Orality and writing in the pre-Hispanic theater

Abstract

The aboriginal pre-Hispanic theater was put into writing in the XIX century by colonial representatives usually supported by a bilingual aboriginal, depository of the works, and in some occasions, member of the group entrusted by the community to keep it in the cultural memory. This process assumed, among other things, the adjustment and reduction of the original piece by putting into alphabetical writing an ephemeral art that for centuries had written a history in constant movement and transformation, while it was performed by the bodies of the actors in the pre-Hispanic, and then, colonial space. In addition, the process of adjustment experienced by the pre-Hispanic theater imposed the concealment, in the interstices of writing, of all those aspects deemed censurable by the dominating culture.