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Memorializing Migration: Immigrant Patronage, Public Memory and the Syrian Centennial Monument to Argentina (1910)

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Public Memory in the Context of Transnational Migration and Displacement

Part of the book series: Palgrave Macmillan Memory Studies ((PMMS))

Abstract

Debates surrounding immigration came to an apex during Argentina’s Centennial in 1910, when the country honoured the 100-year anniversary of its declared independence. Amidst the monuments sponsored by immigrant groups for the event, the first memorial built by a Middle Eastern diaspora community emerged—the Monument of the Syrian Residents to the Argentine Nation, 1810–1910. The sculpture reflects the construction of revised collective memories and transnational identities. By unpacking migrant flows and ideologies that travelled from the Eastern Mediterranean to Argentina, the Syrian monument reveals itself as a strategic tool for its patrons in the urban fabric. Its tangible form, along with theoretical frameworks of memory and performativity, illustrates how this monument countered anti-immigrant discourses while crafting transregional allegiances and idealized memories of migration.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Translations from original Spanish are my own. This avenue today is known as Leandro Alem Avenue. Location and inaugural date are cited in the Archivo de Monumentos y Obras de Arte (hereafter cited as MOA) in Buenos Aires.

  2. 2.

    In the original Spanish, the group was known as Comisión Siria Pro-Centenario. See Los Sirios a La Argentina, Inv: no 36, circumscription 14a, MOA.

  3. 3.

    The press referred to Manouk as the president of the Comision popular siria (Syrian Popular Commission) and published a list of leading members. Nélida Boulgourdjian-Toufeksian has confirmed the surname Manouk is associated with Armenian heritage. Boulgourdjian-Toufeksian and Juan Carlos Toufeksian (2012, p. 61) recorded the entry of Manuel Manouk, as a businessman, travelling 3rd class with origins from the Levant via Marseilles in July of 1908.

  4. 4.

    Los Sirios a La Argentina, Inv: no 36, circumscription 14a, MOA.

  5. 5.

    Affani’s authorship is documented at the AGN, MOAs and Biblioteca Nacional.

  6. 6.

    ‘El monumento a la Argentina ofrecido por la colectividad Siria’, in La Nación, Jueves 16 de Enero 1913.

  7. 7.

    Inv: no 36, circumscription 14a, MOA. Art historian Laura Malosetti discussed the demand for Italian sculptors in Argentina at the turn of the century in her seminar, ‘Arte Latinoamericano del Siglo XIX’, at the Universidad Nacional San Martín-IDAES, Buenos Aires, Argentina, May–June 2014. On Italian sculptors in the global art market, see Sandra Berresford (2009).

  8. 8.

    Diario Sirio Libanés, ‘Una ofrenda de nuestra colectividad: En 1910 un nucleo de siriolibaneses donó una placa al gobierno de Cordoba en occasion del centenario de la independencia argentina’, 23 April 1929.

  9. 9.

    ‘El Monumento de los Sirios: El acto inaugural de ayer’, La Prensa, viernes 17 de enero, 1913.

  10. 10.

    Ibid.

  11. 11.

    Ibid.

  12. 12.

    Ibid.

  13. 13.

    Ibid.

  14. 14.

    36th Sesión Ordinaria de la Honorable Cámara de Senadores. September 12, 1910, (ed.) Congreso de la Nación Argentina, (1911), p. 555.

  15. 15.

    Ibid.

  16. 16.

    Ibid, p. 558. Also cited in Noufouri et al., Tinieblas del Crisol de Razas, p. 155.

  17. 17.

    The Spanish title is Monumentos de los próceres de Mayo.

  18. 18.

    See Memorandum sobre las estatuas inauguradas en 1910 and ‘Comisión Nacional del Centenario’, Sala 7, Legajos 18–1 to 18–6, AGN.

  19. 19.

    ‘Exps. relativos a monumentos del centenario con intervencion del Min. de Obras Publicas’, 1909–1911, Sala VII, 3646, Comision Nacional del Centenario; Iniciador Comision Siria Pro-Centenario, 1912, No Expediente 3827, Letra M, AGN. On ‘polished aesthetics,’ see Rosen and Zerner (1988).

  20. 20.

    Los Sirios a La Argentina, Inv: no 36, circumscription 14a, MOA. See ‘Ubicacion del Monumento donado por la Colectividad Sirio-Libanesa’, Expediente No. 119.529.D. 1931, Boletin Municipal no. 2579, June 18, 1931; Boletin Municipal no. 2546, May 16, 1931.

  21. 21.

    Ibid.

  22. 22.

    The statue remained in the former Parque Colon until 2013, when it was moved near the Aeroparque Jorge Newberry.

  23. 23.

    El Monumento de los Sirios—Colocación de la piedra fundamental—La ceremonia de ayer’, La Nación, 17 Junio 1911.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, Chattanooga, TN, USA

    Caroline ‘Olivia’ M. Wolf

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  1. Caroline ‘Olivia’ M. Wolf
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Correspondence to Caroline ‘Olivia’ M. Wolf .

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  1. School of Social Sciences, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

    Sabine Marschall

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Wolf, C.‘.M. (2020). Memorializing Migration: Immigrant Patronage, Public Memory and the Syrian Centennial Monument to Argentina (1910). In: Marschall, S. (eds) Public Memory in the Context of Transnational Migration and Displacement. Palgrave Macmillan Memory Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-41329-3_2

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