Control Mechanisms: Pornography, Theatre and Subversion in Santa Fe Province during the Last Argentine Military Dictatorship

Abstract

This paper examines a case of cultural repression during the last dictatorship in Argentina (1976-1983). It studies actions carried out by law enforcement officers in response to a denunciation against a group of teachers in a small town in Santa Fe that had participated in a play characterised as ´pornographic´, and who were finally accused of left-wing propaganda and ´subversive´ activities. This case offers an opportunity to review the relationship between immorality, pornography, communism and ´subversion´. Since the Cold War, these issues have been used in Latin America to construct an internal enemy and create governmental mechanisms and regulations for detecting and controlling its actions, and penalising the population in general.