An Imagined Race and its Architectural Defense. Modernism and Racial Discourse in Chile 1938-1941

Resumen

This article explores some of the ways in which modern architecture was involved in the construction of a racial imaginary in Chile during the government of Pedro Aguirre Cerda, from 1938 to 1941. It attempts to reconstruct how the concept of ‘race’ was used by Aguirre Cerda’s state program ‘The Defense of the Race and the Good use of Free Time,’ and by Jorge Aguirre Silva, its leading architect. By situating architectural discourse alongside medical science, physical education, and eugenics in the development of Aguirre Cerda’s program, it attempts to show how its architecture was influenced not only by European modernism, but also by a local version of hygienism, eugenics, and a form of nationalism based on the production and protection of an allegedly homogenous race.