ABSTRACT
Colonial culture in most of its aspects was a projection of contemporaneous Spanish culture and only faintly reflected native American influences. Colonial literature, with some notable exceptions, was a pallid reflection of prevailing literary trends in Spain. Colonial art drew its principal inspiration from Spanish sources, but Indian influence was visible, particularly in sculpture and architecture. The colonial university was patterned on similar institutions in Spain and faithfully reproduced their medieval organitation, curricula, and methods of instruction. The conditions of colonial life did not favor the development of a rich literature. Colonial newspapers and reviews played a significant part in the development of a critical and reformist spirit and a nascent sense of nationality among the educated Creoles of Spanish America. The circulation and influence of forbidden books among educated colonials steadily increased in the closing decades of the eighteenth century and the first years of the nineteenth.
