Website of memory

The War of the Pacific (1879–84) in the global age of YouTube

Bibliographic Data

ID12905643
AuthorsPaulo Drinot (0000-0003-3717-1383, University of London, corresponding author)
Year2011
Volume4
Issue4
Pages370-385
Publication date2011-10-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueMemory Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1750-6980 • E-ISSN: 1750-6999
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/1750698011409290
OpenAlexW2009597343
LanguageEN
Citations received23
References cited34

This article is an examination of the comments attached to a video upload on YouTube of a Chilean television mini-series on the War of the Pacific (1879–84), one of Latin America’s rare international wars, which pitted Chile against Peru and Bolivia, and which in many ways remains an open historical wound. Posted by anonymous commentators whose national subject positions as Chileans, Peruvians, Bolivians and Argentines are nevertheless discernable, the comments offer a compelling perspective on the ways in which digital artefacts such as YouTube enable the circulation and reproduction of collective memories in de-territorialized and transnational ways. However, the analysis of these comments suggests that the operation of memory in global virtual spaces does not guarantee or even necessarily enable the unmooring of memory from the national. In fact, the evidence presented here suggests that global spaces such as YouTube may contribute to the strengthening of national, and indeed, nationalist memories

Cultural history · Economic history · Historiography · Human sexuality · Latin Americans · Media studies · Political science · Politics · Racism · Social history (medicine · Sociology · State (computer science · Asian American and Pacific Histories · Gender Studies · Historical Studies in Latin America · History · Law · Medicine · Philippine History and Culture