The Patagonian desert in southern Argentina is a harsh environment, where little seems to thrive on its seemingly endless red plains and parched land. Yet in this unlikely place, there is a unique community made up of the Afrikaans and Spanish-speaking descendants of the South African Boers.
This is the story of one of the least known communities among all those that emigrated to Argentina, still present and speaking Afrikaans up to this day. Welcome Avatar! At the beginning of the 20th century after the Boer War in 1902, Boer settlers arrived in Comodoro Rivadavia, Argentina, looking for freedom.
To many, Patagonian Afrikaans is a relic of the past. Against the odds, however, a renaissance has begun.
Historical Context: The Boers and Their Trek to Patagonia
The Boers trace their origins to the Dutch population that settled on the southern tip of Africa in the seventeenth century. In South Africa, the Boers (a name derived from Dutch/Afrikaans which means “farmers”) came into conflict with British colonizers and were defeated in 1902.
A group of British prisoners, with Winston Churchill. Source: Wikimedia Commons
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They came into conflict with the British Empire as it expanded in the region, culminating in the Second Anglo-Boer war of 1899-1902. This conflict is known as the Boer War, in which people of the like of Winston Churchill and Mahatma Gandhi fought on the side of the British army against the two Boer republics (the South African Republic and Orange Free State).
At the end of the war, many of the Boers were determined not to accept British rule, and sought to settle in other parts of the world, including Argentina. Many Boers, unwilling to accept British rule, then sought to relocate elsewhere, including Argentina. Around 650 families arrived between 1902 and 1907, settling in Patagonia after Roca’s “Conquest of the Desert.”
The official policy of Argentina since 1860 was to encourage the settlement of European immigrants. This policy was especially strengthened after 1880, once the military campaign of Julio A. Roca had ended. It was then that the Law of National Territories and in 1884 the Ley del Hogar were passed to encourage the settlement of European migrants. With these laws, the Argentine Government granted small plots of land for agricultural exploitation, in addition to guaranteeing them freedom of religion and association.
Within the framework of the promotion of European immigration, the Minister of Agriculture, Wenceslao Escalante, became interested in the colonization of Patagonia, taking into account the precedent of the establishment of Welsh colonies in the valley of the Chubut territory. Given the relative success of the Welsh colonies, groups with strong community ties were sought, considering that these ties would compensate for the lack of economic infrastructure.
At the end of 1901 before the end of the Second Boer War, the Argentine consulate in Cape Town actively promoted the migration for these groups, as well as offering the possibility of developing sheep farming in the province of Chubut. The Minister of Agriculture at that time, Wenceslao Escalante, estimated that the Patagonian plateau had many geographical similarities with the area occupied by the Boers in South Africa, which would make it easier for them to adapt to this area of Argentina. The government offered them an area of 150,000 hectares, which were subdivided into lots.
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Settling in Patagonia: Life and Adaptation
The migration process of the Boer community in Chubut is characterized by a planned migration of family groups that arrived in three waves. First Boers arrive in Chubut, Argentina The first contingent arrived in Comodoro Rivadavia, which at that time was just a settlement with roughly thirty inhabitants. The province of Chubut was a wasteland, a remote place far from the bigger cities. The first group arrived in 1902 and consisted of a few families. The other two contingents arrived in 1903 and 1904, respectively, after the Second Boer War had already ended.
The main settlements of the Boers in Argentina: Comodoro Rivadavia, Sarmiento and Sierra Chaira, all in the Chubut Province. The first settlement of the Boers took place in Colonia Escalante, where they dedicated themselves to the breeding of sheep and cattle, as well as building roads and working the land of the area. From the beginning, Colonia Escalante was characterized by being a differentiated population center, which tried to maintain its language, religion and customs.
The Boers considered that the education of children was fundamental, which was a concern from the beginning of the colony. They formed rural schools that operated in the same estancias. In addition to the educational content, different religious practices were also developed. Many of the first settlers served as teachers at the beginning, once they had a stable pastor, it was he who educated them.
Several black African families in servitude arrived with their masters, Boer settlers, from South Africa to settle in the Escalante Colony of Chubut in 1903. Source: Flickr
The Chubut region of Patagonia is very desert-like (similar to the Gobi desert), and the Boers were also the ones who promoted the first drillings to extract water for Comodoro Rivadavia and its surroundings. Thanks to those first requests to the National Government to bring the drilling machines, oil was discovered in 1907.
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Even today, the water captured by YPF in 1912 supplies the population of Comodoro Rivadavia and its surroundings. Since then, and in honor of its first settler, it is called "Manantiales Behr." The Chubut province has been prosperous ever since, but unfortunately for the Afrikaners, mineral rights in Argentina belong to the province, so they never profited from the discovery.
The Boers were also very religious and fervent believers. Those first settlers who arrived in Chubut were Calvinists, but they were divided into two groups: the Dutch Reformed and the simply Reformed, both of Dutch origin, but with small variations. In some way, arriving in Patagonia was arriving at "the promised land."
Language and Cultural Preservation
The first Boer generations in Patagonia eked out an isolated living. But a cultural shift began in the 1950s as the settlers increased contact with nearby communities in Sarmiento and Comodoro Rivadavia. Today, older members of the community-those over 60-still speak Afrikaans, though their dominant language is Spanish. As the younger generations, which only speak Spanish, become fully integrated into Argentine society, the bilingual community is quickly disappearing.
Since the community had been living outside of South Africa for over a century, the disappearance of its forefathers’ heritage seemed inevitable. By the late 1980s, observers characterized the community as virtually “extinct.” Yet over the last two decades there has been a resurgence of interest in promoting the Boers’ unique cultural identity. This has included acquiring space to house a cultural center and museum. Once-dead traditions, such as an annual games festival, have also been revived.
In 1992, the Association of the South African Community of Chubut was founded, which aims to preserve, spread and promote its Afrikaans culture, traditions and language. The history of the Boers of Chubut is so unique that it even sparked the interest of linguists from the University of Michigan in the USA, who carried out a study on the use of Afrikaans in the community.
According to this study, the dialect preserves elements of Afrikaans from before 1925, when the South African government recognised it as an official language. In recent years, there has been an interest in promoting the cultural heritage of the Boers in Chubut, one example being the creation of a cultural centre and museum in the seaside town of Rada Tilly, which was created by members of the local community.
Our project involves a team of more than 40 professors, post-doctoral researchers, and students at all levels. They come from a wide range of fields, including linguistics, history, anthropology, literature, and religious studies. Over the course of two research trips, we conducted nearly 100 interviews with community members in Afrikaans and Spanish.
The interviews provide a rich corpus of linguistic data as well as new evidence about the determinative role of language, identity, religion, and racial ideologies in the integration of the Boer settlers in Argentina.
The community is, in a way, like a time capsule, reflecting pronunciation and syntax from an earlier era. For example, the Afrikaans word for nine-“nege”-is pronounced niəxə in modern South Africa, but with a hard “g,” as niəgə, in Patagonia. At the same time, some elements are superbly modern, including vocabulary adapted for the 21st century. For example, an airport is not, as in modern South Africa, a “lughawe,” which is a word that did not exist when the community first disembarked in Argentina. It is a “vliegtuigstasie” (literally “aeroplane station”), a compound word coined by the community.
Our work has sparked interest among linguists in Europe and South Africa, and also led to deep personal connections in Patagonia-especially with the younger generations. The children and grandchildren of the older community members responded to our 2014 visit by seeking out a teacher to offer online classes in Afrikaans. We have since made it our goal that a broader public come to view this community as its members do: not as a faded relic of the past, but as a group that continues to thrive in spite of a transformed socio-cultural landscape.
The relevance of this project became clear to us earlier this year during our second research trip. At one point, we invited three cousins to converse solely in Afrikaans, including Rebecka Dickason, who spoke only Afrikaans until the age of 10. During the conversation, her Spanish-speaking daughter, Tecky, witnessed a change in her mother’s demeanor. Rebecka was smiling and gesturing as she conversed comfortably in her original native tongue.
It was a powerful moment for Tecky, who thanked us afterwards with tears in her eyes, giving a new sense of vitality and hope:Ustedes no saben lo que han hecho por mi madre. Le han insuflado vida (You don’t know what you have done for my mother. You have breathed life into her).
After 119 years since the arrival of the Boers in Chubut, the community continues to exist, as does its legacy. One of the main protagonists in the documentary mentioned above. The history of the Boers represents an example of Argentina's cultural diversity and melting pot of races. Like millions of immigrants, the Boers left their homeland to start a new life.
Now that more than a century has passed, the Boer community in Chubut has lost many of its members. A large number returned to South Africa over time, while others died. However, those who stayed continued to maintain many of their customs, as well as the Afrikaans language. Today, the Boer community in Chubut makes up around 30-40 people, with more than half still bilingual in Afrikaans and Spanish. Their culture and customs are kept alive through sports events, a museum and regular encounters.
The Future of the Community
The boers at the end of the world director Richard Gregory talks about the Argentina's Afrikaners
As we see things in South Africa increasingly heating up with the likes of left-wing EFF candidate Julius Malema chanting “Kill the Boer, kill the farmer”, Argentina looks like a great option for freedom seeking Boers once again.
Julius Malema. Source: The South African
Monument celebrating the Boer migration to Patagonia (Chubut on the left, RSA on the right)
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