Rethinking Testimonial Cinema in Postdictatorship Argentina: Beyond Memory Fatigue

By critically examining how trauma theory and subaltern studies have previously been applied to testimonial cinema, Garibotto rereads Argentinian films produced since 1983 and calls for an alternate interpretive framework at the intersection of semiotics, theories of affect, scholarship on hegemony, and the ideological uses of documentary and fiction. She argues that recurrent concepts—such as trauma, mourning, memory, and subalternity—miss how testimonial films have changed over time, shifting from subaltern narratives to official, hegemonic, and iconic accounts. Her work highlights the urgent need to continue to study these types of narratives, particularly at a time when military dictatorships have become entrenched in Latin America and memory narratives proliferate worldwide. Although Argentina is Garibotto's focus, her theory can be adapted to other contexts in which narratives about recent political conflicts have shifted from alternative versions of history to official, hegemonic accounts—such as in Spanish, Chilean, Uruguayan, Brazilian, South African, and Holocaust testimonies. Garibotto's study of testimonial cinema moves us to pursue a broader ideological analysis of the links between film and historical representation.