María de los Ángeles Picone
I am an Assistant Professor of History at Boston College. I specialize in the spatial history of Modern Latin America focusing on on border regions of the Southern Cone and their intersection with nature and nation-making. Particularly, I am drawn to questions on how people experienced a shared sense of community through their spatial practices.
My forthcoming book, Landscaping Patagonia: Spatial History and Nation-Making in Chile and Argentina (UNC Press, 2025), examines how explorers, migrants, authorities, and visitors constructed their versions of ‘Chile’ and ‘Argentina’ in the Northern Patagonian Andes. I argue that between the 1890s and 1940s, these groups created shared versions of nationhood through regional, often cross-border, interpretations and transformations of the natural environment. This study shows how different actors – namely explorers, settlers, authorities, visitors, and bandits – sought to make Patagonia their own by transforming a collection of geographical sites into a landscape that evoked a shared past and a common future.
At Boston College, I teach courses on Modern Latin America, Spatial History, Environmental History, Sports History, and Borderlands. My teaching frequently includes unessay assignments and digital projects, from board games to websites. I’m also co-director of the Graduate Certificate in Digital Humanities and affiliated faculty in the Environmental Studies Program and the Clough Center for the Study of Constitutional Democracy (2023-2025).
My forthcoming book, Landscaping Patagonia: Spatial History and Nation-Making in Chile and Argentina (UNC Press, 2025), examines how explorers, migrants, authorities, and visitors constructed their versions of ‘Chile’ and ‘Argentina’ in the Northern Patagonian Andes. I argue that between the 1890s and 1940s, these groups created shared versions of nationhood through regional, often cross-border, interpretations and transformations of the natural environment. This study shows how different actors – namely explorers, settlers, authorities, visitors, and bandits – sought to make Patagonia their own by transforming a collection of geographical sites into a landscape that evoked a shared past and a common future.
At Boston College, I teach courses on Modern Latin America, Spatial History, Environmental History, Sports History, and Borderlands. My teaching frequently includes unessay assignments and digital projects, from board games to websites. I’m also co-director of the Graduate Certificate in Digital Humanities and affiliated faculty in the Environmental Studies Program and the Clough Center for the Study of Constitutional Democracy (2023-2025).
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Papers by María de los Ángeles Picone
Methodology: Through critical analysis of petitions, newspaper articles, police investigations, and government reports, along with legislation and census data, I examine the genealogy of violence that made possible the granting of extensive land concessions to a large cattle ranching estate, the Rupanco Company, on Coihueco Island, a fertile plain in Llanquihue Province, and the resistance it provoked.
Originality: By embedding the concession made to the Rupanco Company in a longer history of violence, my analysis demonstrates how ideas about space shaped land distribution and created pathways for resistance in courts, before police officers, and through local newspapers. Thus, it shows the overlapping sovereignties between the state, Indigenous Mapuche communities, and private companies.
Conclusions: The conflict on Coihueco Island in the early twentieth century illustrates a long history of violence against a geographical area interpreted as vacant by legislation, military action, and occupation. The creation of private and public property expanded the state’s ability to legitimize toponymy, land ownership, or expulsions, provoking multiple forms of resistance.
Dentro de este marco, jugaron un papel relevante las guías de turismo editadas y publicadas por la mencionada Dirección. En ellas, se refleja el claro mensaje sobre qué identidad se quiere construir en esta región. Sin embargo, las guías de Parques Nacionales no fueron las únicas publicadas. Autores privados que viajaron al sur utilizando los servicios ofrecidos por la Dirección también escribieron guías que sirvieran a otros viajeros. Las similitudes y diferencias que aparecen en estas publicaciones sobre los contenidos, la audiencia y la percepción de Bariloche dan cuenta tanto del mensaje que buscó difundir Parques Nacionales y de cuánto impactó en los turistas. El presente trabajo compara dos guías, una ‘oficial’ y otra ‘privada’ publicadas en 1938 para complejizar el mensaje que la DPN quiso dar en la década de 1930.
Tourism has been present at San Carlos de Bariloche, Argentina, since before the 1930s, although it was only when the National Parks Bureau was founded in 1934 that this activity became de centre of a public policy designed in Buenos Aires. The application of this plan reflected the careful intervention of the National Parks Bureau in local matters and supported by several spreading procedures that fed the idea that tourism was the only activity to which the city of Bariloche was destined to develop.
In this context, the role played by the tourist guidebooks edited and published by the mentioned Bureau was crucial. It is reflected in them the clear message of which identity was the national government trying to build in the region. Nonetheless, the guidebooks published by National Parks were not the only existent ones. Private authors that travelled to the south making use of the facilities provided by the Bureau also wrote guides to aid other travellers. The similarities and differences on content, audience and perception of Bariloche that appear in these publications show both the message the Bureau aimed at spreading and its impact of tourists. This paper will compare two tourist guidebooks, an ‘official’ one and a ‘private’ one, both published in 1938, in order to better understand the complexity of the message of the National Parks Bureau."
Conference Presentations by María de los Ángeles Picone
En la década de 1930 el paisaje barilochense asociado a paisajes europeos sufrió una resignificación ideada por la Dirección de Parques Nacionales (DPN) y su primer presidente, Exequiel Bustillo. En vistas de la construcción de la nacionalidad en una región de frontera y acorde a los objetivos concretos de un gobierno, Bariloche se presentó al público –la élite porteña– como objeto turístico de manera casi exclusiva, comparándolo, paradójicamente, con los paisajes europeos.
El presente trabajo se propone examinar esta resignificación a luz de fuentes documentales no estudiadas como son los diarios del Club Andino Bariloche, como espacio de sociabilidad local, y guías de turismo escritas tanto por organismos nacionales como autores privados, dirigidas hacia un público concreto radicado en Buenos Aires.
Las imágenes emergen, en esta línea, como una fuente indispensable, ya que en la lectura e interpretación del paisaje surgen como argumento inapelable de un orden geográfico que se traslada al orden social. La construcción de paisajes es un tema largamente estudiado, que se vincula al fortalecimiento identitario y de construcción de nacionalidad . En el caso que nos ocupa, veremos cómo distintos actores interactuaron a lo largo del período valorizando el paisaje de diferentes maneras y tensionaron, en mayor o menor medida, el elemento europeo en la zona de frontera que es de nuestro interés. Son estas valorizaciones las que “contribuyen a la comprensión y al abordaje de problemáticas actuales relacionadas con la relación sociedad-naturaleza-desarrollo, con la cuestión territorial y con la actividad turística en particular” .
Methodology: Through critical analysis of petitions, newspaper articles, police investigations, and government reports, along with legislation and census data, I examine the genealogy of violence that made possible the granting of extensive land concessions to a large cattle ranching estate, the Rupanco Company, on Coihueco Island, a fertile plain in Llanquihue Province, and the resistance it provoked.
Originality: By embedding the concession made to the Rupanco Company in a longer history of violence, my analysis demonstrates how ideas about space shaped land distribution and created pathways for resistance in courts, before police officers, and through local newspapers. Thus, it shows the overlapping sovereignties between the state, Indigenous Mapuche communities, and private companies.
Conclusions: The conflict on Coihueco Island in the early twentieth century illustrates a long history of violence against a geographical area interpreted as vacant by legislation, military action, and occupation. The creation of private and public property expanded the state’s ability to legitimize toponymy, land ownership, or expulsions, provoking multiple forms of resistance.
Dentro de este marco, jugaron un papel relevante las guías de turismo editadas y publicadas por la mencionada Dirección. En ellas, se refleja el claro mensaje sobre qué identidad se quiere construir en esta región. Sin embargo, las guías de Parques Nacionales no fueron las únicas publicadas. Autores privados que viajaron al sur utilizando los servicios ofrecidos por la Dirección también escribieron guías que sirvieran a otros viajeros. Las similitudes y diferencias que aparecen en estas publicaciones sobre los contenidos, la audiencia y la percepción de Bariloche dan cuenta tanto del mensaje que buscó difundir Parques Nacionales y de cuánto impactó en los turistas. El presente trabajo compara dos guías, una ‘oficial’ y otra ‘privada’ publicadas en 1938 para complejizar el mensaje que la DPN quiso dar en la década de 1930.
Tourism has been present at San Carlos de Bariloche, Argentina, since before the 1930s, although it was only when the National Parks Bureau was founded in 1934 that this activity became de centre of a public policy designed in Buenos Aires. The application of this plan reflected the careful intervention of the National Parks Bureau in local matters and supported by several spreading procedures that fed the idea that tourism was the only activity to which the city of Bariloche was destined to develop.
In this context, the role played by the tourist guidebooks edited and published by the mentioned Bureau was crucial. It is reflected in them the clear message of which identity was the national government trying to build in the region. Nonetheless, the guidebooks published by National Parks were not the only existent ones. Private authors that travelled to the south making use of the facilities provided by the Bureau also wrote guides to aid other travellers. The similarities and differences on content, audience and perception of Bariloche that appear in these publications show both the message the Bureau aimed at spreading and its impact of tourists. This paper will compare two tourist guidebooks, an ‘official’ one and a ‘private’ one, both published in 1938, in order to better understand the complexity of the message of the National Parks Bureau."
En la década de 1930 el paisaje barilochense asociado a paisajes europeos sufrió una resignificación ideada por la Dirección de Parques Nacionales (DPN) y su primer presidente, Exequiel Bustillo. En vistas de la construcción de la nacionalidad en una región de frontera y acorde a los objetivos concretos de un gobierno, Bariloche se presentó al público –la élite porteña– como objeto turístico de manera casi exclusiva, comparándolo, paradójicamente, con los paisajes europeos.
El presente trabajo se propone examinar esta resignificación a luz de fuentes documentales no estudiadas como son los diarios del Club Andino Bariloche, como espacio de sociabilidad local, y guías de turismo escritas tanto por organismos nacionales como autores privados, dirigidas hacia un público concreto radicado en Buenos Aires.
Las imágenes emergen, en esta línea, como una fuente indispensable, ya que en la lectura e interpretación del paisaje surgen como argumento inapelable de un orden geográfico que se traslada al orden social. La construcción de paisajes es un tema largamente estudiado, que se vincula al fortalecimiento identitario y de construcción de nacionalidad . En el caso que nos ocupa, veremos cómo distintos actores interactuaron a lo largo del período valorizando el paisaje de diferentes maneras y tensionaron, en mayor o menor medida, el elemento europeo en la zona de frontera que es de nuestro interés. Son estas valorizaciones las que “contribuyen a la comprensión y al abordaje de problemáticas actuales relacionadas con la relación sociedad-naturaleza-desarrollo, con la cuestión territorial y con la actividad turística en particular” .