Argentina’s African Roots

Argentina’s Afro-descendant community has long struggled for recognition of its cultural contribution to the country. Now the Department of Human Rights has published a book entitled “Argentina’s African Roots: Visibility, Recognition and Rights,” which contains articles, pictures, poems, stories and testimonies that reflect the diversity of the country’s African-Argentine community. The book tells the stories of Africans brought to the shores as slaves in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the hardships they have faced and the many contributions they have made to Argentina. The authors hope that the book will be adopted as a text in the nation’s schools and especially in history classes that have never even touched the issue. Leo Poblete reports from Buenos Aires for teleSUR.