Marguerite Guzmán Bouvard, poet and author of the book Revolutionizing Motherhood; the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo (1994) gave the IISH material that she used for this publication on the best-known social movement in modern Argentina: mostly audiotapes of interviews with the Madres, photos about the Madres and of diverse actions, and many brochures and journals.
The Madres initially operated as an informal group of housewives searching for their lost children, but they later became the embodiment of the civil resistance against the military dictatorship and the violations of human rights. They had to deal with increasingly more threats and smears but still they continued to demonstrate. They formed the kernel of the popular protest in the transitional years to democracy.
Text was taken from On the Waterfront - newsletter of the Friends of the IISH Issue 14 (pdf, 1.6 Mb).