The hands of all blacks, up" : Gender, ethnicity and class in the Argentine cumbia

Abstract

Since its origin as ethnic music in Colombia at the end of the 19th century - showing a combination of indigenous and African-American traits, as well as other genres considered "tropical" - cumbia spread throughout much of Latin America through the mediation of cultural industries, marking in each local case different variants and meanings. In all, however, one significance prevails: it is systematically the music of the poor: the popular classes. In the Argentine case, since its arrival in the mid-sixties, this popularization implied its connection with other local-folkloric products, as in the case of chamamé,or modern, like the quartet-; But fundamentally, the popularization of cumbia led to its consecration as the most popular genre, in the double sense of its consumption and its class significance. Cumbia in Argentina is, without discussion, the music of the popular classes - although the ways in which the middle classes also consume it allow us to simultaneously understand the phenomena of cultural "plebeyization" that have occurred in the last two decades. This paper wants to discuss these paths, pointing out at the same time how the study of cumbia brings into play at the same time problems of class, gender and ethnicity, possibly like no other cultural product in contemporary Argentina.