On the other side of the border: the indigenous people of the Pampas and Patagonia in face at the conquest of their territories

DE JONG, INGRID

Szekelyfold

Fundaþia Székelyföld

Lugar: Transilvania; Año: 2022 vol. XXVI p. 139 - 156

1453-3871

During the second half of the 19th century, the Argentine State undertook political, legislative, and military strategies aimed at occupying the vast expanses of the Pampas and Patagonia. The state conquest put an end to a long period of three centuries during which the indigenous inhabitants of these regions had developed complex links with the colonial and republican governments, while preserving control over their territories. From its very realization, this process of territorial expansion was referred to as the "Conquest of the Desert". The name “desert” represented the indigenous territories as “empty of civilization”, attributing to their inhabitants the condition of “savage” and therefore justifying the state occupation of their lands. Traditional 20th-century argentine historiography continued to present this conquest as a necessary step to end "barbarism" and consolidate the nation through the incorporation of extensive territories into economic "progress."The recent academic production in Argentina allowed us to know in greater depth these aspects denied by these nineteenth-century representations. Among them are the political relations developed between the Argentine State and the indigenous chiefdoms in the decades prior to the state conquest and the strategies used by the Argentine government to achieve the advance of the borders. In this work we will try to expose synthetically these advances, to end with an appreciation of the pending agenda to be investigated.