It is because of the particular challenges of understanding and translating Latin American theatre that the project will use this area as a focus for the study of methodologies for the translation of performance practice. The research will take us beyond the translation of the written text into questions of the 'translation' of performance pieces, of incomplete texts, of works based more on specific methodologies for acting and creation. A fertile ground for this work is that of la creación colectiva, practised all over Latin America, the most famous exponents being Augusto Boal (Brazil), Enrique Buenaventura and Santiago García (Colombia). Beyond asking the key question of how a theatre practitioner might approach an incomplete text for a 'complete' performance that interests them – a question that, beyond translation, suggests questions of engagement, compromise, often ideological affinities and tensions – the research will examine how to create translating methodologies for, for example, improvisation, script development, engagement with the audience, interaction with the community. In this sense, we will also explore different practices for script development and trace these as guides to translation.

Above all, the goal is to explore the ways in which to appreciate and transform the words of the page that might not resonate at first sight, to understand and breathe life into the artistic practices, the contexts and the theatrical languages that for the outsider lie dormant in them and to allow this learning to be at the heart of new readings.