Carnival Theater: Uruguay's Popular Performers and National Culture (Cultural Studies of the Americas, V. 15)

The murgas are troupes of performers, musicians, writers, and creators who, during Montevideo's Carnival, perform on the tablados, temporary stages built in the neighborhoods of Uruguay's capital city each year. Throughout the period of Uruguay's subjection to a brutal dictatorship and in the following era of "democratization," the murgas, envisioned originally as popular theater, were transformed into a symbol of social resistance, celebrated by many and perceived by others as menacing and subversive. Focusing on the cultural practices of the lower classes and more specifically on the processes and productions of the murgas, Gustavo Remedi's Carnival Theater is a deeply thoughtful consideration of Uruguayan society's identity crisis and subsequent redefinition in the wake of the authoritarian-bureaucratic-technocratic regimes of the 1960s. A revealing work of cultural criticism, the book proposes a new set of criteria for the interpretation and critique of national culture. Gustavo Remedi is assistant professor in the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, Trinity College. Amy Ferlazzo teaches at Meredith College in Raleigh, North Carolina. Annotation Offers a new model for interpreting popular national culture through Uruguay's carnival theater troupes. The murgas are troupes of performers, musicians, writers, and creators who, during Montevideo's Carnival, perform on the tablados, temporary stages built in the neighborhoods of Uruguay's capital city each year. Throughout the period of Uruguay's subjection to a brutal dictatorship and in the following era of "democratization, " the murgas, envisioned originally as popular theater, were transformed into a symbol of social resistance, celebrated by many and perceived by others as menacing and subversive. Focusing on the cultural practices of the lower classes and more specifically on the processes and productions of the murgas, Gustavo Remedi's Carnival Theater is a deeply thoughtful consideration of Uruguayan society's identity crisis and subsequent redefinition in the wake of the authoritarian-bureaucratic-technocratic regimes of the 1960s. A revealing work of cultural criticism, the book proposes a new,set of criteria for the interpretation and critique of national culture Contents......Page 8 Prologue: Metaphors for Approaching National Culture......Page 10 Acknowledgments......Page 18 1. The Interpretation of National Culture from the Site of Popular Cultural Practice......Page 20 2. To Open Up the Night: Carnival and the Struggle for a National, Democratic, and Popular Order......Page 75 3. Theology of Carnival: The Religious Masks of Carnivalesque Theater......Page 119 4. Bodies, Costumes, and Characters......Page 147 5. Carnival Celebrates the National Popular Epic......Page 171 Conclusion: From the Garden of the Comparsas......Page 196 Appendix: Librettos of Principal Murgas from the Montevideo Carnival, 1988......Page 200 Araca la Cana......Page 206 Falta y resto......Page 220 La reina de la Teja......Page 233 Los diablos verdes......Page 248 Los saltimbanquis......Page 260 Don Timoteo......Page 269 Anti-murga BCG......Page 279 Notes......Page 288 Gustavo Remedi ; Translated By Amy Ferlazzo. Originally Published As: Murgas : El Teatro De Los Tablados : Interpretación Y Crítica De La Cultura Nacional, C1996--verso T.p. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 269-289).