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Ethnographic Rendez-vous
would not dare to gather in the light of the day will bump into each
other at the milongas to chat, hug, share breath mints, and sweat to-
gether. They do so on the basis of belonging to one social field and
sharing one passion: tango. Transgressions are here not only permit-
ted but are transposed onto the real (productive) world. The time and
energy spent at milongas also mean social capital (e.g., contacts, re-
lationships, referrals) that becomes meaningful leads during the day-
time. What happens at night will continue the following day, partic-
ularly among those for whom milongas are not just social resorts of
volatile passion but nurturing social hubs that protect lonely souls
from the hostile democratic anonymity of their cosmopolitan North
American milieu.
Daylight also transforms the social personas of tango dancers into
different selves. Many of them endure less flamboyant lives than their
images on the tango floor as want-to-be femme fatales and seductive
Valentinos (polished, elegant, and refined) would suggest. This is the
case with many struggling tango artists and other immigrants embed-
ded in the informal economy. Even among the lucky ones who have
become the stars of fancy tango shows, many endure exploitative rela-
tionships and unstable or low-paid jobs that do not provide them with
either health or social benefits (see Viladrich 2004 b). And for me, an
anthropologist, after all, the more fascinating (and frequently painful)
thing to do during my nocturnal incursions into the tango field was to
discover who these tangueros were outside the dance hall, after they
hung their dance clothes in the closet until the next evening.
With the curiosity of a surgeon, and the compassion of an (albeit ag-
nostic) missionary, I have unwrapped wounded souls to reveal tango
dancers’ bruises and scars, their dramatic migratory tales and un-
solved family dramas. Almost always during my ethnotango incur-
sions, I have discovered how everyone has the potential to become
someone else, with a drama, big or small, to share with a soul who
conveys the necessary (com)passion for and interest in to their petite
histoires. Behind the most seductive womanizer I found an Italian piz-
zeria’s busboy, begging for emotional attention; underneath a model-
like prima donna I met a former abused woman surviving in a trashy
Latino restaurant where he made empanadas (Argentine turnovers);
