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Gauchos and Caudillos


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Questions | Bibliography

Chapter Reference: Independence; Postcolonial Blues; Progress

Gauchos were cowboys, similar, in a number of ways, to the U.S. variety. They rode horseback, roped and branded cattle, established their pecking order in one-on-one duels. But this South American cattle frontier lasted much longer than the U.S. version, and the gauchos were cowboys and Indians, one could say mestizos who sometimes spoke an indigenous language and often wore garments of indigenous origin. One could add that black gauchos (like black cowboys in the United States) were far from uncommon, too. Gauchos, like cowboys, loom large in the national imagination of Argentina and Uruguay, and Brazil's southernmost state Rio Grande do Sul is also gaucho country. In fact, gaścho in colloquial Brazilian speech refers to anyone from Rio Grande do Sul, one of contemporary Brazil's most important states. Students approaching the study of gauchos should get a feeling for the frontier milieu in which the real ones lived. Those who read Spanish can also explore the mythic gauchos of the rich gauchesca literature of Argentina and Uruguay.

The phenomenon of caudillismo, linked with gauchos since Sarmiento's Facundo, is another important connection. Caudillismo is hardly a phenomenon limited to gaucho country, however. Students can identify a caudillo to research in the history of any Latin American country.

Questions for Analysis and Further Reflection:

  1. Originally, the term gaucho referred to vagabonds who roamed the grasslands of the Río de la Plata. They were later incorporated as cow hands on great estates. What are the origins of these vagabonds, what was life like for them on the cattle frontier, and how did their situation change over the course of the 1800s?


  2. Caudillos were normally landowners who had a natural talent for attracting followers and inspiring loyalty. What role did they play in nineteenth-century Argentina and Uruguay?


  3. At the end of the nineteenth century, gauchos were marginalized, seen as troublemakers to be tamed, educated, or done away with. However, gauchos are pervasive figures in the national imaginations of Argentina, Uruguay, and Rio Grande do Sul. How did gauchos go from being considered a nuisance to honored symbols of what it means to be Argentine, Uruguayan, or Rio Grandense?

Bibliography: (Titles with ** are good starting places.)

Chasteen, John Charles. Heroes on Horseback: A Life and Times of the Last Gaucho
           Caudillos.
Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995.

The story of gauchos and caudillos along the Uruguay-Brazil border at the end of the nineteenth century.

De la Fuente, Ariel. Children of Facundo: Caudillo and Gaucho Insurgency During the
           Argentine State-Formation Process (La Rioja, 1853—1870).
Durham, NC:
           Duke University Press, 2000.

A scholarly treatment of the battles waged between the last Argentine gauchos and the Argentine state during the years leading up to the rise of wheat farming and Argentina's export boom.

Lynch, John. Argentine Caudillo: Juan Manuel de Rosas, rev. and abridged ed. of Argentine
           Dictator: Juan Manuel de Rosas, 1829—1851.
Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources,
           2001.

A masterful portrait of one of Latin America's most powerful and well-known gaucho caudillos—Rosas.

** Slatta, Richard W. Gauchos and the Vanishing Frontier. Lincoln: University of Nebraska
           Press, 1983.


Other Resources:
Argentina
Brazil
Uruguay
A Model Country
European Immigration