Working-class libraries, unofficial collecting, and reading practices in the early 20th century Peruvian anarchist press

Ramos Y.B.; Caro J.M.; Castro M.V. · Desde el Sur (2026) · DOI: 10.21142/des-1803-2026-e0056

Resumen

This article analyzes reading practices and reading communities formed around Peruvian anarchist magazines published between 1904 and 1910. Its objective is to examine how publications such as Los Parias, El Germinal, El Hambriento, and El Oprimido contributed to the development of a print culture linked to Peru’s working sectors. The research draws on cultural history, the sociology of texts, and studies on reading communities through the material and discursive analysis of magazines, advertisements, donations, editorial exchanges, and library projects. The results show that these publications functioned as spaces of sociability, education, and transnational circulation of ideas, sustained by networks of working-class collaboration. The study concludes that anarchist press publications not only disseminated political ideologies, but also fostered reading practices, collecting habits, and the construction of an alternative cultural memory in early twentieth-century Peru.

Instituciones: Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos