The Banality of Evil, Nunca Más and the Implicated Subject in Argentine Memory Spaces. Issue 2 (4th May 2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Rodd, Robin
• Is Part Of: Journal of Iberian and Latin American research. Volume 27:Issue 2(2021)
• Page Start: 228
• Page End: 244
• Publication Date: 2021-05-04
• Subjects: Banality of evil -- implicated subject -- Nunca Más -- Argentina -- memory; Civilization, Hispanic -- Periodicals; Language and culture -- Spanish-speaking countries -- Periodicals; Latin America -- Periodicals; Spain -- Periodicals; Portugal -- Periodicals; 909.097561
• DOI: 10.1080/13260219.2021.1994699
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1326-0219

Abstract

ABSTRACT: The ambiguous relations and subjectivities associated with the banality of evil are peripheral to a dominant human rights discourse oriented around the binary logics of perpetrators and victims and dictatorship and democracy. The absence of non-binary subjectivities reflects a conceptual gap relating to questions of shared responsibility posed by Hannah Arendt more than half a century ago. Despite its ongoing relevance for reflecting on the production of systematic suffering, the banality of evil remains an incomplete theoretical project. Here, I bring recent elaborations on Arendt's notion of the banality of evil, particularly Michael Rothberg's Implicated Subjects, to bear on Argentine memory politics. I highlight the potential for the notion of the implicated subject to expand Argentine memory studies beyond the perpetrator-victim binary of the Nunca Más human rights discourse. Conceptual art and artistic approaches to memory may provide fruitful avenues for future exploration of implicated subjectivities and horizons of responsibility.