation in the interpretation of the specific significance of the discourses on Post-modernism/Post-coloniality so as to gain a new perspective on the Latin American continent. This is to lay bare the similarities and differences between the cultures, the specific cultural position of the Latin American thought and the characteristics of the Latin American culture.

Moreover, the project also examines a more recent discussion which became known in the debate on Post-Modernism as the concept of "Post-colonialism". The research carried through under the concept "nouvelle histoire" or "Metahistory" are also closely related to this debate.

In this regard we shall investigate if Latin America or parts of it, constitute a continent that --at least in certain areas of its culture (meaning culture in general)-- has reached the state of Post-Coloniality, a concept which refers to a moment in history in which a homogenous dialogue between the so-called Third World and the economic and scientific world-powers has occurred. Amongst other things, the result of this investigation is to contribute to clarify the relation between "Centre and Periphery" and at the same time to question the correctness of such a classification as well as to settle the question of the "power" of the discursive system.

There is an unjustifiable imbalance in the cultural relations between the centre and the periphery which is also reflected in their economic and scientific, political and historical relations. This subject has been dealt with and researched under the catchword of "hegemonic thinking". The elimination of this imbalance and these static positions as well as the introduction of a multilateral and equal dialogue forms the declared objective of this project.

As far as the discussion on Post-Modernism is concerned, the inequality of the dialogue is even stronger. The reason for this, however, lies not only in the fact that the post-modern question has not been thoroughly dealt with in Latin America and that post-modern cultural manifestations in Latin America (explicit above all in theatre and narrative) are not always known in the countries that understand themselves as the cradle of Post-Modernism. Another reason is that the debate of Post-Modernism and Post-Colonialism don't originate in Latin America (except of course the complex case of Borges and the analysis of his work), and in addition, Latin America was, at the beginning of this debate, very resistant towards the post-modern/post-colonial discussion. However, various works and articles by Latin American authors have been analyzed which forms a solid basis for a fruitful, adequate and systematic debate on Post-Modernism and Post-Coloniality from the Latin-American perspective.

The interest in Post-Modernism/Post-Coloniality in Latin America is, on the one hand, purely academic, i.e. deals with the description of thought and knowledge in Post-Modernism/Post-Coloniality. On the other hand, it attempts at understanding the complexity of our time (i.e. the place in society in which such thought and knowledge are to be found). The objective is to gain general and particular knowledge about the Latin American culture.

By researching this subject matter through a multiplicity of approaches, and by framing the research within a specific theoretical grounding, we expect to make inroads concerning cultural, social and academic issues in Latin America. This in order to provide establish new points of contact between the various fields and disciplines studied in this project.

The project will focus its attention in the following four aspects pertaining to narrative and theatre:

1. Fictional Discourse ("Imaginaire"/'Invention") as Deconstruction of Historiography (Reality/Truth)

Against the background of "New Historicism" and "Metahistoricity" the relation between historiography and the "new" historical novel will be researched. This portion of the project is concerned with the analysis of post-modern theory, taking into account, on an equal footing, different kind of discourses which provide an explanation of their roles and justifications (Loytard, Derrida). A second relevant hypothesis is the idea that reality or history were linguistic and therefore "nomadic" constructs. (Deleuze/Guattari) or "hybrid" (García/Canclini/Brunner etc.). This involves, in particular, the investigation of the concept of truth and the possibility or impossibility to relate, to interpret and to fix history. In this context the concepts "Narrativity", "Tropology" and "Construction" (White) form a basis for the comparison between narration in historiography and fiction. It is thus possible to involve history in general, social history and history of mentality (Le Goff/Braudel).

The questions arising from this investigation, namely the relation between event, mind/perception and the writing down, between speech and writing, that is between the search for meaning and the constitution of meaning (Derrida), are also to be examined.

These analyses shall after all clarify how fiction, i.e. the category of the "imaginaire", rivals historiography. Thus the matter is to study whether the novel functions, for example, as the deconstruction of historiography and the traditional historical novel, or if the novel can be seen as a palimpsestic corrective of the still existing traditional historiography. This depends on whether it turns away from dealing purely with the history of great events, and the often mystified history of heroes, and from political and diplomatic events, based on a linear conception of history bracketed in specific periods without breaks and ambiguities. What we want is to turn to a history of ruptures, of different levels and durations, of the private-every-day-life, of the sensual-subjective, of ambivalence. It is therefore necessary to describe the areas that are excluded by the traditional historiography. They are taken up here to examine how much they contribute to the formation of a new conception of history. In addition, we shall attempt to answer the question if "Post-history" really places us at the "End of History" (Gehlen: Über die kulturelle Kristallisation, in: Studien zur Anthropologie und Soziologie. Neuwied/Berlin 1963; Ende der Geschichte, in: Einblicke. Frankfurt a.M. 1975; Niethammer: Posthistoire. Ist die Geschichte zu Ende? Reinbek 1989; Frances Fukuyama: Das Ende der Geschichte. Wo stehen wir? München: Kindler Verlag 1992; Le Goff et alii, Ed.: La nouvelle histoire. Paris 1988 [Dtsch.: Die Rückeroberung des historischen Denkens. Grundlagen der Neuen Geschichtswissenschaft. Frankfurt/M. 1990; Küttler et alii Geschichtsdiskurs. Frankfurt 1993/1994).

We offer the following examples of historical novel: Roa Bastos Yo, el supremo, García Márquez: El general en su laberinto, Javier Barreiro/ Alessandro M. Cassin: El presidente Scherber; Boi Voador: El Señor Presidente De Tavira/Leñero: La Noche de Hernán Cortés; Filho: Nova Velha Estória; Griffero: Historia de un galpón abandonado. Espectáculo escénico, 99 La Morgue, Cinema Utoppia etc.)

2. Hybridity as Cultural Principle

The issues of post-colonial thinking is intimately related to what we have stated above regarding the type of historiography which seeks to re-define culture and history from the "margins" and enter the debate and take a position with respect to the hegemonic discourses. By these we mean not only the countries of the Centre such as the United States of America, or Europe, but also the periphery and the centres within different countries and cultures in Latin America.

The main emphasis is placed on the relationship between Centre and Periphery and the problem of power which is linked to the acquisition of and the "dwelling" on discourses established by the centre in the attempt to make use of these discourses for own ideas. We shall research which of the elements of the international debate on Post-Modernism are adopted by the Margins and how they are re-coded in Latin America. In this regard the concepts 'Différance' (Derrida) and 'Rhizom' (Deleuze/Guattari) that coincide with the Latin American concepts 'Syncretism/Hybridity' will be helpful constructions. We shall further attempt to elaborate an alternative culture to the normative culture of a given society, and thus show the fragmental plurality, the highly and not removable plurivalence of the Subject, which is a phenomenon also to be found in the theatre. Examples provide amongst others the figures of Francia and Bolivar in the works of Roa Bastos and García Márquez or the short stories by Borges, Roa Bastos and Griffero.

Mutual forms of perception, the "re-writing" of one’s own cultural position and the formation of identity are also to be study.

3. Dissemination of Meaning as a Structural Principle

Starting out from post-modern categories like ‘Simulation’, ‘Rhizom’, ‘Fragmentation’, ‘Heterogeneity’, ‘Diversity’, ‘Plurimediality’, ‘Intertextuality’, ‘Deconstruction’ and ‘Différance’, aspects of the textual and theatrical production shall be analyzed that characterize the Latin American culture within the framework of the general tendencies of our times, and therefore make an important individual contribution to Post-modernism.

The deconstruction of common literary and theatrical-dramaturgical procedures, general narration and depiction will be described as well as the deconstruction of genres, the concept 'genre' and the 'dissemination of meaning' (both construction and deconstruction of meaning).

The short stories El jardín de senedores que se bifurcan or Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius or Undr by Borges can be consulted as examples. They play with the traditional genre of the detective story in which the 'search' or the 'solution of the case' is shifted to the semiotic level: The search is the search for meaning which is, however, never fixed.

Another example can be found in Vargas Llosa who deals with the genre 'Radio-Novela' or 'Novela-Rosa', i.e. the popular culture, in his work La tía Julia y el escribidor to depict the vitalistic or biologistic model of the 19th century French novel as mythologization.

La Mueca by Eduardo Pavlovsky, constitutes an example for the genre theatre and portrays the hypocrisy and the corruption of the well-off middle classes, the aesthetic-revolutionary fanaticism both from the left and right-wing, the subjects of love and sexuality, cruelty, sado-masochism and torture. To prevent the anchoring of meaning, Pavlovsky blurs the dividing lines between torturer and victim, so that the victims develop an emotional relationship to their torturers. Pablo is regarded by Pavlovsky as "non-written [...] final letter", with the final letter becoming the starting point: The letter is "the image that creates a different discourse when it is looked at" and that "creates space for different scenes that are only suggested in the text as possibilities". The author describes his concept of the dramatic text as a search that liberates itself from the traditional rigidity and leaves behind an impression of structural anarchy. Pavlovsky, therefore, considers the structure to be "a stitch on the way of the written text", i.e. it is regarded as a vague structure that becomes concrete in the dramatic text. It is a text with "blank spaces", a text that is to be overcome. In this case it is not a matter of the re-codification of the text but a "perlaboration", to say it with Pavlovsky’s words, it is a "new insertion of diverse elements of sense that were locked in the original text".

In this context, the different forms of Intertextuality and their functions are to be described with the objective to show the change of the binary way of thinking that presupposes a rigid system of knowledge, an origin and a complete structure in favour of a radically open, constantly changing structure.

This is to depict how the post-modern thought is rendered in literature and theatre, i.e. how these two genres shape the post-modern thought. Of a major importance is the description of time shifts in culture and their interferences, since authors like Borges think post-modernism before it is established as a paradigm.

4. Multimediality and Translation

Against the background of the three fixed and explained main aspects of study, we shall analyze the various forms of performing theatre, taking into consideration the multimediality and the function of the different codes used (video- and film clips, art in theatre, music, light effects, photography, different text types, computer-driven technology). In particular, we shall analyze the relation between the dramatic text and the performed text, taking into account the production, the phenomenon of virtuality in contemporary theatre, the rendering of the text or parts of the text in images of the production and the relation between body and language.

Another focus of investigation will be the analysis of translation under several different perspectives: The interpretation of language in the production, the interpretation of a text in different productions, the interpretation of elements belonging to a particular cultural context in a different culture which becomes especially relevant. For example, when an Argentinean play is performed in Germany or when classical plays, that do not have their origin in Latin America, are produced in this part of the world. This analysis does not only deal with the issues regarding cultural transformation, but above all with the unlimited potential to create meaning, such as Griffero’s production of L’avara or Il servitore de due patrone.