Cosmopolitanism, modernity and youth in the 1960s: the transnational wanderings of teen idols from Argentina, Mexico and Spain

ABSTRACT This essay traces the tri-continental flows of youth films and music between South America (Argentina), North America (Mexico and the United States) and Europe (Spain and Italy) in the mid-late 1960s. Focusing on co-productions starring youth idols Palito Ortega, Enrique Guzmán, and Rocío Dúrcal, the essay examines both the industrial imperatives behind those currents and the socio-cultural promise of the films’ representational conventions. The article recognizes the emergence of tighter synergies between culture industries around the world during this period (from film and music to television), and examines the films within larger horizons of reception. Ultimately, the article suggests that such youth films enacted a form of vernacular cosmopolitanism through the aegis of their young, middle-class protagonists who manage to navigate successfully between the ‘old world’ and the ‘new’ and between the traditional and the modern; and who provide a spatio-temporal bridge bringing audiences up-to-date and into the world beyond national borders.