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evita and maría     EvitaandMaría Religious Reverence and Political Resonance in Argentina chapter eight    Although the devotion toward theVirgin of Luján had been heavily and perhaps rather cynically oriented toward state building, state power, and the deliberate construction of national identity, that did not mean that devotion to theVirgin and a sense of her nurturing goodness did not exist apart from that project. On the contrary, Argentina was a Catholic nation in which heavy immigration from Spain and Italy in the late nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth reinforced Mary’s significance.The same kinds of family separation, of feeling out of place and endangered, existed for these immigrants as they had for the Spanish in the colonial world as well as the Bolivians who came later for work.Though the contexts were very different , the idea of having a kind and concerned Mother as a presence in one’s travels and adjustments was again powerful. As we have seen, Argentine governments had promoted the cult of the Virgin of Luján, particularly since the s. It may be that there was a conscious understanding of the need for such a unifying image, given the changes brought by industrialization and immigration, or perhaps the image was psychologically satisfying to leaders themselves in a way that was more felt or intuited than intellectualized. Probably both factors were involved. Certainly it seemed to work, and pilgrimages to theVirgin of Luján and her basilica on her day remain popular and important in religious observance in the area around Buenos Aires. Even Juan Perón, during the first period of his rule (–), continued to put statues of this advocation in public places, often train stations. But it was his wife, Evita, who made best use of Marian symbols, rhetoric, gestures, and evocative acts and performances to establish  ,       a resonance with the Argentine people. During her lifetime this connection had enormous power, and the devotion to her personally since she died in  has remained strong. Remarkably, in the months before her death of cancer, her identification with Mary extended to an identification with the martyred and dying Christ as He suffered the Passion. However, Peronist attempts to continue the political use of the dual Evita/María image without the living Evita largely failed. I am not arguing here that Argentines in any sense confused Evita with or adopted her as a substitute for theVirgin. Rather, I believe that her behaviors had strong Marian resonances that evoked highly positive responses in the Argentine masses and contributed significantly to her political power and personal charisma. Moreover, I believe that the motherly, nurturing, giving, caring Marian persona that she took on as the wife of the president was psychologically satisfactory to her and helped make it possible for her to feel whole despite her dishonored past. Eva Perón was born illegitimate (certainly) in the town of Los Toldos (certainly) on May ,  (possibly), and died in , at the symbolic age of thirty-three. Her birthdate is in question because no documents, either civil or religious, are known to exist—they seem to have been destroyed. According to sources who claim to have viewed these documents, she and one of her older sisters, Erminda, and her only brother, Juan, were baptized at the same time—November , . Her baptismal name was Eva María Ibarguren. Interestingly, Erminda’s middle name was Luján. No name was listed on Evita’s record for her father, perhaps because, as village gossip would have it, her parents had had a dispute about what names should be used for the children. Her mother was Juana Ibargueren. Her father, Juan Duarte, may have wanted to conceal the children’s parentage, and perhaps his affair with Juana had entered difficult times; he reconciled with his legitimate wife in a neighboring town just months after Evita’s birth. Thus ended a liaison of almost two decades and five children including Evita. Along with it died any hope of status for Juana and her children in LosToldos, a small town in the pampa west of Buenos Aires.The family had enjoyed some regard, dressing well and employing a maid before Juan Duarte’s departure, but he left Juana and her children in reduced circumstances. Regardless of the name on the baptismal certificate, Evita and her siblings always used the name Duarte, aspiring to the status they had lost. When Evita was six her father died, and...

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