“So, Long Live May Day!”. Anarchist Commemorations in Salta and Tucumán in the 1920s

Abstract

This article is to explore the May 1st commemorations of the anarchist movement in northern Argentina during the 1920s. Focusing on Salta and Tucumán provinces, through the press that circulated in those territories. The central hypothesis of the article is that the commemorative character of May 1st was combined with specific demands that were relevant to the political, social, and economic context of the territory. There we will see how, in a context of sugar strikes, anarchism took advantage of the commemorations of the Chicago massacre to approach sugar workers and denounce their extreme exploitation. The research aims to begin to address a certain historiographical gap regarding how working-class and militant identities were configured in regions far from the Buenos Aires metropolitan core, and in what way anarchist ideas circulated, adapted, and were re-signified in contexts deeply marked by rural labor and seasonal exploitation. With this, the article places its focus on peripheral spaces where labor conflict and forms of organization adopted their own particular features. Such were the mobilizations, rallies, and artistic activities for May 1st in Salta and Tucumán, observing how the commemorations gained political and symbolic density. We will emphasize the interventions they carried out, the characteristics of their mobilizations, and the workers’ demands and conflicts that stood out when mobilizing on Workers’ Day. For this purpose, we will draw on various publications that represented different currents within the anarchist movement, such as La Protesta, La Antorcha, and local newspapers like Tierra Libre (Tucumán) and Despertar (Salta).