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Donna J.Guy Mothers Alive and Dead Multiple Concept s o f Mothering i n Bueno s Aire s Mothering has many meanings for Argentines. Some beliefs stem from popula r cultur e an d ar e linked t o a higher valu e placed o n birthin g than o n raisin g a child . Accordin g t o popula r Argentin e religiou s lore , between 1820 and 1860 in San Juan province, Dalinda Antonia Correa died of thirst on a dusty road with an infant by her side. Miraculously, her breast milk continued after her death, and the suckling and the mother were found by mule-team drivers. No one seems to know what happened to the infant, but many accounts say that he died shortly thereafter . The fate of the infant seem s to be unrelated t o that of the mother, who became a popular, uncanonized saint . Except fo r th e last episode, her lif e was unknown, but as a saint, she was later assigned othe r good works. La Difunta Corre a (the dead Correa, her religious name) was then praised as a woman who had patriotically spoken out against tyrants before he r death , as a wife who followed her husband after he was impressed into service by a dictatorial political leader, and as a mother who sustained her infant even in death. According to Juan Draghi Lucero, Remembering her glorifies fidelity to an absent spouse and ... gives meaning to her gift of her breasts to her son in her moment of agony. She is the perfect * 15 5 l0 156 * Donna J.Guy woman according to popular definitions. She is submissive and self denying and because of this she feels God at her side in His Holy Glory. Subsequently, La E>ifunta Corre a became the patron saint of truck drivers. Throughout Argentina roadside altars provide opportunities to leave offer ings , usually b y men . There ar e also formal site s where me n an d wome n pray fo r miracles . Although L a Difunt a Correa' s miracles—throug h no t only he r miraculou s mil k bu t als o he r response s t o prayers—hav e neve r been accepted by the formal Catholic Church, she has the most elaborately developed set of shrines and rituals of any popular saint in Argentina. Is this the Argentine paradigm of an ideal mother?2 During th e sam e perio d o f civi l wars , i n 1848 , the order s o f anothe r Argentine despot, Juan Manuel de Rosas, shattered sensibilities by sending a pregnant mother-to-be to the firing squad . Camila O'Gorman, guilt y of marrying a priest, wa s execute d despit e th e colonia l traditio n o f sparin g pregnant women. This time the state intentionally create d it s own marty r and presented th e nation with anothe r dead woman to promote order an d stability fo r Rosas' s authoritaria n regime . Although Camil a ha s no t bee n celebrated as a popular saint, a movie was made about her immediately afte r the demise of the military dictatorships in the 1980s.3 The depiction of Dalinda's death in religious art and practice, along with the retellin g o f Camila' s deat h i n moder n movies , recalls th e nineteenth century practice of using the image of a "dead woman ... t o regenerate the order o f society , t o eliminat e destructiv e forces." 4 Elisabet h Bronfe n ha s argued that during times of change and instability, the symbolic sacrifice of a woman helps reestablish "an order that was momentarily suspended du e to her presence."5 These women were both real and symbolic, and their sacrifice may have served to stabilize society, but as mothers of the future citi zenry , they could never fulfill their patriotic duty. Thus new forms of female patriotism had to be envisioned and constructed to both stabilize society as well as protect the future of the state. It too k man y years for stat e officials t o develo p thes e new ideas. Civil wars laste d until 1862 , and basi c civil, commercial, an d penal code s wer e not fully in place until the 1880s. There was no national public health organization until 1880 , and for many years...

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