ABSTRACT

In regards to oral history and the creation of oral history archives, Latin America occupies a unique position because of the region’s many countries that were shaken by Cold War-era dictatorships at roughly the same time, from the 1960s to the late 1980s. As torture, exile, death squads, and forced disappearances became the norm under these dictatorships, strong human rights movements, many led by female family members of the victims, arose in response. 1 Many of the first oral histories emerged during the continuing repression, usually in the form of denuncia (denouncement) testimonies issued by those affected, several of whom were in exile. 2 In post-dictatorship settings and transitional democracies, a nunca más (never again) discourse commonly came to the fore, as did truth commissions and trials, typifying what has come to be known as memory politics. While particular national contexts differ, Latin American human rights groups have generally sought to protect patrimonial memory sites, such as ex-torture centers or political prisons, to install victim-related memorials, and establish oral and written archives, many of them related to memory sites. 3 Oral history methodology has produced an intense and critical scholarship focused on Latin American Recent History and Memory Studies. 4 Since the 1990s, oral history and oral archives in Latin America have been closely associated with truth, justice, and memory projects linked both to repudiating authoritarian pasts and to shoring up democratic presents and futures. In the 21st century, greater attention has begun to be paid to the gendered and sexualized nature of political violence.