Buenos Aires: Writing Memories at a Former Torture Center

Date
-
Event Sponsor
Center for Latin American Studies
Location
Bolivar House, 582 Alvarado Row, Stanford, CA
Buenos Aires: Writing Memories at a Former Torture Center

ESMA, a former center for torture and extermination, houses now a memorial museum in the building that was headquarters of the repression. It first opened to the general public in 2007 but was subsequently rethought and remodeled. Museological interventions changed the script of the site’s narrative and the visitors’ experience of it. This presentation explores ESMA’s role in the transmission and [re]construction of memories through the process of communication that occurs between the site and its visitors. I ask: What are the differences between the first space for memory and the modified museum? What goals motivated the modifications? How did people interact with the original site? How do the changes affect interactions between the visitors and the space? What potential impact does visiting the new iteration of the museum have on audiences? In reviewing authorial intentions and audiences’ responses to them, I trace the evolving debate over what the script should include/exclude, changes in official memorialization policies, and the perceived impact of the site on visitors. My analysis is based on participant observation during annual visits to the ex-ESMA, interviews (with site administrators, guides, visitors), and comments in the Visitor Books.

Susana Kaiser is Chair of the Media Studies Department at the University of San Francisco where she teaches Media Studies and Latin American Studies. Her research focuses on communication, cultural/political memory, and human rights in Argentina. She has published about young people’s memories of state terrorism; the communication strategies developed by relatives of the disappeared; the role of film and popular music in writing memories; the trials to torturers and assassins as forums to reconstruct the past. She is currently studying visitors’ interactions with memorial sites.

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