Tamales, Folk Music, and Brave Horses: Folklore Festivals in the Argentine Northwest in the Intersection of Tourism, Community and Tradition.

• In Event: Folklore del norte argentino: la tensión entre “lo auténtico” y la estética del mercado

Abstract

The “Tamal y Doma National Folk Festival” at the piedmont town of Chicoana, Salta showcases the diverse factors conditioning the current folk festival industry in Argentina. Once a year and for almost two weeks, the Chicoana celebrates its foodways, rhythms and dances, and the equestrian abilities of its ‘gauchos.’ It receives tens of thousands of visitors from both inside and outside the province, attracted specially by the famous tamales and the picturesque vistas. However, in the last three years the festival has been through a period of crisis characterized by falling turnouts, budget cuts, tough competition from neighboring festivals, and conflict of interests among different members and groups within the community. A bitter debate on how to revitalize the festival has raged over the last two years, and changes have been introduced to minimize costs. Based on interviews and news archives, this paper discusses how the Chicoana festival puts in evidence the process of neoliberization of folk festivals through which, events conceived to celebrate traditional cultures evolved into commoditized products of the tourist market.

Author

• Oscar A Chamosa, University of Georgia