Modern Chile Research Articles

From Araucanian warriors to Mapuche terrorists: contesting discourses of gender, race, and nation in modern Chile (1810–2010)

This article explores the complex, shifting intersections between gender, racial, and national identities in modern Chile. Focusing on the figure of the Araucanian warrior who famously defeated the Spanish conquistadors in the sixteenth century, it draws readers' attention to four transformative periods between the first declaration of Chilean independence and the bicentennial celebrations of that independence, and examines the contesting notions of masculinity that emerged in such contexts. Firstly, it analyses the late nineteenth-century liberal State's “civilising” discourse, which was imbued with imperial racist concepts of masculinity; secondly, a protest mestizo masculinity that emerged through the writings of Nicolás Palacios in the early twentieth century; thirdly, a revolutionary masculinity that was exalted by various actors during the Popular Unity government (1970–3); and finally, multicultural, neo-liberal configurations of masculinity in post-dictatorship Chile. It shows how the masculine ideals of physique (strength, impressive build, virility) and behaviour (independence, intelligence, bravery, spirit of adventure) projected onto the noble warrior of old have existed in tension with disparaging attitudes towards contemporary Mapuche demanding respect for their rights. It also underscores the multiple, creative ways in which Mapuche intellectuals and political leaders have engaged with dominant discourses of gender, race and nation in republican Chile.

Joanna Crow. The Mapuche in Modern Chile: A Cultural History.

Joanna Crow. The Mapuche in Modern Chile: A Cultural History.

The Mapuche in modern Chile: a cultural history

In Joanna Crow’s cultural exposition of Chile’s largest indigenous population, The Mapuche in Modern Chile: A Cultural History, she makes a concerted effort to highlight the cultural components of the group’s identity and presence both in negotiation with and in resistance to the larger Chilean state throughout history. As a primary target of her research, the post-colonial approach illuminates the agency-driven Mapuche as being continuously reimagined in the nation’s history—not necessarily restructured but more to the point of being reconsidered. In order to elicit this type of reconsideration, Crow exposes the prominence of the “historic Mapuche” image as the dominant cultural marker of their existence. One particular manner in which she stresses this reality is in her highlighting of the performative nature of the touristy postcards of present-day Chile and their harkening back to late nineteenth century “indigenous identity” in the way that the contemporary audience desires to conceive of them permanently. The effect that these tourist-driven, souvenir items have in cementing a desired narrative is similar to the problematic historiographic procedures in many global scenarios of colonial and postcolonial relationships. It highlights the mythos-laden identity of an indigenous people as one that is permanently construed as a “people of the past” and therefore negates their

Crow, Joanna. The Mapuche in Modern Chile: A Cultural History

The relationship between Mapuche indigenous people and the Chilean state has been the focus of an increasing number of books within Chile and abroad, all of which probe how the Mapuche have responded to past and present government policies. These publications are written by Mapuche and non-Mapuche academics, trained in the disciplines of anthropology, history, literature and sociology and, unlike previous historiography, they focus on Mapuche actors’ political negotiations with the state. The Mapuche in Modern Chile: A Cultural History by Joanna Crow dialogues with these publications and adds a new dimension to them by focusing on identity debates and cultural politics.

Pinochet: The Father of Contemporary Chile

PinochetThe Father of Contemporary Chile Patricio Navia (bio) Chile: The Other September 11; An Anthology of Reflections on the 1973 Coup. Edited by Pilar AguileraRicardo Fredes. New York: Ocean Press, 2006. Pp. 100. $11.95 paper. Democracy after Pinochet: Politics, Parties and Elections in Chile. By Alan E. Angell. London: Institute for the Study of the Americas, University of London, 2007. Pp. 244. $24.95 paper. The Pinochet Regime. By Carlos R. Huneeus. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2007. Pp. 559. $69.95 cloth. Battling for Hearts and Minds: Memory Struggles in Pinochet’s Chile, 1973–1988. By Steve J. Stern. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2006. Pp. 576. $27.95 paper. Remembering Pinochet’s Chile: On the Eve of London 1998. By Steve J. Stern. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2006. Pp. 280. $19.95 paper. Sigan sabiendo ustedes, que mucho más temprano que tarde, se abrirán las grandes alamedas por donde pase el hombre libre, para construir una sociedad mejor. . . . Tengo la certeza de que, por lo menos, habrá una sanción moral que castigará la felonía, la cobardía y la traición. Salvador Allende, Santiago, September 11, 1973 El dolor de quienes han sufrido no me fue ajeno en el pasado y menos lo es hoy. . . . No podemos negar que quienes hasta ahora hemos sido protagonistas de este período de nuestra historia, no hemos sido capaces de materializar iniciativas suficientes, generosas y creativas que eviten traspasar el problema a generaciones que merecen disfrutar el Chile verdadero que, sin duda, ya ha sido construido. Augusto Pinochet, London, September 11, 1999 Augusto Pinochet (1915–2006) was the most transformative president in modern Chile. After the bloody military coup of 1973, he led the longest government—sixteen and one-half years—in that country’s history. His rule is best known for massive human rights violations against political opponents. Thousands were killed; the remains of hundreds were [End Page 250] never found; and many more were imprisoned, tortured, or exiled. Pinochet deservedly became a symbol of brutal military dictatorships in Latin America. Yet through a custom-made constitution promulgated in 1980 and still in force, and a neoliberal economic model adopted before any other country in Latin America, Pinochet also set the foundations of a new Chile. In 1988, caught in an institutional trap of his own making, Pinochet lost a plebiscite for a new eight-year term. Democratic elections were held in late 1989. When he left office in March 1990, almost 40 percent of Chileans lived in poverty. Inequality had worsened. Social exclusion informed many government policies. Indeed, the country was “a nation of enemies.”1 After peacefully surrendering power, Pinochet stayed on as chief of the army until March 1998, when he took a lifetime seat in the senate. Pinochet’s unexpected arrest in London in October 1998 on an extradition request issued by Spanish judge Baltazar Garzón, who was trying him on crimes against humanity, effectively brought an end to his political career. After twenty-five years at the center of national politics, this arrest transformed Pinochet from a subject to an object of politics. Pinochet was released on humanitarian grounds in March 2000 and sent back to Chile. A week after his arrival, economist Ricardo Lagos became the first socialist president since Salvador Allende. During Lagos’s administration, Pinochet was tried—but never sentenced—in Chile for human rights violations. The autonomous judicial power also investigated accusations of corruption after revelations of secret accounts held in U.S. banks by Pinochet, his relatives, and his associates. Ironically, these revelations came as a result of legislation passed in the United States after the September 11 attacks against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The political and legal repercussions of this later September 11 would inadvertently put the last nail in the already-diminished and deservedly tainted legacy of Pinochet in Chile. When he died on December 10, 2006, Pinochet was widely perceived as a polarizing and uncomfortable remainder of a difficult period in Chile. Conservative politicians had distanced themselves; dissuaded by revelations of human rights abuses, disregard for democratic principles, or corruption, most prominent public figures who had...

A diverse assemblage of fossil hardwood from the Upper Tertiary (Miocene?) of the Arauco Peninsula, Chile

Silicified woods of 10 dicotyledonous tree families of probably Miocene age from the Arauco Peninsula, central Chile are described and classified according to their anatomy. The diversity is surprisingly high, in that of the 19 samples analyzed, virtually every one could belong to a different species of tree or shrub. Almost all species document a damp climate, and most have related species living in the central zone of modern Chile. The samples were collected in a narrow zone on Punta El Fraile, west of the town of Arauco. The following families are based on woods from the Arauco Peninsula: Anacardiaceae, Boraginaceae, Euphorbiaceae, Fagaceae, Lauraceae, Leguminosae, Monimiaceae, the first report of fossil Myristicaceae, Myrtaceae, and Proteaceae. Their diagenetic history is connected to tuffaceous material and calcareous concretions.

Neogene Patagonian plateau lavas: Continental magmas associated with ridge collision at the Chile Triple Junction

Extensive Neogene Patagonian plateau lavas (46.5° to 49.5°S) southeast of the modern Chile Triple Junction can be related to opening of asthenospheric “slab windows” associated with collisions of Chile Rise segments with the Chile Trench at ≈ 12 Ma and 6 Ma. Support comes from 26 new total‐fusion, whole rock 40Ar/39Ar ages and geochemical data from back arc plateau lavas. In most localities, plateau lava sequences consist of voluminous, tholeiitic main‐plateau flows overlain by less voluminous, 2 to 5 million year younger, alkalic postplateau flows. Northeast of where the ridge collided at ≈12 Ma, most lavas are syncollisional or postcollisional in age, with eruptions of both sequences migrating northeastward at 50 to 70 km/Ma. Plateau lavas have ages from 12 to 7 Ma in the western back arc and from 5 to 2 Ma farther to the northeast. Trace element and isotopic data indicate main‐plateau lavas formed as larger percentage melts of a garnet‐bearing, oceanic island basalt (OIB) ‐like mantle than postplateau lavas. The highest percentage melts erupted in the western and central plateaus. In a migrating slab window model, main‐plateau lavas can be explained as melts that formed as upwelling, subslab asthenosphere which flowed around the trailing edge of the descending Nazca Plate and then interacted with subduction‐altered asthenospheric wedge and continental lithosphere. Alkaline, postplateau lavas can be explained as melts generated by weaker upwelling of subslab asthenosphere through the open slab window. Thermal problems of high‐pressure melt generation of anhydrous mantle can be explained by volatiles (H2O and CO2) introduced by the subduction process into slab window source region(s). An OIB‐like, rather than a mid‐ocean ridge basalt (MORB) ‐like source region, and the lack of magmatism northeast of where ridge collision occurred at ≈13 to 14 Ma can be explained by entrainment of “weak” plume(s) or regional variations in an ambient, OIB‐like asthenosphere.

Modern Chile, 1970-1989: a critical history

Few dispute that a major turning point in the history of present-day Chile commenced with the election in 1970 of a Marxist physician, Salvador Allende. What followed were three years that shook South America, if not the world. Land reform, factory expropriation, the politicization of a sector of the armed forces, curriculum reform in education, each in their turn led to a hardening of political fault lines, and created the basis for the overthrow of the Allende regime. This work, by one of the foremost analysts of modern Chile, features an interview with an earlier president of that beleaguered country, Eduardo Frei. In what is likely to be viewed as the most authoritative statement to date on U.S.Chile relationships during this stormy period, Falcoff debunks the myth of a CIA-inspired overthrow of the democratic forces, placing responsibility on Allende's failure to obtain or even seek a decisive electoral mandate, on a governing coalition internally inconsistent and frequently at war with its constituent elements, on an economic policy that polarized supporters and enemies, and ultimately on the need to turn to the military for the stability that its policy failures could not achieve. The final chapter, on the assumption to power and political changes rendered by the present ruler, General Augusto Pinochet Ugarte, indicates that the problems of Chile are not attributable to any single ruler or party. Falcoff indicates that core problems in Chile, from capital formation to the search for diversification, were exemplified in cultural, moral, and spiritual values between the Frei and Allende epochs. The prolonged Pinochet regime, for Falcoff, has postponed settlement of the major issues raised by the democratic era: equality and growth, legality and legitimacy. The costs of democratic order remain for Chileans to confront and resolve.