The article analyzes a key question: what role did the new generation of intellectuals play during the period of fte Violence in Colombia? In order to achieve such a purpose, it takes into account the studies of Pierre Bourdieu and Jacques Dubois as theoretical framework, especially the concepts of field and institution. It concludes that the groups that made this generation had diRerent conceptions and cultural and political interests, but they remained together due to their desire to modernize the culture and the national institutions. fte poet Jorge Gaitán Durán was the mentor of this generation.