Images of Branislava Sušnik among the Slovenians in Argentina: Migration, Life in Paraguay, and Connections with the Homeland

The article presents the life and research of Branislava Sušnik, who fled Slovenia after World War II, emigrating first to Argentina and eventually to Paraguay. In Paraguay, she worked in ethnolinguistics, anthropology, and the cultural history of Paraguayan indigenous peoples. The article mainly analyzes her migration experiences, her connections with the homeland, and particularly the images of Branislava Sušnik as a migrant scientist constructed in the publications of the Slovenian diaspora in Argentina.
KEYWORDS: Branislava Sušnik, Slovenian diaspora in Argentina, Paraguay, migrant scientist

The article presents the life and research of Branislava Sušnik, who fled from Slovenia after World War II, emigrating first to Argentina and eventually to Paraguay. In Para­guay, she worked in ethnolinguistics, anthropology, and the cultural history of the indigenous peoples of Paraguay. The article mainly analyzes her experi­ences of migra­tion, her connections with the homeland, and especially the images of Branislava Sušnik as a migrant scientist constructed in the publications of the Slovenian diaspora in Argentina.
Branislava Sušnik was a distinguished researcher dedicated to studying the indige­nous groups of Paraguay, their languages, their cultural and cosmological characteristics, and the socio-cultural changes in colonial history. She was edu­cated in Ljubljana, Vienna, and Rome but chose exile after World War II. She emigrated to Argentina, where she was vaguely involved in the emerging Slovenian diaspora. However, as she sought personal and scientific freedom, she did not like the autocratic Peronist regime, and the diaspora was also too introverted and homeland oriented. After spending a year in the mission in Chaco, she moved to Paraguay. In Paraguay, she became a researcher, the director of the Ethnographic Museum Andrés Barbero, and a professor at the National University in Asunción. The paper provides an analysis of the multiple layers of Branislava Sušnik’s migration experiences, her connections with the homeland and with Slovenians in Argentina. Although she distanced herself from the Slovenian diaspora in Argentina, she sporadically maintained ties with certain individuals there.
She was also considered one of the most-respected Slovenian emigrant scientists. The article examines the images that the Slovenian publications in Argentina constructed of her, especially in connection with the personal and socio-political reasons for migration and the anti-communist position. These images not only helped to establish an interpretative model for understanding her life and work in Paraguay but also to facilitate the symbolic return of the memories of Branislava Sušnik to Slovenia.