Author(s)

Christian Dennys Monteiro de Oliveira

Geography Department, Federal University of Ceará (UFC), Ceará, Brazil.

The present study represents an attempt to read the patrimonial landscape composed by the sacred-profane festivities of the New Orleans Carnival, known as Mardi Gras. It uses a methodology of comparative observation and qualitative analytical procedures to link the theatricality of the city to the performance of Afro-descended groups (the “Indians”), the aesthetics of their self-presentation and their engagement in cultural resistance. To do so, the study projects inequalities and cultural shocks with reference to the play A Streetcar Named Desire, by Tennessee Williams. The main purpose is to elaborate a concept of a theater space where it is possible to develop modes of interpretation of the Latin American culture, that is, a “translatinity” a political and social overflow of African and Amerindian values, especially from the second half of the 20th century, in the culturally polarized cities of the American continent.

Carnival, Theater Space, Latinity, Patrimonial Landscape

Oliveira, C. (2019) The New Orleans Carnival as a Theater Space: A Patrimonial Landscape in the Understanding of Translatinity. Open Journal of Social Sciences, 7, 27-41. doi: 10.4236/jss.2019.72003.