Afro Argentine

Afro Argentine

The black population resulting from the slave trade during the centuries of Spanish domination of the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata had a major role in Argentine history. Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, it comprised up to fifty per cent of the population in some provinces and had a deep impact on national culture. In the 19th century, it declined sharply in number as a result of factors such the wars of Independence, high infant mortality rates, low number of married blacks, the Paraguayan War, cholera epidemics in 1861 and 1864, as well as a yellow fever epidemic in 1871. By the late 19th century, the Afro-Argentine population consisted mainly of women who mixed with the European immigrants that arrived. With thousands of immigrants of Europe arriving to Argentine soil, and most black women intermarrying with them, whose populations were already low, the Población negra en Argentina became largely indistinct from the general population.

Research supports the claim by the Center for Genetic Studies of the School of Arts and Sciences of the Universidad de Buenos Aires (UBA) that an estimated 4.3 percent of the people living in suburban Buenos Aires have genetic markers of African descent. Today there is still a notable Afro-Argentine community in the Buenos Aires district of San Telmo. There are also quite a few black Afro-Argentines in Merlo and Ciudad Evita cities, in the Buenos Aires metropolitan area.