The present volume analyses the actual processes by which liberal ideas and modern educational
and cultural projects traveled to and were institutionalized in the Latin American context
during the post-independence period. It comprises a number of essays that pay attention to the
process of importing specific ideas to particular contexts and to the peculiar dynamics of
that communication. Although diverse in theme and methodological approach all of the studies
that make up this volume focus on the typical features characterizing the selection
appropriation and utilization of imported political discourses and institutions models of
schooling and cultural practices. Each of the contributors follows the circulation and
appropriation of specific European ideas and models and discusses the social and cultural
characteristics of the process of communication that shaped that circulation.
