Memory figurations and historical rereading in Buenos Aires dramaturgy written by women

Abstract

The post-dictatorship period in Argentina, between the years 1983-2016, gave rise to a more complex nature of theater, whose main characteristic was marked by the intersections between different social and artistic practices. The ‘90s, particularly, provided the framework for a process of radical transformations within the theater field in Buenos Aires, aimed at piercing the models of aesthetic authority prevailing until then. The so-called ‘emerging dramaturgies’ called into question thematic demands as well as form and writing techniques. New ways of relating to the past and raising questions about social memory gave way to the visibility of women playwrights who were subject to censorship and exile during the dictatorship of ‘76, as well as the emergence of new female voices. Such are the cases of Susana Torres Molina, Cristina Escofet, Patricia Zangaro and Adriana Tursi who have not only contributed to the enrichment of dramaturgical writing but have also broadened the scope of concerns around repetitions of the historical past in their productions. This article seeks to put together a path that allows us to historicize, on the one hand, the efforts in the collective action of pondering female authorship in theatrical writing and, on the other hand, to point out, on a corpus of texts, the cyclical nature of Argentine history, organized on the figure of the sacrificial victim.