Atahualpa Yupanqui en la búsqueda de lo auténtico argentino – La (re-)construcción de indigeneidad y la canción testimonial

Abstract

Héctor Roberto Chavero (*1908, Province of Buenos Aires) travels through the whole country due to his father’s profession as a railroader and later because of his personal interest. In 1920 he calls himself Atahualpa Yupanqui and starts to work as a guitarist and singer. 25 years later, he joins the Argentine Communist Party and expresses his political ideals by playing Argentinian and Latin American folklore and by emphasizing indigenous elements to claim ‘authenticity’. This article reflects on the constructedness of Yupanqui’s ‘Argentinity’ through formerly silenced indigenous elements that are essentialized as soon as they are being attributed ‘authenticity’.