As tense as a thriller, as vivid as an undercover documentary, Matias Nespolo's bold and brilliant first novel takes the reader on a rollercoaster ride through a place of crime and deprivation. Set in Buenos Aires at the time of Argentina's financial crash, and seen through the eyes of twenty-year-old Gringo, it tells the story of two boys on the cusp of adulthood who have no choice but to join the gang warfare that rules their community. At least, Gringo's friend Chueco thinks they have no choice. He's determined to prove himself hard enough to get into El Jetita's gang, but smart enough to remain his own man. Gringo is more intelligent. He knows that gangs don't work like that: you obey the leader or else. As the two get drawn ever deeper into a pitched battle between El Jetita and his rival Charly over control of the barrio's drugs and prostitution, Gringo sees a life of love and loss pass before his eyes. A few days before, he was joking with Chueco about killing cats. Now, he's fighting to save his skin. Written in the street-slang of the slums, and full of fantastic characters from the sympathetic Gringo to the ruthless gang leader El Jetita or the grotesque bar owner Fat Farias, this is one of those novels that is about one place and every place. While its depiction of Buenos Aires rings vibrantly true in every detail, the barrio could be any place of urban deprivation where young men are pushed into a violence that, ultimately, will destroy them.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Diversidad y recurrencia en las culturas populares actuales / Daniel Míguez y Pablo Semán
• Estilos musicales y estamentos sociales : cumbia, villa y transgresión en la periferia de Buenos Aires / Daniel Míguez
• "El aguante" : hinchadas de fútbol, entre la pasión y la violencia / José Garriga Zucal y María Verónica Moreira
• La doble de Gilda, o cómo, cantando cumbias, se hace una santa popular / Eloísa Martín
• Antiguos difuntos y difuntos nuevos : las canonizaciones populares en la década del
• 90 / María Julia Carozzi
• Violencias públicas y privadas en la producción de familia y género / Alejandro Isla
• Qué hacer con los quehaceres? : las razones domésticas del cambio familiar / Agustina Cepeda y Cecilia Rustoyburu
• Lucha y papeles en una organización piquetera del sur de Buenos Aires / María Cecilia Ferraudi Curto
• La mano invisible : clientelismo y práticas políticas en sectores populares en la era de las ONG / Gabriel D. Noel
• Política y prácticas clientelistas en las villas del conurbano bonaerense / Nathalie Puez
• El pentecostalismo y el "rock chabón" en la transformación de la cultura popular / Pablo Semán.

• Prefacio
• Parte primera: Mar de fondo: ascenso y caída de las multitudes
• 1. Cambiando el curso de la historia: dignidad, emancipación y tenacidad
• 2. El tiempo de los hornos: clandestinidad, negociación e insurrección
• 3. Una brisa transformada en huracán: el apogeo de la movilización de multitudes
• 4. La rivalidad entre las multitudes: euforia, desencanto y ruptura
• Parte segunda: La utopía perdida: la guerra de guerrillas y la contrainsurgencia
• 5. Tiros en la noche: venganza, revolución e insurgencia
• 6. El largo brazo de la justicia popular: castigo, rebelión y sacrificio
• 7. La revolución aplazada: rabia, frustración y derecho al poder
• 8. Las sombras de la muerte: improvisación, contrainsurgencia y declive
• Parte tercera: Quebrar los corazones y las almas: tortura, identidad y resocialización
• 9. La guerra cultural: jerarquía o igualdad, cristianismo o marxismo
• 10. La maquinaria de la represión: ataques, secuestros y aniquilación
• 11. El teatro de operaciones: tortura, deshumanización y traumatización
• 12. Cárceles políticas y centros clandestinos de detención: desarticulación, desocialización y rehabilitación
• Parte cuarta: La pesadilla argentina: la desaparición forzada
• 13. Las desapariciones: desesperación, terror y miedo
• 14. La búsqueda: esperanza, angustia y falsas ilusiones
• 15. La reivindicación de la verdad: desafío, resistencia y poder materno
• 16. El pasado recuperado y reenterrado: democracia, responsabilidad e impunidad
• Conclusión. Las espirales de la violencia y el trauma
• Apéndice
• 1. Lista de personas entrevistadas
• Apéndice
• 2. Siglas
• Bibliografía
• Índice temático
• Agradecimientos

"Political Violence and Trauma in Argentina demonstrates through a multilevel analysis the process by which different historical strands of violence coalesced during the 1970s into an all-out military assault on Argentine society and culture." "Combining history and anthropology, this compelling book rests on thorough archival research; participant observation of mass demonstrations, exhumations, and reburials; and interviews with military officers, guerrilla commanders, human rights leaders, and former disappeared captives. Robben's penetrating analysis of the trauma of Argentine society is of great importance to our understanding of other societies suffering similar crimes against humanity."-- From English edition.

For decades, Argentina's population was subject to human rights violations ranging from the merely disruptive to the abominable. Violence pervaded Argentine social and cultural life in the repression of protest crowds, a ruthless counterinsurgency campaign, massive numbers of abductions, instances of torture, and innumerable assassinations. Despite continued repression, thousands of parents searched for their disappeared children, staging street protests that eventually marshaled international support. Challenging the notion that violence simply breeds more violence, Antonius C. G. M. Robben's provocative study argues that in Argentina violence led to trauma, and that trauma bred more violence. In this work of superior scholarship, Robben analyzes the historical dynamic through which Argentina became entangled in a web of violence spun out of repeated traumatization of political adversaries. This violence-trauma-violence cycle culminated in a cultural war that "disappeared" more than ten thousand people and caused millions to live in fear. Political Violence and Trauma in Argentina demonstrates through a groundbreaking multilevel analysis the process by which different historical strands of violence coalesced during the 1970s into an all-out military assault on Argentine society and culture. Combining history and anthropology, this compelling book rests on thorough archival research; participant observation of mass demonstrations, exhumations, and reburials; gripping interviews with military officers, guerrilla commanders, human rights leaders, and former disappeared captives. Robben's penetrating analysis of the trauma of Argentine society is of great importance for our understanding of other societies undergoing similar crimes against humanity.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)