Paper short abstract:

This paper puts forth a historiography of Argentine national history that proposes that Buenos Aires' International Centennial Exposition (1910) laid the foundational moment not only of the nationalist state and a capitalist economy but of the systematic use of genocide as a political tool.

Paper long abstract:

Using archival photographs this paper discusses the language and policies of historical revisionism and censorship in relation to the history of indigenous people and their struggles through a focus on various critical events in Argentine history (notably the Exposición Internacional del Centenario). The paper traces and conflates these important historical junctures to dissect the ideological and philosophical roots that rationally justified the use of state violence. By historicizing current problems that revive past yet poignant events the paper discusses the intersection of race, nationhood, and collective memory to give a critical re-questioning of the dominant imaginary of Argentina as homogeneously white (allegedly the result of European immigration and the extinction of most of the country's indigenous people). As such, it echoes the claim of human rights organisations that argue part of the call for a commitment to a truthful account of history is that the history of native people must be known and acknowledged by the state.