Between Life & Choice: Discourse Analysis on the Argentinean Senate 2018 Luciana S. Fernandez University of Florida Abstract Feminist movements in Latin America have gained significant support, but at the same rate have counter movements. This paper analyzes the speeches of Argentine Senate in 2018 in the discussion for the legalization of abortion through Discourse Analysis. This study is performed at three different levels. First, there is a textual and contextual close reading of the senators’ speeches in favor and against the legalization of abortion. I highlight the most used themes across the discussion as well as the incidence of topics to argue in the opposite positions. By using Discourse Analysis, I identify the overarching themes that appeal for a preconceived notion of the ideal Argentine nation. Second, I focus on the broader notions of gender and nationalism as social constructs that have real effects in the population. I see how each side of the discourse serves the desires and purposes of an ideology or national ideal. Lastly, I investigate the real sociological consequences of the discourses for citizens in their lives and the new challenges for emerging social movements. Keywords: pro-life, pro-choice, abortion discourse analysis, gender, nationalism 3 BETWEEN “LIFE” & “CHOICE” - Fernandez TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. BACKGROUND ................................................................................................... 4 1.1.FEMINISM AND NATIONALISM IN CONTEMPORARY ARGENTINA .............................. 4 1.2.A BRIEF REVIEW OF THE HISTORY OF FEMINISM ..................................................... 5 1.3.ABORTION AS A FEMINIST ISSUE AND A HUMAN RIGHT .......................................... 8 2. THIS RESEARCH PROJECT .......................................................................... 10 2.1.METHODOLOGY ..................................................................................................... 10 2.2.ABOUT DISCOURSE ANALYSIS .............................................................................. 12 2.3.ANALYSIS OF THE SPEECHES FROM THE SENATE BY THEME .................................... 12 3. DISCUSSION ...................................................................................................... 24 3.1.NATIONALISM, GENDER AND THE STATE ............................................................... 24 3.2.SOCIOLOGICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF PRO-LIFE DISCOURSE .......................................... 28 3.3.SOCIOLOGICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF PRO-CHOICE DISCOURSE .................................... 29 4. CONCLUSSION ................................................................................................. 30 5. BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................... 32 4 BETWEEN “LIFE” & “CHOICE” - Fernandez 1. Background 1.1. Feminism and Nationalism in Contemporary Argentina Women’s Day in Argentina in 2019 was characterized by the streets being crowded with more than 400.000 people across the different provinces. Most participants were wearing green and/or purple representing the main flags of this wave of feminism in the country. Purple started to represent the protest against femicides and gender-based violence when #NiUnaMenos (Not One Less) went viral in the South American country in 2015. Green became the color to advocate for safe and legal abortion. As the new law was drafted the slogan representing the campaign was; “Sexual education to decide, birth control to not abort, and legal abortion to not die.” March 8th was not only a women’s march, but also a strike to protest the current political and economic situation in the country, where the president, Mauricio Macri, defunded projects aimed at the empowerment of women. In 2018, the Argentinean lower house passed the law for the termination of early pregnancy with 129 votes in favor and 125 against. The Argentinean Senate had the last word on the matter and decided to leave the country with a law from 1921, when 38 senators voted against the bill and 31 in favor. However, this was just the beginning as the feminist movements in the country keep protesting on the streets and fighting to expand sexual reproductive rights as well as the complete separation from church and state. The opposition to the new bill IVE (Interrupcion Voluntaria del Embarazo), Voluntary Interruption of Pregnancy, came mostly from conservative religious sectors such as the Catholic and Evangelical churches. At the same time, Argentina is the home of Pope Francis, who compared abortion to the eugenic campaigns carried out in the Nazi era (Specia, 2018). This is the furthest any piece of legislation regarding legal and safe abortion has made it in the Argentine political system. This project studies the different discourses proposed in 5 BETWEEN “LIFE” & “CHOICE” - Fernandez the senate to debate the decriminalization and legalization of abortion focusing on the portrayals of nationalism and the ideal society. Through the use of sociological discourse analysis this work will analyze such discourses at three different levels; textual, contextual, and sociological significance. In this paper, I assert that the political and social basis of the discourse against the legalization of abortion is founded in the argument that Argentinean nationalism and feminist ideals are not compatible. Second, through the analysis of speeches from the Senate in Argentina, I explore how the same arguments are used in both sides with opposite objectives. Lastly, I discuss how the young population, college students and in particular, the feminist movements have been a key factor in shifting and redefining cultural paradigms regarding abortion as well as sexual and reproductive rights (Politi & Londono, 2018). 1.2.A Brief Review of the History of Feminism The history of feminism and women is hard to establish, since most of the national historic memory neglected this group and its significance (Lavrin, 2005). Most authors state that feminism came to the country with the huge currents of immigrants coming from Europe at the end of the 19th century. These immigrants brought with them the ideas of anarchism. They were already concerned about the unequal power and relationships between different socio- economic classes, as well as men and women (Lavrin 2005 & Bellucci, 1997). Female Anarchists organized themselves, most of these women joined the Socialist Argentinean party, while trying to push forward for public policies to achieve equal rights (Lavrin, 2005 & Molyneux, 1986). Between 1896 and 1897, La voz de la Mujer, a women’s magazine, helped define the role of the workers and their relationship to this ideology. Molyneux (1986) analyzes the content in these publications and argues that the key element was “its recognition of the specificity of women's oppression” (Molyneux, 1986, p. 126). This oppression was not only by the bourgeois, but also by men in general. This was a key difference with the later emerging 6 BETWEEN “LIFE” & “CHOICE” - Fernandez socialist feminism, in which claims were solely focused on the oppression of the state and capitalism, ignoring the oppression went on in women’s private life. Anarchism with its ideals of equality arriving to Argentina with the European immigrants, shaped feminism and its conceptions in the country. La voz, a magazine focused on different feminist issues such as marriage, family, and male domination, was advocating to improve the legislation that was in place to regulate and control women’s lives (Molyneux, 1986, p. 129). The main problem with anarchist feminism, was how radical their ideas concerning the institutions of the family and marriage were, in a world where most women did not have other options. The family was a site of oppression and unequal division of labor in most cases, but some women also found this place to have at least some security and certainty about their future (Molyneux, 1986, p. 142). After the anarchist feminist magazine stopped publishing, socialist feminism emerges alongside with the Socialist Party. The three main pillars of this version of feminism were then defined by Justa Burgos (1903) who argued that the main objectives were: the acknowledgement of women’s intellectual capacity, the right to exercise any activity they could, and the right to participate in public and political decisions (Levrin, 2005). These were the same bases that the liberal feminist established earlier in Europe and North America (Lavrin, 2005). As it was the case with anarchism, the connection of feminism and the socialist party was strong, and the communication with the working class necessary, to create and develop its ideological platform (Lavrin 2005 & Bellucci, 1997). The magazine La Vanguardia, was one of the first sources in which definitions and political stances establishing the unfair relationship between the sexes were published by the Socialist Party (Lavrin, 2005, p. 35). The magazine’s main goal was to formulate demands for the state. This institution was the main discriminatory agent against women that also neglected other sexist practices happening in more private spaces such as marriage, the family, etc. (Molyneux, 1986, pp. 141-142). The socialist feminist group argued 7 BETWEEN “LIFE” & “CHOICE” - Fernandez that working was the main way women had to achieve equality. They saw that the class struggle was as important as the feminist cause for equality (Lavrin, 2005, p. 37). Work as a tool to even the playing field, was an idea shared with