Abstract
Vista Alegre is a municipality in the province of Neuquen, Argentina. Situated in a region traditionally known for its fruticulture economy, Vista Alegre has recently been identified as a potential location for fracking, a development that has resulted in widespread opposition among its inhabitants. The fight against fracking in Vista Alegre has followed a number of channels, from road blockades to art festivals and a legal challenge to the municipality. This paper analyses the conflict focusing on the forms of community art and media employed by the local assembly against fracking to widen and sustain participation in the struggle, and the role that these media have in mediating collective identity processes in the fight against fracking. Building on the concept of mediated identities (Fornas and Xinaris, 2013), I look at these community art and media practices as dialogical (Kester, 2004). I propose that activities such as art festivals, mural painting and open radios contribute to collective identity processes through three mediating tactics: participation, knowledge sharing and the event modality. I conclude by arguing that these forms of community arts and media can be seen as a productive output of the conflict (Merlinsky, 2015), as they become crucial practices of cultural resistance.
Highlights
The Argentine Patagonia, the southernmost region of the country, was incorporated into the national territory in the late nineteenth century following the ‘conquest of the desert’, a military campaign that resulted in the killing and displacement of thousands of indigenous people
Protests against the socioenvironmental effects of fossil fuel extraction have for decades taken place in the region (GER-GEMSAL, 2013, p. 771), but it has been since the recent development of the Vaca Muerta (Dead Cow) megaproject, which brought with it the technology of fracking1 (Taller Ecologista and Observatorio Petrolero Sur in EJES, 2018), that fossil fuel extraction and its surrounding conflicts have reached a new peak in terms of intensified mobilisations, followed by state repression
In a similar trajectory to community arts we find the field of community media
Summary
The Argentine Patagonia, the southernmost region of the country, was incorporated into the national territory in the late nineteenth century following the ‘conquest of the desert’, a military campaign that resulted in the killing and displacement of thousands of indigenous people. In collective action art and media serve as the channels through which the narratives of a movement are communicated to those within and outside of it, and, they are often the tools and languages through which narratives are formed and identities negotiated (Serafini, 2018), or in other words, mediated Following this line of thought, I will move on to an exploration of community arts and media as practices through which those interactions can take place. Looking at the Argentine context and from the perspective of social psychology, Bang and Wajnerman (2010) argue that at a time where society is characterised by the weakening of relationships and the dismembering of spaces for community organisation, the generation of processes of collective art-making contributes to a community’s ability to become agents of transformation in their immediate realities. In other words, when considering these forms of art and media and their potential for generating dialogical spaces, we are considering the capacity of media as ‘vectors of affect’ (Cefai, 2018)
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