Between collective action and public policies: A panoramic perspective on memory in Latin America

Abstract

What we generally refer to as Latin America is made up of a diversity of nation-states whose histories and cultural environments exhibit their diversity rather than a common denominator. Even the term “Latin America” itself is a result of the ways in which the colonial dispute operated in the mid-nineteenth century during the wars waged by various proto-states to gain independence from their European metropolises. As Soria (2004) asserts, it was French cultural diplomacy that coined the term “Amérique Latine” to assert, in opposition to Anglo-Saxon America, the existence of a cultural unity between some European nations and the emerging American states based on a common language origin. This strategy overlapped with, and to a large extent was successful in highlighting, the influence of the French Revolution as a driving force behind the processes of independent war waged from the shores of the Río de la Plata to the ancient lands of the Mayas and Aztecs.