For this week’s reading, I would like to concentrate on what happened in Argentina. Before reading the text, I would think of Argentina as a country in love with soccer. Argentina has one of the best soccer teams in the world and often play for the World Cups. However, after reading about Madres de la Plaza Mayo, my impression toward Argentina completely changed. The movement Madres de la Plaza de Mayo was a political movement comprised of mothers who had claimed that their children were kidnapped by the authority. In 1977, a small group of women gathered at the Plaza de Mayo and demanded information about their missing children.  In the beginning, their movement was not disturbed even though any political movement was banned, and the authority thought that their movement was not a threat. However, as the movement enlarged with the aid from foreign journalist, the authority started to block the movement and dispatched a secret police. While I was reading the text, I was surprised that it was a group of women who stood up against the dictatorship even though they could be hurt potentially in the future. Especially when dead corpses arrived near the beach of Mar del Plata, other countries started to gain more interest in event in Argentina.

The authoritarian government of Argentina tried to divert people’s anger to external by attempting to seize Falkland island, which is part of the UK. However, this war was a complete failure, which augmented the anger and sparked massive protest. Hence, the government responded by promising a democratic society in 1983. It was intriguing to read about invasion of Falkland island because this was something I had known before reading, but I was not sure about the full context behind the war and always looked for an opportunity to learn.

In this term, I happened to learn about some social movements in other classes, and I was surprised to learn about women’s contribution in the movement. I always thought that men were the main characters of the movement, but because of various feminist movements and Madres de la Plaza Mayo I was able to learn the importance of women’s participation and their achievements. In sum, my image toward Argentina drastically changed and by learning dark side of Argentinean history, I believe that I have better understanding of it and judging it objectively.