Defining Patagonia
Definiendo Patagonia
In Alex Bowen's 2005 film
Mi Mejor Enemigo ( My Best Enemy), disoriented Argentine and Chilean military patrols run into each other during a 1978 conflict without being certain which side of the border they're on. In a southern Patagonian steppe with no obvious markers, their encounter is, on one level, an allegory for the entire concept of Patagonia—a mythical region shared by the two countries.
Patagonia is a brand. It's also a region that everybody's heard of and wants to visit, but that nobody describes with any precision. There is consensus that it is, broadly speaking, the southernmost part of South America but, beyond that, there's wide disagreement, especially when it comes to the Chilean side. What exactly is this region that has so stimulated the imagination for so many since Ferdinand Magellan first landed near present- day Port San Julián in the 16th century?
A recent El Mercurio article, citing the Instituto Antártico Chileno, linked Patagonia to its separation from Africa as part of the Gondwana supercontinent, and the expansion of grassy steppes that began some 60 million years ago in the southeastern sector of the South American continent. To the west, Chile's Pacific sector consists of rugged forested mountains, fjords and islands and, in the same article, conservationist Bárbara Saavedra stresses the surrounding seas, with its abundance of penguins and marine mammals, as an inte-
En la película Mi Mejor
Enemigo, dirigida por Alex Bowen y estrenada en 2005, desorientadas patrullas militares argentinas y chilenas se encuentran durante un conflicto en 1978, sin estar seguros en qué lado de la frontera están. En una estepa del sur de la Patagonia sin marcas precisas, su encuentro es, en un nivel, una alegoría para todo el concepto de Patagonia, una mítica región que ambos países comparten.
Patagonia es una marca. También es una región de la que todos han escuchado y quieren visitar, pero nadie la describe con mucha precisión. Hay consenso que es, en general, la parte más austral de Sudamérica pero, más allá de eso, hay gran discrepancia, especialmente del lado chileno. ¿Qué es exactamente esta región, que ha estimulado tanto la imaginación de muchos desde que Fernando de Magallanes recaló por primera vez, en el siglo XVI, cerca de lo que hoy es el Puerto San Julián? Un reciente artículo de El Mercurio, que cita al Instituto Antártico Chileno, vinculó la Patagonia con su separación de África como parte del supercontinente Gondwana, y la expansión de estepas pastosas que comenzó hace unos 60 millones de años en el sureste del continente sudamericano. Hacia el oeste, el sector chileno del Pacífico consiste en boscosas y escabrosas montañas, fiordos e islas y, en el mismo artículo, la conservacionista Bárbara Saavedra destaca los mares adyacentes, con su abundancia de pingüinos
The Patagonia region is in southern Chile and Argentina, but its exact boundaries are cause for debate. La región de la Patagonia está en el sur de Chile y Argentina, pero sus límites exactos son motivo de debate.
“Patagonia is a brand. It’s also a region that everybody’s heard of and wants to visit, but that nobody describes with any precision.” “Patagonia es una marca. También es una región de la que todos han escuchado y quieren visitar, pero nadie la describe con mucha precisión”.
gral part of Patagonia—from Argentina's Río de la Plata around the continent's tip and north to Chiloé. The University of Chile biologist Mary Kalin Arroyo points out that the steppes that sprawl over the far south of Argentina and parts of Chile are actually recent compared to the forests in the region that resemble those of New Zealand and the Pacific Northwest.
Prospective visitors may think first of iconic landscapes like Torres del Paine and the Perito Moreno Glacier, but Patagonia's name probably derives from the nomadic Tehuelche people, the first aboriginal inhabitants of the region's far south whom early explorers encountered and dubbed “Patagones,” often translated as “people with big feet.” Though the word's etymology is uncertain, Magellan's Italian chronicler Antonio Pigafetta reported that Magellan himself first used this descriptive term from a 16th-century knightly tale for peoples who dwarfed the Spaniards in stature.
Hearsay grew that legend, but the region's native people are still a good starting point for defining the region. Until the late 19th century, the Tehuelche, Mapuche, Huilliche, Pewenche, Puelche and other indigenous peoples dominated the area south of the Río Colorado (in Argentina) and the Río Biobío (on the Chilean side), and they are still a presence today—most conspicuously in Chile. Still, those boundaries are more convenient than definitive.
Argentine Patagonia
In southern Buenos Aires province, just north of the Río Colorado, a roadside mapsign on coastal Ruta 3 states—unequivocally—that “Patagonia starts here.” Broadly speaking, Argentine Patagonia comprises the mainland provinces south of the Colorado—Río Negro, Neuquén, Chubut and Santa Cruz—plus its sector of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago. Geographically, it's about the size of Texas or Turkey, much of it “Big Sky Country”—think Montana, but with an Atlantic coastline populated by marine mammals (whales and seals) and penguins. As you travel west, the thinly vegetated steppe turns into southern beech forest as it approaches the relict glacial lakes on both sides of the Andes.
Historically and politically, it's not quite so clear-cut. According to University of Buenos Aires geographer Carlos Reboratti, it's “more administrative than real” and, as population increased, the territory's configuration changed and there began to appear various “Patagonias.” One of these, known as Comahue, included the more northerly province of La Pampa and a surprisingly large sector of southern Buenos Aires Province.
y mamíferos marinos, como una parte integral de la Patagonia, desde el Río de la Plata en Argentina, rodeando el extremo sur del continente, y hacia el norte hasta Chiloé. La bióloga de la Universidad de Chile, Mary Kalin Arroyo, señala que las estepas que se extienden por el extremo sur de Argentina y partes de Chile son en realidad recientes en comparación con los bosques de la región que se asemejan a los de Nueva Zelanda y, en menor medida, a los del Pacífico Noroeste.
Los potenciales visitantes pueden pensar primero en paisajes emblemáticos como Torres del Paine y el glaciar Perito Moreno, pero el nombre Patagonia deriva probablemente del pueblo nómade tehuelche, los primeros aborígenes del sur de la Patagonia, a quienes los primeros exploradores encontraron y denominaron “patagones”, a menudo traducido como “personas con pies grandes”. Aunque la etimología de la palabra es incierta, el cronista italiano de Magallanes, Antonio Pigafetta, informó que el propio Magallanes utilizó por primera vez este término descriptivo, que viene de un cuento caballeresco del siglo XVI, donde se denominaba así a los pueblos que empequeñecieron a los españoles en estatura.
Los rumores hicieron crecer esa leyenda, pero los pueblos nativos de la zona siguen siendo un buen punto de partida para definir la región. Hasta fines del siglo XIX, los tehuelches, mapuches, huilliches, pehuenches, puelches y otros pueblos indígenas dominaron el área al sur del río Colorado (en Argentina) y el río Biobío (en el lado chileno), y siguen presentes hoy, más notoriamente en Chile. Sin embargo, esos límites son más convenientes que definitivos.
Patagonia argentina
En el sur de la Provincia de Buenos Aires, justo al norte del río Colorado, un cartel en la costera Ruta 3 establece, rotundamente, que “la Patagonia comienza aquí”. En general, la Patagonia argentina comprende las provincias al sur del río Colorado: Río Negro, Neuquén, Chubut y Santa Cruz, más la zona del archipiélago de Tierra del Fuego. Geográficamente, es más o menos del tamaño de Texas o Turquía, y tiene mucho del
País del Gran Cielo (como se conoce al estado de Montana) pero con una costa atlántica habitada por mamíferos marinos (ballenas, focas) y pingüinos. Mientras viajas al oeste, la estepa de vegetación fina se convierte en un meridional bosque de Nothofagus al acercarse a los lagos glaciares en ambos lados de los Andes.
Histórica y políticamente hablando, no es tan claro. De acuerdo al geógrafo de la Universidad de Buenos Aires, Carlos Reboratti, es “más administrativo que real” y, a medida que creció la población, la configuración del territorio cambió y empezaron a aparecer varias “Patagonias”. Una de estas, conocida como “Comahue”, incluye la provincia más norteña de La Pampa, y sorprendentemente gran parte del sur de la Provincia de Buenos Aires.
Aún así, dice Reboratti, desde un estricto punto de vista geográfico la Patagonia argentina abarca estas áreas más al norte, incluyendo la parte sur de la Provincia de Mendoza (en el pueblo mendocino de Malargüe, los motoristas disfrutan el beneficio del descuento en gasolina y diésel con sus “precios patagónicos” así como lo hacen en La Pampa, al sur de la Provincia de Buenos Aires, y hacia el sur).
Reboratti destaca que la “marca” Patagonia Argentina aplica a toda el área al sur del río Colorado: “La Pampa siempre ha manifestado pertenecer a la Patagonia, pero nadie les cree, ¡y mucho menos los patagónicos!”. Él plantea dos Patagonias: la clásica estepa, ventosa y poco poblada, y un sector andino que se extiende desde Bariloche hasta El Calafate.
Still, says Reboratti, from a strictly geographical point of view Argentine Patagonia encompasses these more northerly areas, even including southernmost Mendoza province (Don't dismiss the administrative standard—in the Mendocino town of Malargüe, motorists enjoy the benefit of discount “Patagonian prices” on gasoline and diesel, as they do in La Pampa, southernmost Buenos Aires province, and points south).
Reboratti stresses Argentine Patagonia's “brand” applies to the area south of the Colorado: “La Pampa has always claimed to belong to Patagonia, but nobody believes them, much less the Patagonians themselves!” He posits two Patagonias: the classic steppe, windy and thinly populated, and an Andean sector stretching from Bariloche to El Calafate of “mountains, lakes, forests and snows, clearly differentiated but still defining itself as Patagonia.”
Both Patagonias have antecedents. Many Argentines date Patagonia from the 1880s, when General Julio Argentino Roca undertook the so-called Conquista del Desierto (“Conquest of the Desert”) to establish national authority there. At that time, says Reboratti, it was “a mythological notion linked to the remote and unknown.” Roca brought scientists to document the region's resources, but his troops attacked the Chilean Mapuche, who had crossed the Andes and often raided early settlers' livestock (though there was also trade between the two groups).
Under Roca, the indigenous were partly exterminated, captured and deported, or confined to the Andean piedmont. There remain clusters of these Argentine Mapuche, revitalized by legislation acknowledging their identity and granting them land rights, but it's worth mentioning that Roca's equestrian statue, on Bariloche's Centro Cívico, is frequently defaced with epithets like “murderer.”
Because of their similarities to Argentina's coastal steppe, there's a geological case for including the Falkland Islands in Patagonia as they are part of the Deseado Massif that forms much of Santa Cruz Province and the adjacent ocean floor. In human terms, though, as Reboratti says, “At some point the relation was more symbiotic than now (for example, the sheep flocks of Patagonia came in large part from the Falklands), however today it can't be said that the Falklands are ‘part of Patagonia' given that, in practice, there is no relationship whatsoever.”
Chilean Patagonia
In Chile, Patagonia traditionally begins at the channels and fjords of the thinly populated Aysén region. It's an almost roadless area dependent on ferries and planes for movement until the completion of the construction of the Carretera Austral some two decades ago. In its terrain and vegetation, it resembles British Columbia and the Alaska Panhandle.
Chile's southernmost region of Magallanes, which includes part of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago, is undoubtedly Patagonia. But the more northerly “Lakes District” south of the Río Biobío has also actively embraced the designation, and in that sense, Patagonia is becoming an informal geographical brand (rather than a celebrated clothing line) and such an expansive definition would bring the Chilean boundaries more closely in line with those in Argentina.
In size, Chilean Patagonia is roughly comparable to Germany, but environmentally speaking the differences with Argentina are striking. South of Puerto Montt, it's a maze of channels and islands covered with dense forests that, on the continental side, occasionally give way to rolling grasslands and even glaciated peaks. Farther south, the steppe becomes Magellanic moorland, while the glaciers and icefields still survive.
Eco-anthropologist Horacio Larraín, of Chile's Catholic University, takes a more restricted view of what constitutes Patagonia, derived from Darwin's description of the indigenous Tehuelche as hunters of the guanaco and inhabitants of the cool, arid steppe. “In modern times,” he says, “when Argentina occupied the area, eliminating the Tehuelches and Pampas Indians by force and violence, the landowners started raising sheep, with great success. Sheep replaced the guanaco. In that sense,” he asserts, “Chile's Aysén region is barely Patagonia, with its dense woodlands and heavy rainfall.”
The more southerly Magallanes region, Larraín suggests, is different because of a steppe that extends east and north from the city of Punta Arenas to the Argentine