Los Afroargentinos

I came across an Argentina commercial from October highlighting Afroargentines, so I did a little digging (and by digging I mean YouTube searching...and by searching I mean clicking the related videos on the sidebar lol) and came across this clip from a documentary about Afroargentines. After about 20 more minutes "related videos" clicking, I had completed an entire "Brief History of Afroargentines." The video clip I like the most is below. It's in Spanish and the people speak with Argentine accents, which I don't think are too thick, but if you are learning Spanish you still may not understand completely. 

I also found this video which is in English and Spanish. It's about 8 minutes of slides with text in English and Spanish so I encourage you to watch it if you have some spare time. 

Now that is "re" interesante (a little Argentine slang for ya) para mi because I studied abroad in Argentina in 2009 and, like the video above says, Argentina is one of the "whitest" South American countries I've been to. As a chica negra I'm always interested in the Afro populations of any country, so while I was in Buenos Aires I asked folks about negros en Argentina. From what I learned from conversations with other Argentines, the Afro population in Argentina were immigrants; Brazilian, Dominican, Panamanian...but not originally from Argentina. Well apparently that is wrong. I'm a little embarrassed to find myself surprised that Afrodescendants once made up half of the population of Argentina. I am well versed in the slave trade and it would be foolish to believe that 1. Slaves were only brought to the Caribbean/North America even though those are the most recognized and 2. That slaves never escaped and migrated further south from where they were originally taken (or even after slavery ended decided to head south instead of north or staying put).

I'm so interested in this for one because if I could pick one city in the world to live for the rest of my life it'd be Buenos Aires. Love it! Haven't been to any city better than BsAs and I can't wait to go back. But two, it's just a cool thing to find out. lol I'm applying for a Fulbright ETA in Colombia (the Afrocolombian community there piqued my interest and contributed to me choosing this country as well) for the 2012-2013 school year and actually considered changing my application to a research grant in Argentina for about 90 seconds before I realized that a 20 minute YouTube session does not provide sufficient information for a 2-page research proposal. So, Argentina, my love, we will have to wait to meet again a little while longer. 

D