Diálogo

Abstract:

Roxana Aramburú and Patricia Suárez’s play Damiana, una niña aché reactivates our understandings of historical truth and meaning on the stage via the character of Damiana (based on the real-life Damiana/Kryygi) to demonstrate, question, and reveal complex historical issues involving the use of Indigenous peoples and their remains in building national identities, as both objects of study and theatricalized props supporting the creation of national narratives. As spectators, we are invited to see how the relationship between a viewer and the “object of study” contains an unavoidable gap in understanding and reveals our ubiquitous shortsightedness when it comes to others and representing Indigenous persons and communities as “tools” for teaching the past.