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Afro-Argentine Foodways

Community

⚠ A DELIBERATELY RECORDED ERASURE. In the early 19th century people of African descent were a large share of the population of Buenos Aires — by some counts around a third — and of Córdoba, Santiago del Estero and Tucumán. That presence was then written out of the national story through a combination of war casualties, epidemic, intermarriage, census practice and deliberate myth-making about a "white" Argentina. Documented culinary traces: the candombe drumming tradition, mazamorra and maize dishes, street food selling in colonial Buenos Aires, and a contested but frequently argued African contribution to asado practice and to the word and preparation of some dishes. ⚠ THE EVIDENCE IS THIN PRECISELY BECAUSE OF THE ERASURE, and that is stated rather than hidden.

Atlas — where and when

Communities and languages

  • Afro-Argentines community documented

Languages: Spanish

What is recorded

  • People of African descent were a substantial share of the population of Buenos Aires and of several interior provinces in the early nineteenth century, by some counts around a third of the capital. That presence was subsequently obscured through war casualties, epidemic, intermarriage, census practice and deliberate construction of a white national narrative. The thinness of the culinary evidence is a consequence of that erasure and is stated rather than hidden. documented
  • People of African descent form a substantial share of the population of Buenos Aires and several interior provinces, before that presence is obscured in the national narrative. documented

Recipes

No recipes are filed under this cuisine yet.