Afro-Argentinian Day

Since 2013, November 8 has been celebrated as the National Day of Afro-Argentines and African Culture. The date was chosen to commemorate the recorded date for the death of María Remedios del Valle, a rabona and guerrilla fighter, who served with the Army of the North in the war of Independence.

The National Institute Against Discrimination (INADI) is the public body responsible for combating discrimination and racism. In 2021, the Argentine government announced the establishment of a “Afro-Argentine Community Federal Advisor Council”, made up of prominent Afro-Argentine activists and scholars.

The national holiday is being viewed as a victory for the nation’s Black Movement, which has spent decades campaigning against the notion that there either are no Black people in Argentina or that those Blacks found in Argentina do not have a long history in the nation. Today, there are an estimated 2 million people of African descent in Argentina of various ethnicities, including Afro-Argentineans, Cape Verde Argentineans, and many West and Central African immigrants. As recently as 2010, the national census for the first time included questions that allowed citizens to identify themselves as people of African descent. Prior to that, the last identification of any Argentinean as a person of African descent was in 1895.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afro-Argentines#