AFRICANOS Y AFRODESCENDIENTES EN EL BUENOS AIRES TARDOCOLONIAL: UNA MIRADA SOBRE EL CUERPO

Afrodescendientes, Buenos Aires, Historia colonial, Cuerpo, Violencia Abstract: In this article we will deal with the representations of the African and Afro-descend ent body in Buenos Aires during the late-colonial period, considering as the core the ambiguity that characterizes the enslaved body, which we believe accompanies those who achieved liberty, between the body of a subject (which is not liable to be reified) and the body as another person's property. Understanding the body as a cultural construct that intervenes in the definition of social relations, in this paper, we will analyze the ambiguity between the subject and property in the representations of the Afro body, through the analysis of the Slaves' Petitions in Buenos Aires, focusing in three angles: the petitioners' selfintroduction, the definition frames of legitimacy or illegitimacy of violence and how moral and economic appreciations of the body contribute to the composition of the expected parameters of the master-slave relationship. Afro-descendants, Buenos Aires, Colonial History, Body, Violence. 1 . La configuración de una participación activa de afrodescendientes en la sociedad colonial es central para nuestro análisis, aun cuando por las características de nuestras fuentes nos concentremos en un sector minoritario de esta población: aquellos afrodescendientes esclavizados que se presentaron ante la justicia, solicitando ante el gobernador, primero, y luego de la creación del virreinato del Río de la Plata con capital en Buenos Aires en 1 776, ante el virrey.