Framing Plaza De Mayo: Photographs of protest
Document Type
Journal Article
Publisher
Routledge
Faculty
Faculty of Education and Arts
School
School of Communications and Arts / Centre for Research in Entertainment, Arts, Technology, Education and Communications
RAS ID
5741
Abstract
Plaza de Mayo is the main square in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Its name commemorates the May Revolution of 1810, which instigated the process towards Argentina's independence from Spanish colonial rule. Notably, independence, defiance and calls for liberty have been and are key features of the square. As an urban public space it is central to the cultural memory of the city, ‘containing important symbolic elements of government, religion, and finance and a long history of demonstrations dating back to the Peronist era’ (Rosenthal 2000, 40). Like many squares in Latin America, the public plaza is central to the city landscape (Rosenthal 2000). This role is sustainable primarily because it is a centre for a variety of forms of community life. Its use ranges from a place of interaction between friends and strangers to a place to sit down and relax from the fast-paced activities of the city. But it is also a space for collective political protest. The sustainability of the square may be related to the way ‘urban Latin America possesses certain features that help protect public space’ such as ‘well-developed collective memories, which integrate public sites into local histories, thus investing them with a power that not only preserves them but causes them to be continually used’ (37). In the following accompanying photo-essay I have presented a small sample of my impressions of the use of Plaza de Mayo as a space for political visibility and collective action with a focus on human rights, such as civil and political rights. The photographs were taken over a period of just seven days, from 8 to 15 August 2008. The photographs serve as a record of four protest demonstrations involving the homeless, the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo (who have been protesting at the square for around 30 years for answers about their children who were abducted by the military regime), a university student group and the Barrios de Pie movement, which is a national activist group for workers and the unemployed.
DOI
10.1080/10304310802484605
Comments
Allmark, P. (2008). Framing Plaza de Mayo: photographs of protest. Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies, 22(6), 839-848. Available here