Building the Enemy: The Anti-Spaniard Movement in River Plate Revolutionary Literature (1810-1820)

Abstract

The revolutionary process initiated in 1810 was accompanied by political propaganda aiming at generating adherence and politically indoctrinate the River Plate population, which was mainly based on an anti-Spanish speech with the aim of defining the political enemy of the revolution: the Spaniards. This paper examines how Spaniards were represented in "patriotic" theater plays and poems written by revolutionary writers in the 1810's and how the anti-Spaniard movement developed in these works was understood and incorporated into the anti-Spanish imaginarium present in the River Plate society since colonial times.