The Denial of Citizenship and the Paradox of a Non-Diasporic negro Identity in Argentina

EZEQUIEL ADAMOVSKY

Colonia

Simposio; Second International Symposium of the Research Network for Latin America; 2011

Universiversität zu Köln (Alemania)

The historiography of the 20th-century lower classes in Argentina has neglected the impact of differences of colour among Argentineans. The aim of this presentation is to argue that hints of a non-diasporic “negro” identity can be traced in Argentina’s 20th century. Reactions to the discrimination on “racial” grounds in the job market and in the political arena can indeed be found. However, they rarely appeared explicitly in the public sphere, but rather indirectly, through the use of certain keys and symbols that alluded to the negro mark. The presence this non-confrontational strategy will be explored, by studying one of the rare cases in which it was explicitly formulated. In 1945 and 1946 Cipriano Reyes –a rank-and-file union organizer– played a key role in the birth of Peronism. His political imagination at that time included a re-definition of the national “melting pot” and a discussion of the frontiers of inclusion/exclusion of the Argentine nation.