What is the current situation regarding the suppression of freedom of expression in the world - especially in Central and South America?

In the winter semester 2024/25, two seminars in German and Romance literary studies explored this question:

"Current Censorship Phenomena" by Nikola Roßbach and "Censorship and Freedom of Expression in Central and South America" by Jan-Henrik Witthaus.

First, we discussed concepts and theories of censorship and took an in-depth look at the history and present of censorship in Central and South America.

Two case studies provided concrete insights into specific censorship policies: one on the Mexican investigative journalist Anabel Hernández García and the other on the historical censorship of the Brazilian military dictatorship: Henrique Bordini (Erlangen) reported on his archival research.

The seminar focused on student projects on censorship in various countries: Chile, Guyana, Hawaii, Cuba and Mexico. Interesting discoveries were also made about Argentina. The results can be found in the "Kassel List", the world's largest database of banned books.

Take a look at our country information - Chile, Cuba and Argentina are already online: www.kasselerliste.com.