The lecture develops a ›metabolic‹ idea of cultural violence unfolding from Evangelization and Spanish domination in baroque Latin America. Exploring the multilayered processes of appropriation, absorption and destructive transformation that occurred between Europeans and indigenous people, I will discuss an approach that takes in account both transculturalisation‘s relation to power and it‘s openendedness. My starting point will be a material-semiotic history of the eucharistic host, obviously a central object of missionary endeavors and its anthropopophagic reinterpretations that since then keep on disrupting and twisting simplifying narratives of giving and taking, receiving and producing.

Karin Harrasser is Professor of Cultural Theory at the University of Arts Linz. After studying history and German language and literature, she received her doctorate in 2005 with a dissertation on the narratives of digital cultures at the University of Vienna. This was followed by a research assistant position at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne and various guest professorships in Germany and Colombia. Afterwards habilitation at the Humboldt University in Berlin (book: Prothesen. Figuren einer lädierten Moderne) (published 2016). In addition to her academic activities, she has been involved in various artistic and curatorial projects, e.g. at Kampnagel Hamburg, Tanzquartier Wien or with MAPA Teatro and the Colombian Truth Commission in Bogotá. Her research currently focuses on asymmetrical cultural transfers between Europe and South America and the relation between globalization and contemporary history. Recent books: Surazo. Monika und Hans Ertl: Eine deutsche Geschichte in Bolivien (2022), Gegenentkommen (2023).