State Crimes, Spatiality, and Memories in Argentina: The Case of Hospital Posadas

Abstract

In this article, I examine the spatial transformation in Hospital Posadas and its surrounding neighborhoods during the cycle of political violence and military dictatorship in Argentina and the imprint left in the memories of workers and residents. Hospital Posadas, a hospital in the locality of Haedo in the province of Buenos Aires, was a focal point in a process of political radicalization leading up to the 1976 coup d'état. Afterwards, a clandestine detention center was housed within it, where individuals who had been kidnapped or arrested were imprisoned, while the rest of the hospital continued to operate normally as a health care facility. At the same time, its surrounding neighborhoods were subjected to intense political repression. I argue that space constitutes one of the fundamental frameworks of collective memory and that, moreover, its continuities and transformations give concrete form to the social memories of the actors who struggle to make sense of the past. This analysis will thus enable a historicization and an understanding of the area's process of political violence through the changes effected in the topography of the hospital and the neighborhoods and through the impact on the memories of workers and residents.

URN: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs1701203