Building Territories in Urban Settings: Family Networks of Indigenous Peoples in Argentina’s Hinterland

This chapter deals with the process of migrations led by indigenous peoples in La Pampa province (Argentina), focusing on how family networks allowed them to build territories in new environments, such as Santa Rosa city. Migration patterns, ways of obtaining resources (food, shelter and jobs) and everyday life features are examined while specific family cases are presented. As regards methodology, this research combines qualitative and quantitative approaches and is based on interviews, genealogical trees, birth, marriage and death certificates, images, city government documents and maps, among other sources. Family networks were drawn with Genopro, a software which allows for visualization of multiple generations and lines of descendance.Fil: Salomon Tarquini, Celia Claudia. Universidad Nacional de la Pampa. Facultad de Ciencias Humanas. Instituto de Estudios Históricos y Sociales de La Pampa. - Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Patagonia Confluencia. Instituto de Estudios Históricos y Sociales de La Pampa; Argentin

To speak with the other's voice: reducing asymmetry and social distance in mental health care admission interviews

The aim of this article is to examine the case of adoption of characteristic features of the interlocutor's ‘voice’ in mental health care admission interviews at a public hospital in Buenos Aires, Argentina. We observed ethnographically that ‘speaking with the Other's voice’ is a strategy adopted by psychoanalysts to achieve clinical goals, though they overlook its wider implications and contradictions as it involves both professionals and patients. We will argue that patients adopt bureaucratic and psychiatric terms in order to decrease asymmetry and reorient the activity conducted between the professional and the client. On the other hand, professionals tend to consider social class, age, ethnicity or religion when adopting the patient's voice in an attempt to decrease social distance. These strategies are employed to accomplish different goals during the interview: to the patient, it is a way to show competence in the activity of medical consultation, indexing the highly valued voices of state institutions and psychiatric knowledge; to the professional, it is a strategy to achieve clinical goals by decreasing social distance and enhancing transference. Analysis will show the unequal distribution of voicing options for participants: while patients attempt to reduce asymmetry despite social distance, psychotherapists try to decrease social distance but maintain asymmetry. In conclusion, wider implications will be discussed for intergroup communication between professionals and clients.Fil: Bonnin, Juan Eduardo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Saavedra 15. Centro de Estudios E Investigaciones Laborales; Argentin