Europeans in Latin America and the Memory of the Great War

MARÍA INÉS TATO

Transatlantic Battles. European Immigrant Communities in South America and the World Wars

Brill Publishing

Lugar: Leiden; Año: 2022; p. 127 - 143

During the Great War, the warring powers mobilized their societies for total war. The call to the home front included citizens residing overseas, showing the global and transnational character of the conflict. European citizens in Latin America – a privileged destination for the great transatlantic migrations of the second half of the nineteenth century – largely responded to the call to arms.This chapter analyzes the initiatives undertaken by three immigrant communities residing in Latin America – British, French, and Italian – to record their mobilization around the First World War. After the Armistice, Europeans in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, and other countries gathered detailed information about their activities during the conflict. They published illustrated books of remembrance, offered to their governments as proof of their loyalty.This chapter establishes the peculiar nature of these publications as records of the war effort and analyzes the agents and processes of its elaboration, and their role as commemorative documents.