Outside the Nation, Outside the Diaspora

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Afro-(Latin)-American religions have spread beyond the.ir original boundaries of race, class, and, increasingty, nation, to attract an economically, ethnically and ...
Sociology of Reli~rn 2002, 63: 3 291 '315

The 2001 PauI Hanly Furfey Lecture

Outside the Nation, Outside the Diaspora: Accommodating Race and Religion in Argentina Alejandro Frigerio* Catholic Universityof Argeminal Natª Councilfor Scientiflc Research, Argentina

Afro-(Latin)-American religions are amongst the most rapidly developing in the Americas. However, relatively few articles about them appear in North American scholarly journals in the field of the sociology of religion, probably because these religions have been strongly racialized and considered the property of racial or ethnic minorities. As well, studies about them are seen as falling more within the domain of anthropology rather than of sociology. While this position may have been true in the first half of the twentieth century, it has certainly lost credibility in the past two or three decades, as these religions have spread beyond their original boundaries of race, class, and, increasingly, nation, to attract an economically, ethnicaUy and nationally diverse constituency. Direct correspondence to Alejandro Fr/ger/o, Las Heras 3875111A, (1425) Buenos Aires, Argentina, e.mail: alejandro..higc,[email protected]. Man:y thanks to Maria ]ulia Ca'rozs and Robert Pacheco… insightŸ comrtmm on earlier drafis. This researchwas s ~ by the Center … A[ro-American Smdie.s (UCLA), and by the C,o m ~ Nacional& Invesagu:ionesC ~ :~T› and the Ftmdaci6n Antorchas (Argenana).

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Afro-(Latin)-American religions have spread beyond the.ir original boundaries of race, class, and, increasingty, nation, to attract an economically, ethnically and nationally diverse constituen~. In the process, issues of race and nationality, which have always figured prominently in these religions' discourses - - as well as of those whn wrote about them - - llave now acquired even more relevance. The lecture analyzes the efforts of white, mosdy low middle class foUowers of AfroBra~lian reli~ns in Buenos Aires to accommodate issues of race and nation in order to overcome the increasing problematization of the.ir practices, h examines the strategies that practitiorters have employed to try to improve the image of their religi£ and how these have changed according to public reaction and the support they llave garnered. The analysis focuses, especially, on their atte~ts m stress the cultural aspects of their religious practice and on their efforts to insert their reli~gn within the country's history and culture by stressing the nation's Black heritage.

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As they enticed larger numbers of middle-class, white followers in countries other than those in which they originated, issues of race and nationality, which have always figured prominently in the discourses of both the religions and those who wrote about them (Burdick 1992; Dantas 1988; Lefever 1996; Palmi› 1998), have now acquired even more relevance. Religious practices that were bom as regional of national variants (such as Candombl› and Batuque in Bmzil, and, especially SanterŸ in Cuba) have become transnational (Oro 1999). Therefore the religious and academic discourses that developed to explain their origin and their links to other cultural practices, to certain ethnic groups, and to the regions and nations in which they developed, have become inadequate. New discourses have to be elaborated to accommodate these religions in diverse cultural and societal contexts, and to account for their presence in countries where they previously did not exist. Furthermore, as Palmi› (1995) shows in his analysis of "Africanizing" and "Cubanizing" discourses among Cuban and African-American practitioners of Santeria in the United States, in these new national settings discourses on race and nation, which originated in different societies, met and clashed. There ate certain similarities in the spread of Bahian Candombl› to Brazil's more ethnically diverse and developed south; of Batuque and Umbanda from Porto Alegre to Argentina and Uruguay, and of Cuban SanterŸ and Haitian Vodou to cities in the United States. In most of these new societal settings, these pmctices and beliefs are three times alien. Their attempts to modify the everyday reality of their devotees through the practices of animal sacrifices place them, in the public's view, closer to sorcery than to religion (Bartkowski 1998). Regardless of their means of arrival, in the case of Argentina and Uruguay through local religious entrepreneurs, or through groups of immigrants as in the United States, these religions ate identified with foreign nationalities (Brazilian in the former case, Cuban in the latter) (Green 1991). Finally, the religions' ultimate African origin identifies them as "Black" religions, and therefore suspect when practiced or advocated by white individuals. The attempts of their followers, especially of those who convert to them in new societal contexts, to transcend these categorizations and have their beliefs and practices considered a world religion, have met with failure. They have neither been granted that status by scholars nor by other churches or state institutions. Opposition has sometimes come from within the movement itself, from adherents who are wary of the changes that increasing transnationalization might bring to the religion. The conflicts produced by these displacements of racial and national boundaries have only recently been studied. Most of the studies that appeared in English-language publications are concerned with syncretism (Brandon 1997; Greenfield and Droogers 2001) and focus on disputes about the "correct" way to practice these religions (Cosentino 1993; Glazier 1996; Houk 1995; Palmi› 1995) or even how to study them (Perez y Mena 1998). While the racial and

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RELIGIONS U N B O U N D The study (and the practice) of Afro-American religions has always been closely tied to issues of race and nation. The very fact that most people in the United States read the words "Afro-American religion" in a different way than Latin American writers do, is a clear indication of this. In the former usage, the term would denote the religiousness of African-Americans, and would include different religious variants than would a Latin American reading of the same term. The latter would never include Black protestant churches, for exampl91 and would immediately bring to mind Santeria, Candombl› Vodou and the like. There is also no unanimous way to categorize Afro-American religions, and the chosen term will be intimately related to the author's national, racial and political position, as well as to what is theoretically fashionable or politically correct at the time of writing. Thus, scholars in different countries and times have used the terms "Black religions" (Simpson 1978), "African religions" (Bastide 1978), "Afro-American cults" (Pollak-Eltz 1977), of "Afro-Latin religion" (Perez y Mena 1998) to refer to basically the same phenomena. Besides the obligatory use of macro categories that make reference to racial (Black), cultural (LatŸ and geographical (Africa) origins (although these too ate intertwined) there are also categories that refer to regional or national origins, including Bahian Candombl› Brazilian Umbanda, Cuban SanterŸ and/or Haitian Vodou. Originally such categories unambiguously located these variants, but nowadays, the candombl› of BahŸ has moved to Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo (Capone 1996, 1999a; Prandi 1991, 1998; Silva 1995) and from there to Argentina. The Batuque of Porto Alegre has been taken to Montevideo (Hugarte 1998), and from there through Uruguayan followers rather than

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national underpinnings of these controversies have been noted, they have not been elaborated upon. In this lecture I will analyze the efforts of white, mostly lower middle class foUowers of Afro-Brazilian religions in Buenos Aires, to accommodate issues of race and nation in order to overcome the increasing problematization of their practices. After providing a brief introduction to the history and characteristics of Afro-Brazilian religions in Argentina, I will detail the public reaction to this new presence, especially as reflected through the media. Also, I will show how these religions have become increasingly problematized as they became involved in a controversy over sects that created a moral panic in the country. I will then examine the strategies that practitioners have employed to try to improve their religions' image and how these have changed according to public reaction and the support they have garnered. Finally, I will focus especially on the attempts of Afro-Umbandistas to stress the cultural4aspects of their religious practice and to insert them within the country's history and culture by stressing the nation's Black heritage, and the difficulties they have encountered in this endeavor.

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B r a z i l i a n - to Buenos Aires (Frigerio 1998a; Oro 1999). Likewise, Uruguayan devotees have taken the Brazilian par exce//ence (Concone 1987) Umbanda to Venezuela (Pollak-Eltz 1993) and Argentine pmctitioners are taking it to Spain and Italy. Cuban Santeria, on the other hand, has expanded to the U.S through Puerto Rican, African-American, and Cuban leaders (Brandon 1997; Gleason 1975; Palmi› 1995). Some of the entrepreneurs who pioneered the spread of Afro-American religions through these diverse countries ate Black, but many are white. All these developments do not mean that racial and national variables are not important anymore, on the contrary, they are very much so. Debates over purity and syncretism have been endemic both in the academic literature and in religious temples. These arguments about who possesses the "correct" knowledge and the "right" to practise these religions are increasingly complicated by variables of race and class - - now much more so than before - - and the element of national origin is now added. Further, in the new and diverse contexts into which these religions migrate, the criteria for assigning priorities to these variables, and the way they are constructed (race constituting the best example) are multiple and contested. The place that these religions found in the regions or nations in which they originated, where after a long struggle they were accepted as part of the legitimate cultural and (sometimes) spiritual heritage, has now to be regained. New narratives of local, racial and national belonging need elaboration, as accusations that were successfully refuted in the places where these religions originated are reiterated or new ones are concocted (Birman 1999; Frigerio 1991a). The strategies that leaders of Afro-American religions employ to cope with hostile societal responses can be fruitfully studied, although they seldom have, as accommodation efforts of new religious movements to host societies (Hampshire and Beckford 1983; Harper and Le Beau 1993; Snow 1979). They are, unequivocally, attempts to steer off the troubled waters of problematization and sail into the tranquil shore of accommodation (Harper and Le Beau 1993). Efforts of leaders of Afro-American religions to align their practices and beliefs with local models of religion and with national narratives constitute a strategic use of external, as well as intemal, cultural resources (McAdam 1994; Williams 1995; Zald 1997). The dominant narrative of the nation is one particularly valuable external cultural resource (Williams 1995) that some movements (social, ethnic, racial) may try to tap into. Nations are "imagined communities," cultural artifacts that must be constructed through narratives (Anderson 1983; Bhabha 1990a). Dominant narratives provide an essentialized national identity, focusing on the nation's extemal boundaries and internal composition, proposing the correct and orderly placement of its (ethnic, religious, gender) constituent elements, containing the presentas they construct a legitimating past. Neither univocal nor uncontested, dominant narratives ate confronted

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AFRO-BRAZILIAN RELIGIONS IN BUENOS AIRES Afro-Brazilian religions arrived in Argentina in the second hall of the 1960s, vŸ Argentine practitioners who were initiated in and around the city of Porto Alegre in the South of Brazil, and by Uruguayans who were initiated in Montevideo (where these religions had been present since the 1950s) (Frigerio 1998a; Hugarte 1998; Oro 1999). In BuenosAŸ these religions grew slowly during the 1970s, but rapidly in the 1980s with the return of democracy in 1982. Today about 500 temples function legally because they are registered in the National Register of Non-Catholic Cults, but practitioners claim that there are as many as 3000 temples in Buenos Aires, mostly in its suburbs. This number is most likely an overestimate, although the number of temples is certainly higher than legally acknowledged and probably more than double that number. People who go to these temples are middle and lower-middle class white porte¡ (as the inhabitants of Buenos Aires are known) who search for answers to health, job and family problems (Carozzi and Frigerio 1997; Frigerio and Carozzi 1996). Temples practice both Umbanda, a syncretic variant with strong Spiritist and Catholic influences, and Batuque. Batuclue,also known as Naci0n, is a more African variant, similar to the better known candombl› of BahŸ or to Cuban SanterŸ which developed in Rio Grande do Sul and which thrives in Porto Alegre (Corr~a 1992; Oro 1994). Most temples practice both variants (Umbanda and Batuque), because they constitute different stages in the same religious path which practitioners call "la religion" (the religion) (Frigerio 1989). Within this religious path, Umbanda is visualized as the first step towards Batuque, considered the core of the religious

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with counter-narratives or subjected to oppositional readings (Hall 1993) with different degrees of success or social acceptance in particular historical moments. Although literature has been an important site for constructing (and studying) narratives of the nation (Bhabha 1990a), there ate other social locations where such narratives are produced (Danforth 2001). Religion, for example, is certainly one such privileged arena. The racial and national discourses that religious groups produce may be seen as accommodative strategies (Snow 1979) used to align their practices within dominant national narratives or, alternatively, as attempts to present oppositional ones that strive to include their religion within the country's heritage. The production of a discourse about a religion's cultural wealth and its links to ethnic groups and national narratives is clearly a (cultural) resource that can mobilize members, justify their practices and gain legitimacy in the eye of bystander publics, supporters and govemment officials. Before analyzing the strategies used by practitioners of Afro-Brazilian religions in Argentina, I will first provide a brief overview of how their beliefs and practices arrived in the country and the form they take there.

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system. Individuals who want to join a temple are first initiated into Umbanda, where they are socialized into the religious worldview and practices, and only aftera year or two do they undergo the ritual initiations into Africanismo, as Batuque is also known in the city (Frigerio 1989; Carozzi and Frigerio 1992). Umbanda, with its use of Catholic imagery and concepts, thus functions as a "cognitive bridge" between folk Catholicism and the more alien body of pracrices and beliefs of Africanismo (Carozzi and Frigerio 1992; Frigerio 1999). Since they ate two stages in a same religious path, the worldview that sustains both variants in the country is practically the same (Frigerio 1989). Differences between them are found in the practices, especially the rituals. Sessions of Umbanda, in which drumming, dancing and songs in Portuguese call down the spiritual guides of Umbanda (Pretos velhos and caboclos) to enter the bodies of mediums in trance, who then give advice on the consultants' economic, health and love problems, take place every weekend. Feasts of Batuque only take place about six times ayear. During these feasts songs are sung in African and the mediums are possessed by a different kind of spiritual being, the orishas. Orishas do not arrive mainly to provide consultations, as Umbanda spiritual entities do, but to dance and share a sacred space and time with humans. On the night or nights before the feast animal sacrifices are performed. The blood and certain inner parts of their bodies are offered to the symbolic representations of the orishas, in order to replenish their ax› or spiritual force so that they can help mortals in their daily lives. Their meat will be shared and eaten at the feast during a break in the dancing. Apart from organizing Umbanda charity sessions and Batuque orŸ feasts, the pai or mae de santo offers individual consultations during the weekdays and performs "spiritual works" to improve the daily lives of clients and devotees. Consultas are divination sessions where, with the use of cowrie shells or sometimes even Spanish or Tarot cards, the temple leader provides advice on the problems affecting his/her clients. After these private consultations, some "spiritual works" are almost always performed to aid the client. In these, he/she is cleansed with ritual objects, and probably small offerings will be made to Umbanda spiritual guides or to Batuque orishas. These services are paid, and they are the main way in which temple activities ate financed. Another source of income are the ritual initiations, which also require animal sacrifices, that individuals undergo in their religious path. These rituals may lead to priesthood, although not necessarily. The need to perform animal sacrifices for several (akhough by no means all) of these activities (initiations, some spiritual works and offerings to the orishas in the Batuque variant) becomes the main stigmatizing feature before Argentine society, since it is considered that these practices are "magical" and not truly religious. Their "magic" gives the temples abad public image, however, at an individual level, it attmcts clients.

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T H E IMAGE OF A F R O . B R A Z l L I A N R E L I G I O N S IN A R G E N T I N A For approximately twenty years after arriving from Brazil in the mid 1960s Umbanda was not socially perceived asa religious movement in Buenos Aires. Conflicts between the new religion and society occurred mainly at an individual level, in instances in which religious leaders were accused of the "illegal practice of medicine," m an accusation which placed them in the same category as ordinary folk healers (curanderos). Umbanda asa magical sect (1986-1991)

"Satanic rituals" and "human sacrifices " ( 1992) At the beginning of the 1990s, Umbanda, which until then had not been one of the most stigmatized groups, became involved in the first of three moral panics (Goode and Ben Yehuda 1994) over sects that rocked Argentine society (Frigerio 1993a, 1998c). After a child was ritually murdered in the south of Brazil, and an argentine UFO cult group blamed for his death, a Catholic priest denounced the murder of a young girl in an Umbanda temple in Buenos Aires. Because of this accusation, for ten days Umbanda beliefs and practices were judged harshly in the media. In several television programs ex-members described initiation ceremonies that included blood and animal sacrifices and trance possessions, which lent credibility to accusations that Umbanda, as all

I This definition appeared in an important newsweekly (Somos, 3/5/1986), as part of a piece entitled "The growth of the sects." AImost the same definition was repeated in another article which appeared in the Sunda? magazine of the prestigious journal La Naci6n: "Umbanda, an esoteric cult of Afro-Brazilian origin which includes black and white magic, sacrifices and exotic rituals" ("Religious sects: a world phenomenon that irrupts into Argentina," 5/11/1986). As an examph of the ambivalent status that this new religion had, it was also included as ah example of the growth of magic and magical products in the article "The fashion of magic" (in C/av/n, 4/13/1986) the country's bestselling middle class newspaper.

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Umbanda was among the many social practices that for several years took place behind closed doors, but which started gaining visibility with the return of democracy to the country in 1982. In journals and magazines of the mid-1980s, this new religion was mentioned in the context of the development of sects or of new magical beliefs in the country (Frigerio 1991a, 1991b). In these pieces Umbanda was usually described as "a sect that practices black and white magic, as well as exotic rituals. ''1 In th~s way, the religion was doubly stigmatized: for being a sect and because it was considered magical Animal sacrifices had already become their main stigmatizing feature, especially because of the claims-making efforts of animal protection societies that were echoed in important journals (Frigerio 1991b).

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"sects" did, divided families and could lead to murders (Frigerio 1998b; Frigerio and Oro 1998). After the accusations, which were later proven false, animal sacrifice was considered a dangerous practice that could lead to human sacrifice. The degree of societal concem was expressed in an editorial column of the prestigious journal C/ar/n (one of the two most important newspapers in the country) entitled "Dangerous superstitions" that stated: Without even considering the matter of murders, animal sac'rifu:es already oŸ

our eoUectivr.

consciente. The appearance of groups or people who admit these practices indicates grave distur-

Umbanda a s a dangerous sect ( 1 9 9 3 - 2 0 0 1 )

With this scandal (Lull and Hinerman 1997), the threatening activities of "sects" became a topic worthy of national attention, and local anti-cult movement (Bromley and Shupe 1995; Introvigne 1993) experts achieved ownership of the problem (Best 1990; Frigerio 1998c). Umbanda's image became irrevocably tied to this controversy. From that moment on, most articles in the print media dealing with "sects" featured prominent photos of Umbanda ceremonies as part of their illustration. Television programs also frequently illustmted news on "sects" or on a specific group with footage of Umbanda trance possessions and drumming, although this religion had nothing to do with the group or the event being reported. Umbanda thus became the visual example of a "sect," a role that pentecostal groups had previously played in the 1980s (Frigerio 1998c). The degree to which the image of Umbanda was affected by the media controversy can be seen in the results of a public opinion poll undertaken at the request of a provincial Parliamentary Commission for the Study of Sects. In a guided question about which groups could be considered dangerous, Umbanda placed second, after The Family, the group that had been involved in the most recent moral panic over sects (Gutierrez et. al. 1995:2677). ACCOMMODATIVE STRATEGIES: FROM RELIGION TO CULTURE Umbandistas are well aware of the negative image their religion has in Argentine society. With the return of democmcy, they tried to improve their image by organizing public events that hadas one of their main purposes the

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bances that doubtlessly caU for psycholo~al or sociolo~cal analysis more than theological critique. Superstition, magic, divinatory practices and other similar behaviors ate rejected and condemned the great religions of f'aankind. They do not beiong t o the sume dimensŸ but to a m o r e primitive, obscure a'ad irrational one. ( . . . ) Sources of abnormal behav/orsand cr/mes,theyate a matter of contero and caUfor aclequate responses on the part of society which pretends to caU itselŸ civilized. (C/afŸ 8/3/92, my emphases).

OUTSIDETHE NATION, OUTSIDETHE DIASPORA 299 public divulgation of the true nature of their practices and beliefs. 2 As social controversy around them grew, and they became increasingly problematized in the media, the manner in which practitioners chose to publiely present themselves underwent changes. Two major and distinct accommodative strategies (Snow 1979) ate apparent ir we examine the names and activities of the almmt twenty public events that took place from 1985 to 1999.

a) "Umbanda is a religum"

2 These events also attempted m unite the various leaders and devotees and produce - - as well as show a sense of religious community. 3 The only magazine edited b/Umbandist~ at the time described a dinner at the flnt public event in the following terms: "The most relevant feature d the night vas the elegante oŸthe relilgiom leadem Han, night dresses, tuxedm. G ( ~ taste and tefinement. Umbarda ~ that its f o l ~ can present thetmelves befofe society in swlish meetings. The ridiculous prejudice that discriminated U m b a n d i ~ lar being coar~ and uncouth has been hft behind. •eligiously, culturally of socially, Umhanda p a s ~ the test!" ( U ~

Argenam6/2111985)

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During the second hall of the 1980s, when the media described Umbanda as "a magical sect," the leaders stressed as often as they could, that, to the contrary, theirs was "a religion." They highlighted this in almost all their statements in the media. In 1985 a group of leaders decided that it was time to reach a public beyond those who visited their temples or read popular magazines. To this purpose, they organized "congresses" in well-known downtown locations. Beginning with the "First Argentine Congress of Umbanda and its Roots," in their speeches they emphasized that Umbanda was nota sect of curanderismo, but a religion. To prove it, they highlighted the features that approximated them to the established model of a religion: the Catholic one. They stressed that their religion was monotheistic and that it possessed the formal features of established religions: a dogma, a distinct ritual, a priestly hiemrchy (Frigerio 1991b). To show that they were not rude curanderos, their events were organized in fancy downtown hotels. I¡ these sessions disidentifiers (Goffman 1986:44) were ubiquitously present. Ties, suits and long dresses replaced in these centric and fancy environments the white clothes they used in their temples in lower-middle of working class neighborhoods, trying to disprove the image that Umhandistas were socially inadequate. 3 Both in media statements and in their speeches during public events, the sacrifice of animals was downplayed or omitted. This was accomplished by identifying the religion primarily with Umhanda. Of the two variants present in the temples, it was the most respectable one, since it did not perform animal sacrifices and used heavy Catholic imagery. By steadfastly repeating the slogan "Umbanda does not kill animals," they tried to omit the fact that animal

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sacrifices played a central role in the Batuque ceremonies which most of them also performed. In order to show journalists that the rituals of Umbanda were not terrifying and that practitioners had nothing to hide, in the first two events public ceremonjes of Umbanda spirit possessions were performed. Before one of them started, the organizer of the "Festival and Gathering of Umbanda and African Rituals," declared: Our rituals ate not savage and lewd as is often thought . . . . Our rituals are merry. Happiness, rhythm, movement and optimism ate our paths to Good. Such are our sessions, that today, for the first time, will be done publicly in Buenos Aires. It will be an aesthetic and colourful exhibition of what we do to communicate with God.

b) "Africanismo is culture" Within this new accommodative strategy, Africanismo was not legitimized by emphasizing its specifically religious features, but by claiming that it had an ancient cultural, ethnic and religious origin, traceable to Africa, specifically to the Yoruba group in Nigeria. After failing to legitimate their practices and beliefs by emphasizing their similarities to the prevailing social model of religion, followers now highlighted their differences and justified them by their origin in a different cultural and religious tradition: an African one. They also stressed that this tradition had borne fruit in many countries of the Americas. 5

4 For example, one magazine featured a three page article with several pictures of (rather chubby) leaders in religious clothes and titled it "The Yoruba Iook" (L/bre 7/1/1986). A newspaper published a very critical piece under the heading "Fiasco and circus fair in the First Festival and Concentration of Umbanda and African rituals." (T/en~ Argem/no 6/21/1986). 5 0 n e of the flrst public enunciations of this strate~ was published in 1987, in a poster which invited people to the inauguration of the First Afro-Argenane Museum, which was founded within ah Umbanda temple. The invitation read: "As believers and practitioners of ala Afro-American religion, we are part of a

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This didactic intention, however, did not bear the expected fruit. Media coverage of the second event was merciless. The dancing and the religious clothes that practitioners wore were ironically commented upon.4 For this reason, the organizer of the next major public meeting did not pefform another Umbanda ceremony, in fact nobody ever did in such events, and explicitly asked for participants to wear formal clothing, because he wanted it to be "more refined." After recognizing that efforts at improving their public image by identifying with Umbanda and stressing its religious features were unsuccessful, several leaders embraced what up to then had been a minority accommodative strategy, which only two or three temples had been pursuing: to establish a stronger public identification of "the religion" with Africanismo.

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- First Meeting of Afro-American Cultures (1991 ) - First Africanist Congress of Psychology and Anthropology of Afro-Amerindian Religions (1991) - Latin American Anthropological Congress of Africanist Religion (1992) - Argentine Symposium of African Culture (1992) - First International Congress of Afro-American Cultures (1993) . National Congress of Africanist Culture and Religion (1993) . Exhibition of Afro-American Folklore and Art (1995)

The word "Umbanda," which was present in the name of ever~ public event organized during the 1980s, disappeared and was replaced by the word "Africanist" or "African." Further, the word "culture" ( o r a related one like anthropological or anthropology) figured prominently and more frequently than the word "religion." Most of these events were held in cultural centers or in a rented auditorium at the Medical School of the University of Buenos Aires. The speakers at these events were religious leaders who talked about the historical or theological dimensions of their beliefs, as well as - - in a smaller proportion - - scholars, anthropologists and historians, who talked about the African heritage in the country. Practitioners now presented themselves as

millenarian tradition that flourished and developed through several cultures ( . . . ) Our religious activities reproduce every day a way of life that connects us to people in distant places and times. We believe that the knowledge of the development, diversi~ and richness of this tradition will lead us to better understand our own life. It is our wish that the divulgation of our millenarian tradition wiU help to enlighten dmee that, due to their igno~anceor prejudice, consider ottr religion to be a s ~ and abetud fetishism. (...)"

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The idea that an appreciation of Afro-(Latin)-American and African cultute and history would lead to higher social esteem of the religion became more widespread in the religious community after the visit of a Yoruba king (the Oni of Ife) to Argentina in January 1990. The king of the sacred city of lŸ together with another king, the Obi of Onitsha, visited an Africanismo/Umbanda temple that had built an Afro-American museum on its premises. The Nigerian ambassador to Argentina arranged the visit. As an historian who had published books on the African diaspora in the Americas, he was pleased to show presentday African influences in Argentina. A visit of the kings to a temple with a museum on its premises provided a good opportunity to show Nigerian cultural and religious influences in the country, and to have the royal visitors meet a group of highly appreciative locals ~ in this case, religious followers. The public events that were organized during the 1990s show the widening acceptance of this "cultural" accommodative strategy. Organizers of the public events endeavored to show mainly cultural aspects of the religious practices and to establish links with other ethnic and religious groups in several countries of the Americas and Africa. This can readily be appreciated from the titles of the events:

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bearers of a traditª that was, at the same time, cultural, historical and religious. According to this new discourse, this tradition: a) linked them to other groups present in most countries of the Americas; and b) constituted one of the cultural roots of Argentina, that was frequently ignored because of the Eurocentric bias that has historically prevailed in the country. Practitioners now strove to be included within the African diaspora and to present ah oppositional reading (Hall 1993) of the dominant narrative of the nation. In this way they sought to include Blacks, Mulattos and Indians as important contributors to the country's culture and history. RE.WRITING HISTORY: BRINGING AFRICA BACK IN

Diasporization:Becomingpart of Afro.America

6 For example, in a radio program in 1986, one of the best-known maes de sanw in the counm/declared: "we have always claimed that this is a t3rpically (LatŸ American religion... (it has) American roots, Indian roots that we comider not to be the sole heritage of Brazil but of all the indigenous tribes that inhabited our continent. And there will surely come a day when we will invoke not only the tupi-guarany tribes, but also others, including the Argentine ones that inhabited our country." (Mae Peggie of Iemanj~i, radio program Testimonios 7/30/1986). 7 A good example is the change of name undergone by the organization that pretended to unite all Umbanda/Africanismo federations in the counm/. After the moral panic over put~rted ritual murders in 1992, a group of the counm/'s foremost Umbanda religiom haders founded the A/ro-Ameand~ Argenane Rdg,/om Commun/ry, which was suppo~ m function as the umbrelh organizatŸ that would unite all temples and federatiom. Two years, and many imexnal struggles after, this imtitution changed its name for the mote African one of Argenane Commun/ry of Trad/l• Rd/g/on. Although a detailed anal~is of the process falls b~wond the scope of this paper, it mmt be noted that re-africanization involves not onlu increasingly streuing the African origlm of the religion, but also the use of African garments, slanbob and theological concepts in the actual practice of the religion. These replace of ate added to the ones that characterize Batuque in Porto Alegre, therefore slightly modi~ing its practice and beliefs in Buenos Aires. 8 Up to that moment, most fo|lowers consi~ered that their religious communi~ encompass~ Buenos Aires, Porro Ale~e and Montevideo. Fora few, it exter~ed as lar north as [~lhia in Br~iL O n ~ a couple of i_~,~~_rs~ t that C a r i ~ variant, like S,mrerhl were meaning6~/rehted m their im,~__~o During the 1980s, for example, the leaders of the fin,t temple to function legal[,/in Argmthaa, who were initiated hato Santeria in Venemeh, b/Cuhan habalawos, were criticized for mixing religlom vadan~ During the 1990s, several of their ex-eritics started studying with them the divination system d lŸ now ccmldered the hacklx:me

ofthe religion.

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Umbanda is the Brazilian religion (Concone 1987) but was early on regarded a s a Latin-American religion by its followers in Argentina. 6 A similar appropriation occurred with the more African variants like Batuque or candombl› These Bra~lian reg/ona/variants became "Afro-American" in the new context, and, as the reafricanization process in Argentina advanced, they were increasingly considered "African" religions (Frigerio 1993b). 7 A clearer and more explicit consciousness of becoming part of a diaspora occurred after the visit of the Oni of Ife in 1990. 8 For the leaders that attended

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the meeting, and for the many more who did not but heard about it, the visit was proof and certification that Argentina "was recognized as one of the American nations where the cultural and religious tradition of Yoruba origin is present." (my emphasis). 9 The "diasporization" (becoming part of the diaspora) that accompanied the preeminence of a "cultural" accommodative strategy became visible in the way practitioners "performed" or presented their religion in the public events they organized. We saw that during the 1980s they presented their beliefs and practices through the public performance of Umbanda ceremonies, with actual spirit possession. These open presentations of their rituals in which tuh/te Argentine devotees fell into trance were replaced in the 1990s by staged performances of religious dances done by groups of mosd:y Biaclrprofessional dancers Afro-Brazilian and/or Cuban performers who taught these dances in academies and cultural centers. On some 4~ccasions these performers also performed secular dances of Afro-American origin like capoeira, rumba, camivai dances, or Afro-Uruguayan candombe. The more elaborate events, like the I Meeting (1991) and the I Congress (1993) of Afro-American Cu/ture, and the Exhibition o… Afro-American Folklore and Art (1995), presented, in addition to live secular and religious Afro-American dance, exhibitions of African Art, Haitian paintings, Afro-American religious altars and clothes, and Afro-Uruguayan paintings depicting candombe scenes. These visual representations and performances illustrated the African presence in the Americas about which the guest anthropologists of historians spoke in their invited lectures. Further, members of African embassies sometimes attended these events. For some years after the visit of the Oni of Ife, the cultural attach› of the Nigerian embassy was a regular and much honored presence at these events. 10 A further example of the diasporization of the foUowers of~these religions is their identification with famous Black leaders of various nationalities. For example, in 1994, the organizer of one of the public meetings gave a prize (named Pai Miguel aftera preto velho or old Black spirit) to the famous AfroBrazilian candombl› priest and artist Mestre Didi, to Nelson Mandeh and, postmortem to MartŸ Luther King. A famous mae de santo, in another public event, claimed that the po,i de santo who had spent two years in jail after being falsely accused of committing a ritual murder "has been, perhaps, our Nelson Mandela." The comment was met with standing applause. u

10 Besides organizing public events, Umbandistas also obtained some (rented) access to the mass media. They hosted a few radio programs, and, fora time, a couple of television programs on local cable channeh. These programs emphasized the cultural aspects of the religion. In progratm with names like "Black C,ultta~ in the New World" (which first existed asa cable tv program and then on radio) tho/invited histoff ~ , anthropologists and/or musicians to talk about African heritage in Argentina and the Americas.

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9 As the leader of the temple visited by the Oni of Ife stated in a report she sent to the Secretaw of NonCatholic Cults.

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These efforts of practitioners to link their practices to other cultural and religious forms of the African diaspora were accompanied, simultaneously, by attempts to presentan oppositional reading of the dominant national narrative that could include the presence and contribution of Blacks and their culture to the country's heritage.

Opposiamu~ reading of the national narrative: Inrroducing the "Alto" prefix befo're "Argentina"

Of the four roots that historically contributed to the formation of our country (indigenous, Spanish, African and inmigrant) the African one has received the least attention. The important contribution that the slaves of African origin and their descendants have made to the history and culture of our country has been unfairly ignored and deserves recognition.

Two years after voicing this initial concern about how the African roots of the national culture were ignored, the same leader made a more forceful claim. In her invitation to a second academic conference, she proposed that the study of the impact of African heritage could "allow (Argentines) to know our true national identity." The conviction that African roots were a crucial part, not only of the country's cultural heritage, but also of its national identity, slowly became widespread in the religious community as it became voiced in public events, stated in the media or published in magazines or books edited by pais de santo.

The fact that most of their fellow countrymen ignored the African roots of the national identity made possible, they believed, the pervasive discrimination of the many Others that did not fit into the country's ideal self image of a white, European country in Latin America. "The excessive European influence," wrote

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Practitioners are well aware that Argentina's dominant national narrative does not glorify, like other Latin American countries, mestizaje (MartŸ Echaz• 1998), but rather stresses the nation's "whiteness." As their practices were problematized in society and the image of their religion deteriorated, their discourse about the causes of this discrimination increasingly included thoughts about the national context that allowed for such fierce and unfounded persecution. Their references to race and nation therefore became more frequent and even radical. The religious leader whose temple the African king had visited, and who had founded the Afro-Argentine Museum in 1987 was one of the main proponents of the accommodative strategy of emphasizing the African heritage in the Americas and in the country. When she was organizing the First Meeting on Afro-American Culture in 1990 (the event would take place the following year) she made one of the first public statements regarding the importance of the country's Black heritage. She justified the relevance of the upcoming meeting calling attention to the fact that:

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a mae de santo in her magazine, is the cause that Argentina "has ignored its

Histories of the past, even though if today we will not end tortured or b u m t at the stake, we can still be labeled sorcerers and not considered followers of a universally recognized religion.

11 She made these statements in her temple magazine (Axe Africa-America 16:4-5, 1999) and repeated them in another publication that was distrŸ on newsstands throughout the city (Afr/c.a Lar/na 1:2-3,

2000). 12 A telling confirmation of the self- conscious character of the "cultural" accommodative strategy, and the importance of making a link between Black culture and Argentina's culture and heritage is provided by the way the organizer of an important event spoke about it in private and in public. One of the most impressive attempts to show the African heritage was the Art Exhibirionof Afro-Amer/can Folkoreand Handicrafts held ata very important downtown cultural center, organized by a Federation of temples called the Argent/ne Community of TradirionalAfrican Religion. The exhibit catalogue, written In/the molede santo who led the federation, finished a review of African esthetics and its influence in the Americas by bringing the topic close to ['tome: " . . . this exhibition.., composed of pieces belonging to the Afro-Argentine Museum, will be accorapanied by a photographic exhibition of the history of Afro-Argentines, that ,.r a/lmr us to understand how t h ~ have become t~art of our nat/ona/folklore." (my emphasis). The motives behind this exhibition were clearly stated in the federation's magazine, which was more clearly geared towards consumption by an insider re[igious audience: "lt is the duty of our federation to make known the cultural-religious herttage that our ancestors possessed, on/y thus ~ w e be ab/e to er the fa/se ta/mos that soc/ety has gmr mar tel/g/on." (all emphases reine).

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native culture and made possible the continuous discrimination of Indians, Blacks, mulattos and mestizos." She therefore called for religious leaders to contribute to the unveiling of the country's "real cultural identity" by educating others about the past, "the only true past that we do not even dare teach in our schools. ''11 Although this was one of the most forceful enunciations about the lack of awareness of an ethnically diverse past, several of her colleagues had, for the past four or five years, also been trying to correct this misperception - - albeit with the limited means at their disposal. Almost all the magazines edited by temples carried some article on the country's Black past and several made reference to the fact that if Argentines knew more about the African roots of their culture, followers of African religions would not be so discriminated against. 12 The way that practitioners of African-derived religions try to appropriate the Argentine past to talk about the present is shown by the use they made of a short piece that appeared in ClarŸ in October 1996. In a small section in which the journal describes events which occurred in the country on that date in the past, the story was told of an African slave who was accused of performing sorcery on her master's family. The woman was tortured and burned at the stake. This story about an Afro-Argentine slave was reproduced a month later in the magazine of one of the Umbanda federations, and a direct connection to the present was established. The article ended with the following cautionary words:

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The appropriateness of the analogy between this episode of the distant past and the Umhandista's current reality was confirmed by the fact that the same story was later reproduced by two other Umbanda magazines thus appearing in all the religious magazines edited at that time. In one of them, the editor even said that he had named the dining hall he has in his temple u in which free lunch is served to poor children - - "MarŸ Conga" in homage to the murdered slave. 13 The discourse of vindicating the Afro-Argentine past got more frequent and forceful throughout the 1990s. At the end of this period, however, this accommodative strategy experienced an unexpected setback. The very AfroArgentines whose memory practitioners defended suddenly reappeared in public arenas, and the initial contacts that members of both groups had were not as cordial as expected.

When it seemed that Afro-Argentines were replaced by practitioners of Afro-Brazilian religions as spokesmen of the Black heritage of the country, a group of them founded a new association called "Africa Lives" (Afr/ca Vive). Although they did not yet succeed in gathering many Afro-Argentines beyond the founder's (quite large) extended family, the group did manage to gain some visibility in the media, especially after participating in an important and much publicized seminar on discrimination organized by the city university in 1999.14 The seminar, akhough focusing mainly on the discrimination against indigenous groups and recent immigrants, provided a first public forum for the different groups promoting Black culture in the city (mostly Afro-Uruguayans, Afro-Argentines and practitioners of Umbanda/Africanismo, see Frigerio 2000) to interact and present their views on the subject.

13 Maria Conga is not the name of the slave of the stor but of a Brazilianpreta m/ha (old Black female) Umbanda spirit. This sho~ the creative me that Argentine umbandistas make of both traditions, the AfroArgentine and the Brazilian one. A simihr thing happens when they celebrate the day oŸthe preto ~ spirits on May 13th, which is the date that shves were granted freedom in Brazil. Sometimes on that date they make reference to Argentine shvery, but they do not change it to the ~ i n g Argentine one. 14 For example, the Sunday magazine of the joumal ClarŸ the mmt impo~ant national newspaper, pu~idaxl ah eight-page mxicle entitled ~ and Pauiom oŸAfm-Argentines." This artide vas particuhrly relevant, because ir acimowledged the exiuence d ah Afro-Argentine community. This was a ~ from previous articles on B[acks in l~enos Aires, which had, f~ the past twent~ years, generally f e a ~ Uruguayan of Brazilian Biacks and spoke of Argentine Biacks in the pa~ teme. The last artide to focm on a naliqaeAfro c.omnamity had been a 1971 piece (which also appeared in the Sunday magazine of the same newspaper) caUed "8uenm Aires de Ehano."

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OUTSIDE THE DIASPORA: CONFLICTS ABOUT AFRO.ARGENTINE HERITAGE

OUTSIDE THE NATION, OUTSIDE THE DIASPORA 307 In one of her interventions in the workshop the leader of "Africa Lives" charged against the pmctitioners of Afro-Brazilian religions in Argentina, stating that: I want to stress that, as a non-govemmental organization, we do not become involved with religion (...) nor in politics. In religion, because our religion is not the one you ate practicing (...) because there is no Bible, there is no Bible for our religion. It is transmitted oraUy,and we Blacks know that my grandmother could have taught it to me, or other elders could and after that it was over. Now there is nobody who can say this person is a hule or a pa/(religious leaders). In my opinion, there is no one in Argentina today who can certi~ this. One of the best-known Umbanda/Africanismo leaders in the country was present at the seminar. This white woman immediately interrupted t h e AfroArgentine speaker:

One of the coordinators of the workshop interrupted the argument, stating that if there was hypothetical discrimination of Blacks against whites it should be condemned, but that they were there to discuss the discrimination that Blacks suffered at the hands of whites, which was more frequent. The discussions between the leader of "Africa Lives" and the white m ~ de santo, can only be understood in terms of the past activities of the parties involved. Although the leader of "Africa Lives" had never personally met the m ~ de santo, she was aware that leaders of African-derived religions had organized conferences on Afro-American culture and were claiming the right to speak for Black culture and history in Argentina. By using the words "pa/" and " ~ e , " Portuguese words that clearly refer to leaders of Afro-Brazilian religions, she was intentionally addressing this group. That these are not solely personal quarrels, but conflicts that correspond to different positions in the Black cultural field (per Bourdieu's use of the term) in Buenos Aires is evident from the fact that the feud continued in similar terms in another arena. A few months later, a local scholar organized a series of lectures on Afro-Argentine history and culture a t a private university. Since most of the scholars who specialized in these topics were invited to speak on one of the eight panels, it was, together with the previous seminar, one of the rare opportunities in which Black culture and history could be publicly debated. The leader of "Africa Lives" was not featured as a speaker, but one of the co-founders of the group (a daughter of Cape-Verdean inmigrants) presented a paper on the Black

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Excuse me, I do not agree with this. I represent the Black religions in Argentina (...) and I think that nowadays whites are being discriminated for practicing a Black religion. (...) There is a prejudice which says that only Black people can feel the orishas, and whites can't. I do not agree with this. (...) Also, that nobody can teU who is a hule ora pa/, I disagree with this, because we know, we have a methodology, we have ritual initiations (...) We ate white and we are discriminated in our own country for practicing a religion of Blacks and lndians. That is why we ate here (in this seminar against discrimination) today.

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organizations that had existed in Buenos Aires in the past three decades. In her work, she did not mention the cultural activities of leaders of African-derived religious temples for they are not Black. The same religious leader who had been at the Seminar attended several talks, and at the last one, which was on the current situation of Blacks in the city, was invited to read a five-minute presentation. In it she lamented the discrimination that her fellow believers suffered not onLy from Argentine society but also from Blacks, and made several explicit references to how their plight was the same as that suffered by the slaves of the city:

To their surprise, practitioners of African derived religions were, literally, being pushed off the diaspora, not recognized as belonging to it by the very AfroArgentines whose culture they had claimed to represent and had tried to reinsert in the country's history. OUTSIDE THE N A T I O N As with most followers of new religious movements in the country, practitioners of Afro-Brazilian religions have been stigmatized. Unlike other groups, however, their practices have been increasingly problematized, and their image has deteriorated over the years. Although they have tried by several means to improve it, their efforts have had limited success. Certain temples the ones that enacted the cultural accommodative strategy most forcefully have managed to become privileged interlocutors with government agencies, particularly the Secretary of Cults, or have achieved some legitimacy at the level of the neighborhoods or municipalities in which they reside. The different public identification that followers have made with Umbanda or Africanismo, at consecutive moments of the past two decades, confirm that a religious movement may strategically attempt to attain legitimacy and respectability without losing its distinctive characteristics (Snow 1979:30). It was the

15 This same leader aLso had some encounters in intemet discussion sites with African American followers of Orisha religions who claimed that white individuals could not receive orishas.

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I want to talk about the religious discrimination suffered by those of us who have adopted the religions brought to America by the slaves ( . . . ) The social visibility of Blacks and their culture is continuously denied by our society. "There are no Blacks in Argentina," they say. "Thank God," it seems they wouid like to add. And since Gr is white and has blue eyes, Blacks, "brands from hell" (as they were called in the city}, cannot be recognized by Hito. Even less m, those heretics and excomull~ated whites who have converted to African religions. This is the reality these days ( . . . ) Our plight is as hard as was that of the Black slaves. I suffered prison, my house was raided by the police, I was segregated by my family and by the society at large ( . . . ) For Afro-Argentines we ate whites who have stolen their religion ( . . . ) even Blacks discriminate us. 15

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16 Andrews has shown that the nation's Black population was considered extinct long before its

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temples' public discourse that changed, and not the actual practices, since they atways practiced both variants. However, just after these religions received an important public endorsement - - following the visit of the Yoruba king m they became heavily involved in the controversy over sects developing in the country. Consequently, the opposition against them grew and diversified. The development of a new accommodation strategy that stressed the "cultural" aspects of the religious practices, and its connection to the Afro-American heritage, was successful in some contexts but less so in other important ones, especially the media. The promotion of cultural activities gave temple leaders access to previously off-limit spaces like cultural of academic centers and activities, but the tactic was of little use in the media. Television journalists wanted replies to the accusations of murder, brainwashing, or the use of blood in rituals. In this unfavorable setting, leaders faced apostates, anti-cult movement ac2ivists, or psychologists whose arguments and accusations were specific, insidious and not easity answered in terms of African culture and national heritage. Furthermore, most of the religious leaders who were invited to these programs, with few exceptions, were not the most prepared in terms of the cultural accommodative strategy and could only confusingly deny the preposterous charges. The use of a "cultural" strategy of accommodation of religious practices E which was employed successfully by other groups like the Hare Krishna (Rochford 1987) m is a good example of a movement's use of internal and external cultural resources (Williams 1995). Practitioners made creative use and extrapolation of their religion's cultural resources. They expanded its geographical and performance scope, linking ir to secular African-derived arts (music, dance, painting, sculpture) produced in several countries of the Americas (not only Brazil, where their religion originally carne from) and finally linked it to the country's own Black heritage. In so doing they established liaisons with academics; Afro-American musicians; dancers and visual artists of different nationalities; African diplomats; as well as local cultural and ethnic entrepreneurs. With varying degrees of success, they also established contact with practitioners of Afro-American religions throughout the Americas, and with African priests and diviners. To a remarkable extent for a grass-roots movement, they thought globally and acted locally. Their capacity to manipulate external cultural resources, however, was constrained by internal and external factors (Williams 1995) such as their race, and the strength and characteristics of the local national narrative they tried to oppose. Argentina has long considered itself a white nation, a piece of Europe in Latin America. In the dominant national narrative, there is no space for Blacks, Indians of mestizos, since the Argentine melting pot is thought to have included mostly European immigrants (Andrews 1980; Juliano 1987; Shumway 1991).16

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numbers dwindled -aldaough ir has not, to dais day, disappeared, as the efforts of the founders of "Afi'ica Lives" indicate (Frigerio 1993c, 2000). The countw's indigenous population was likewise considered non-existent (Juliano 1987) even though its numbers are bigger, boda in absolute and relative numbers, than that of countries which are thought to have a relevant Indian population, like Brazil (gibeiro, forthcoming). Although it is true that European in-migration had a very significant effect in the c.~xmtry's life, it ahsolutely monopolizes the dominant national narrative.

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In this narration, contributions of ethnic and racial minorities to the national culture, history or identity are negligible. Although most LatŸ American narratives tend towards homogenized versions of the nation, Argentinian constructions of national identity and history are particularly exclusive and forceful. In his book The invention of Argentina, historian Nicholas Shumway (1991) has even proposed that a "mythology of exclusion" constitutes one of the nation's main "orienting fictions." Umbandistas, as we have seen, are well aware of the persuasiveness of this dominant narrative. Since there is no place in it for their practices and beliefs they have tried to provide ah oppositional reading that resonates with historical revisionist theories and allows them to at least align themselves with a growing opinion movement demanding a more multicultural expression of the nation. For all their efforts, however, they still risk being left outside the nation justas some Afro-Argentines and Afro-Americans would leave them outside the diaspora. In addition to running counter to the dominant national narrative, their practices also contradict certain cultural themes (Gamson 1988) dear to Argentine society: the idea that the country is not only white but also a modern and rational one (Frigerio 1996). These cultural themes are strong even in social sectors that oppose the excluding dominant national narrative and therefore deprive practitioners of potential allies. The communication with the spiritual world through animal sacrifices continues to create a cognitive distance between the religion and most sectors of the host society (progressive or conservative) that no effort of interpretive work seems able to bridge. Contemporary identity politics, in Argentina or elsewhere, has no place for magicians. Their success in convincingly presenting an oppositional reading of the national narrative is further hindered by the fact that they are whites vindicating (and practicing) Black culture, which makes their arguments less credible. Although the current historical context is propitious for the proposal of multicultural constructions of the nation, ir seems that this is the case only if ir is the ethnic Others who advocate their plight. This is clear in the positive reception that the resurgent Afro-Argentine movement has had in the media, as opposed to Africanismo's negative media image and the accusations of quackery that white priests have to endure. In Argentina, as in many other places, Black heritage and culture is seen as something that only Blacks can vindicate.

OUTSIDETHE NATION, OUTSIDETHE DIASPORA 311 CONCLUSIONS

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The heavy racialization of Black culture is the main reason why AfroAmerican religions are not yet considered world religions, in spite of their rapid expansion. Racialization is deeply tied to the primitive character that was traditionally assigned (and, in arenas like the media, still is) to these religions. Therefore, African derived theological concepts and practices are not recognized asa legitimate spiritual quest in the Western world, especially ff practiced by white individuals. Judgments ate more condescending when practiced by Blacks, since then the ethnic cultural resistance functions of these religions take precedence over their alleged religious value. The existence of national and regional variants, and the staunch defence that many of their followers make of their specificity, also precludes the possibility of their becoming a world ~ligion. Traditionally tied to local narratives of the nation (or even the region, as Dantas 1988 has shown) that also found them a place as the cultural heritage of nationa/ethnic groups in countries where the Black presence was visible, the erasure of religious boundaries also implies the blurring of national ones. Although a growing transnational movement that predated, but now heavily uses the internet (Capone 1999b), advocates transcending local specificities in the construction of a world community of worshippers of the orisha tradition, ir is still doubtful that this may be achieved in the near future. The importance of racialization and nationalization becomes clear if we make a necessarily brief comparison with another group that has also undertaken a "cultural" accommodative strategy and has courted the favor of the ethnic (and national) Other that originated the tradition which the group vindicates. Hare Krishna devotees, who at first avoided identification with the Hindu tradition, started aligning themselves within it after their leader's death. They emphasized its "huge cultural, historical heritage" (Rochford 1987:118), built palaces, and organized and participated in parades and festivals in Western countries. They also successfully garnered the active support of local immigrant Indian communities (Nye 1997; Zaidman 1997). Their achievements in these endeavors gained them some of the social legitimation which they previously Iacked (Rochford 1987). The success of white followers claiming a legitimate place within the Hindu tradition, compared to the difficulties that white practitioners of orisha religions find in seeking a place within the Afro-American cultural and religious tradition, is indicative of the places given to these traditions in the West. Hinduism has long been recognized asa legitimate spiritual quest, one of the spiritual legacies of mankind, and by now it comes as no surprise that white individuals become followers of these religions. Africa, on the other hand, is stiU, in the Westem imaginary, a locus of savagery and primitivism (Pieterse 1992). There-

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For the Nigeriana, we are white. And for the Afro-Argentines we are whites who have stolen their reli~on. And we have not stolen anything. We have simply adopted the traditional African religion because it moved our hearts, because we chose that path. Yet even Blacks discriminate us. So, then, we my: only for Olodumare, God, are we equal, h is only in His eyes that we are equal.

REFERENCES Anderson, B. 1983. Imag/nedcommunities: Reflections on the origina and spread of nationalism. London & New York:Verso. Andrews, G. R. 1980.The Afro-Argentines of Buenos Aires (1800-1900). Madison: Universityof Wisconsm Press. Bartkowski, J. 1998. Claims-makingand typificationsof Voodoo asa deviant religion: Hex, lies and videotape.Joumal for the Scientific Study of Reli~m 37(4):559-579. Bastide, R. 1978.The African reli~ons of Brazil. Baltimore:Johns HopkinsUniversityPress. Best, J. 1990. Threa*ened children: Rhetoric and concem about child.victims. Chicago: Universityof Chicago Press. Bhabha, H. 1990a. Introduction: Narrating the nation. In Na,ion and Narration, edited by H. K. Bhabha, 1-7. London:Routledge. 91990b.DisseminNation:Time,narrative and the marginsof the moderonation. In Nat/on and Narra*ion, edited by H. K. Bhabha, 291-322.London:Routledge. Birman, P. 1999. Entre Fran~;a e Brasil: viagens antropol6gicas num campo (religioso) minado. Horizontes Antropol6~cos 10:35-60. Brandon, G. 1997. SanterŸfrom Africa to the new world: The dead seu memories. Bloomingtonand Indianapolis:IndianaUniversityPress.

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fore, when African-derived religions are practiced by whites they are seen as out of place, and as especially threatening. The way the ethnic and racial minorities in turn view the white Other is also important. Indian immigrants not only accepted the participation of Westem individuals in their religions, but, in the case of the Hare Krishna, have even established with them viable working relationships in the management and use of ISKCON temples (Zaidman 1997). To the contrary, many Black followers of Afro-American religions, inspired by African-American social activism, insist on the racialization of Black culture, considering it a patrimony that belongs exclusively to Blacks and cannot be legitimately practiced by whites. There are other followers who have a less racialized view of these religions for they come from local structures of race relations such as the Brazilian or Puerto Rican cases that are different from the North American model. However, in migratory contexts like the United States they are unable to override the strong national narratives that assign strict definite p[aces to ethnic segments and their cultural production. Because the logics of exclusion are so strong and frequently present in national narratives, and even in the ethnic movements that counter them, the words of one of the Argentine religious leaders deploring the discrimination she and her followers suffered, become so poignant:

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