Oral literature, fictitious orality:: The relationship between oral literature and written literature in Latin American culture

Within the framework of the conceptions of orality and writing prevalent in Latin American cultural practice, the author attempts an approach to the relationship between the contradictory notion of 'oral literature' and the redundant notion of 'written literature', that is between orality as a real communication phenomenon, when it occurs as verbal creation, anf the fiction of orality found in literary writing. In this, case, what one really discovers is an effort to establish a dialog with what has been omitted by the literary establishment anf cultural standards. Along these lines, literary texts not only incorporate forms and structures proper of oral texts, but in some paradigmatic cases a true link with a deep cultural orality is found.