The gown, the cap and the golf ball floating on the left foot: the indelible image of Diego Armando Maradona at the University of Oxford, during a talk in 1995, has been for decades the postcard of that unlikely meeting between the academic elite and the popular idol. Now, exactly 30 years later, with the Fluff Now dead, the meeting of those worlds that seemed incompatible, like “the Bible and the stove” of tango, has become a productive intimacy. And the figure of Maradona was at the center, for the first time – according to the organizers – of an international university conference.
For three days, at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA), professors, researchers, writers, journalists, athletes and students debated and shared research, exhibitions but also memories and anecdotes about the former Argentine footballer and coach, legendary world champion with the Albiceleste in Mexico 1986.
Maradona and national and Latin American identity; Maradona and popular cultures; devotion and religiosity in the Maradonian universe; Maradona and the Malvinas war; Maradona and hegemonic masculinity; fashion, tattoos and muralism around his image… were some of the topics addressed, among many others.
“We wanted to think about Diego from different perspectives and within the context of the public university. To think about our recent history through him, to think of him as a political, social and sporting fact, to think of him in relation to feminisms”, lists Fabián D’Aloisio, coordinator of the Diegologias chair and director of the magazine Metasenses at playthe two spaces that hosted the congress together with the Faculty of Social Sciences (UBA).
Without resorting to state funds, the tender exceeded expectations. Between Thursday and Saturday, more than 200 exhibitors from 15 Argentine universities and other countries participated in the meeting, with free admission to the public.
“We miss Diego every day. Do you know how much we miss him today in this country?”, say Pablo and Marcelo, two advanced Sociology students, almost in chorus. On the facade of the faculty several posters reproduce the image of Maradona and announce the congress. On the street, a batucada punctuates the entrance.
Inside, waiting for the start of activities, a long line of people winds through the Social Sciences corridors, among groups of students studying or discussing, others reading alone or waiting to take an exam. “Half of the budget is not enough,” warns a poster, rejecting the cut in funding for public universities implemented by Javier Milei’s ultra-government.
“It was the hand of God and the sweaty devil,” journalist Alejando Apo summarized the many faces of Maradona, reading a poem by Héctor Negro at the opening of the congress. Even then, journalist Ariel Scher recalled Jorge Valdano’s definition of Maradona’s survival in social memory: “He is the most present absentee I have ever seen.” During the three days of the congress, the cry “Maradoo, Maradoo” accompanied the debates and conferences. The football shirts with the 10 on the back – of Argentina, Boca, Napoli, even Newell’s – have painted the classrooms in their colours.
“Maradona’s main characteristic is his anger,” noted historian Hernán Brienza in one of the panels. “Maradona is a great downgrader: he was a billionaire who thought like when he was poor, from that plebeian anger he faced structural injustice,” he added. “Maradonian anger is the historical strength of the dignity of a defeated homeland”.
In another presentation, sociologist Pablo Alabarces called the former Barcelona and Sevilla player “the greatest idol in the history of Argentine popular culture.” “Our greatest superhero”, proposed the writer Gabriela Saidón at the same table, and then reflected on the construction of Maradona as “saint and god”. However, Alabarces underlines that he is “a more political than religious figure”, the protagonist of “a plebeian, democratic, egalitarian, profoundly popular history”. Something that, according to him, Lionel Messi cannot embody. Nestor Borri, Christian activist and co-director of the Francisco Factor project, intervened in the debate: “It could also be said that we are a people with two souls, which is why we have a Maradona and a Messi.”
The incredible parable of life FluffFrom his humble beginnings to worldwide fame, his addiction and personal problems also emerged in debates, where his sporting exploits were almost not discussed. The feminist perspective provided new approaches.
“After November 25, 2020 (when Maradona died at the age of 60), many women had to explain why we wanted him despite…”, said Mónica Santino, footballer and coach. He argued “not to put Diego in a position of guilt or innocence. Diego was someone who always lived in discomfort, he could have had calmer moments if he had not faced power. In his own way, certainly sexist”.
Colombian sociologist Laura Márquez Ramírez analyzed the representation of masculinity in Maradona and, contrary to what one might have predicted, observed that “his figure opens cracks in traditional mandates” and proposes “different men, poor, fallen men, who have failed and seek redemption”, allowing “vulnerability, crying, shared emotional expression”.
The closing of the congress this Saturday left latent the presumption that there will be new editions. In any case, it is expected that every year, in the second semester, the UBA will hold a non-curricular course entitled “Diegologie. Perspectives on the Maradonian universe”. At university, what the writer Osvaldo Soriano defined as “the country in shorts” seems to already have a guaranteed place.
