San Antonio de Areco: (contested) Tradition as a way of life

CECILIA PÉREZ WINTER

konesh sapce

K[]NESH space

Lugar: Londres; Año: 2020

0378-1046

In the book ?The invention of Tradition?, Hobsbawm and Ranger invite the scholar audience -by providing some guidelines and examples- to research on the processes of how traditions are created, institutionalized or vanish. Hence, in this article we are interesting in identifying and examining mechanisms and practices that allow traditions to perpetuate by resignifying and changing place-space. We propose the case of San Antonio de Areco district (province of Buenos Aires, Argentina) to discuss this issue.In Argentina the gaucho is considered a national archetype and the rural pampas are placed as its great scenario. These are some of the most relevant elements of national tradition. However, during the conformation process of the Argentinean Nation-State, rurality and the gaucho were perceived as, by certain sectors of the liberal elite such as D.F. Sarmiento, symbols of "barbarism" that had to be replaced through the technologization of the countryside and the presence of European immigrant workers.During the first half of the 20th century, in a territory characterized by a heterogeneous and tense society, the ruling elite of Argentina seek to ensure versions of tradition as a strategy of cohesion and subordination of the population. In this frame, the gaucho was recovered. One of the events that promoted its legitimization was the creation of the Tradition Day in November 10th -birth of the writer José Hernández. It was declared first in the province of Buenos Aires -and years later in the rest of the country- by the ends of the 1930s. San Antonio de Areco disputed -and consecrated as- the official headquarters of the provincial and national festivities.Annually, in November, the Tradition Day is celebrated in San Antonio de Areco, by evoking values and visual images provided in the book Don Segundo Sombra, of the writer Ricardo Güiraldes. This account proposes a stylized gaucho and valorizes the ?uses and customs? of the Pampas-Buenos Aires region. One of the main figures of the book, Segundo Sombra, is based on the physical characteristics of Segundo Ramírez, a farmhand of estancia La Porteña. This was a property of Güiraldes family located in San Antonio de Areco, where the writer met Ramírez and other residents, as well as the local landscape, which helped him to create the narrative of Don Segundo Sombra.In this article we propose to examine and question the tradition called ?surera? in San Antonio de Areco, which activate local and national elements, by the evocation of Don Segundo Sombra account. We suggest that although that version of tradition is institutionalized and legitimized; it?s also contested and resignified, particularly in this last decade. To fulfill these objectives, we will trace and retrace Don Segundo Sombra in the locality, by analyzing how the tradition ?surera? was establish, which places, practices, actors and processes contribute in its legitimization; but also, how some of those places are contested by other actors who try to reprint other versions and narratives of local tradition and history.