Indigenous People and Smallpox in Argentina's Desert Campaign, 1879-1881

Bibliographic Data

ID2733814
AuthorsRobert Christensen (0000-0002-0364-5563, Gustavus Adolphus College, corresponding author)
Year2024
Volume71
Issue1
Pages113-138
Publication date2024-01-01
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueEthnohistory (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0014-1801 • E-ISSN: 1527-5477
PublisherDuke University Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1215/00141801-10888061
OpenAlexW4391854058
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited25

Argentina's 1879-85 Desert Campaign formed the basis for dispossessing the Indigenous community of its southern frontier. This article argues that the Desert Campaign should be understood as much as an epidemiological event as a military one, focusing on the most intense phase of a smallpox epidemic that ravaged communities of Indigenous survivors. More lives were lost to smallpox than to combat, particularly as the disease permeated prisoner camps. A general lack of concern for the health of Indigenous prisoners punctuated their experience of dispossession at the hands of the Argentine army and "distribution" into forced labor systems throughout the country

Ancient history · Archaeology · Biology · Desert (philosophy) · Ethnology · Geography · Indigenous · Indigenous culture · Political science · Smallpox · Vaccination · Animal Disease Management and Epidemiology · Argentine historical studies · Ecology · History · Indigenous Cultures and History · Law · Medicine · Virology

Tools

Open DOI