Los vilelas del Chaco: desestructuración cultural, invisibilización y estrategias identitarias

Abstract

Little is known about the Vilela culture and language. Moreover, most of the specialized literature of the Chaco area over the last 50 years has taken their imminent disappearance for granted. Our research reveals a more complex socio-cultural reality as a consequence of historical processes of cultural and political disarticulation, geographical dispersion, demographic decline and conflicting interethnic relations. Based on field research, we conclude that the current situation of the Vilela can be better explained in terms of their social invisibility. In this article we first analyze the historical processes that contribute to explaining the elusive present situation of the Vilela people in Argentina, focusing on those processes that favored the emergence of strategies of concealment of identity, as well as the abandonment of the language and apparent break with their cultural heritage. We then present a general overview of the present-day socio-cultural and socio-linguistic situation based on data collected in settlements in the provinces of Chaco, Santa Fe and Buenos Aires. Finally, we examine the perspective this case suggests in relation to the processes of ethnic and political reorganization and cultural and/or linguistic revitalization.