Resumen

ALBALADEJO, Christophe; SASSONE, Susana M.  y  CARA, Roberto Bustos. Patrimonialización del pasado francés en la pequeña ciudad pampeana de Pigüé: un recurso para la identidad y el desarrollo local. Rev. Univ. geogr. [online]. 2018, vol.27, n.2, pp. 43-77. ISSN 1852-4265.

This article analyses the processes of building the identity of a territory and the way local actors manage and increase a cultural heritage from a unique migratory past going from the private sphere of families or a particular community to the local public sphere. We take the case of the present of the French immigrant in the small town of Pigüé (17,000 inhabitants), in Saavedra district (Province of Buenos Aires). The society became aware of this past as an identity resource in 1984 with the centennial celebrations of the town foundation. Cultural cooperation with France allowed some people to find it, discover or value their family background, and for several others, of French origin or not, to create new links with France and the past of the territory. Fifteen semi-structured interviews were conducted with the key actors of this process, giving way to the transversal thematic analysis of the recorded stories. We conclude that a construction of a local social memory was achieved in the present of the French past as a territorial resource beyond the community of origin. This resource, which is constituted as patrimony, is likely to be used economically for local development with minor risks of commercial or folklorising reinterpretations.

Palabras llave : Local development; Patrimonialisation; Territorialisation; Local memory; Immigration.