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Argentineans' cultural symbols are mostly the result of hybridization. Football (soccer in the United States) and tango (which encompasses more than just the dance itself) are probably the two strongest symbols of a common national identity. Tango refers to the music, the lyrics, and the dance itself and is a complex urban product that originated in lower-class neighborhoods of Buenos Aires city. The music, its lyrics, and the dance represent the profound transformation of the urban landscape at the beginning of the twentieth century, with the influx of diverse European immigrants. Tango expresses the amalgamation of already existing traditions, themselves a mixture of African, indigenous, and Spanish influences with elements brought by Italians, Spaniards, French, Germans, Polish, and Jews. Argentine nationalists felt threatened by the newcomers because they felt they jeopardized the existing hierarchical system of social relations and refused to see tango as a national cultural product.

Tango was also a moral threat. The sensuality of the dance and the lyrics emphasizing lowlife values and language challenged bourgeois morality and dominant views on appropriate female behavior. It also romanticized a particular male behavior that kept men away from the home. Tango men spent their days in bordellos, sites identified not only with sexual encounters, but also with intense political activity.

The popularization of football is partly explained by social reformers' concerns with appropriate behavior and the proper place of Argentine men and women. British citizens introduced football to the city of Buenos Aires in the early 1860s. The game went unnoticed until Argentine politicians deliberately promoted the sport. From the 1920s to the 1940s military and civilian moral reformers attempted to construct nationhood on the basis of the "true" traditions of Argentina. They encouraged folk music (the music of the motherland) and discouraged tango, which was believed to be the expression of foreigners with dubious morals. As part of this neo-Victorian prudery, Argentina's rulers promoted sports as healthy and hygienic pursuits which would keep men away from the cabarets and bordellos where tango music reigned.

Besides music and sports, food is also a powerful cultural symbol. Argentines sometimes use the expression "she or he is more Argentine than dulce de leche ." Dulce de leche is a milk-and-sugar spread used in a manner similar to peanut butter in the United States. It appears on toast, pastries, and various confections. Argentine asado , a barbecue that is part of the gaucho heritage, is still one of the most important meals in the Argentine diet. Like football, it is a strongly gendered cultural symbol, associated with manliness. Shopping for beef, sausages, and other animal parts that go into a barbecue, as well as the cooking itself, is a male activity. Asados are an important part of Argentine socializing on any occasion.

Mate drinking is also seen as a feature of the cultura rioplatense. Mate refers both to the container where a popular infusion is prepared and to the drink itself. The container might be simply made out of a gourd or might be carefully crafted in silver or other metals. It is drunk with a special metal straw with holes in one end to filter leaves. The slightly stimulating infusion is made with leaves from the Yerba mate ( ilex paraguaiensis ) plant which is cultivated in northeast Argentina. Migrants adopted mate consumption and became so adept that some of those returning to their original countries carried this custom with them. Because of this, countries such as Syria and Lebanon now import Yerba mate from Argentina.

Certain men and women stand as undeniable national icons. Historical figures, sportsmen and sportswomen, politicians, and intellectuals contribute to a common identity. Who best represents or plays a role in shaping who Argentines are and had been is a highly contested issue. Several men and women are important in the development of argentinidad. However, there would be no agreement on whether they positively or negatively fostered the rise of some kind of national consciousness.

José de San Martín is probably the least controversial of many Argentine icons. Seen as liberator of the Americas in the nineteenth century, he stands as a moral model to be emulated. Some Argentines use him to represent how they would like to think of themselves vis-a-vis other Latin American nations: as messengers of modernity and freedom, without personal or national ambitions of domination. Juan Manuel de Rosas, a landowner from Buenos Aires province, who came to rule Buenos Aires province for almost thirty years and represents the interests of the provinces before Argentina became unified as a nation, is a good example of the schisms in the process of nation building. Derided by the liberal, modernizing, and urban-oriented sectors of society who regarded him as a tyrant who deliberately kept the masses ignorant, he was an idol for the traditionalists who saw him as and adamant defender of national sovereignty against imperial ambitions. While Rosas was at the center of the disputes around the fate of Argentina in the nineteenth century, Juan Domingo Perón, was the focus of impassioned divisions among Argentines during the last half of the twentieth century. He ruled Argentina from 1946 to 1955 and again in 1973 until his death in 1974. Although some analysts draw parallels between Rosas and Perón, insisting that the two have defended the interests of the people against a foreign colonial order, the two are the products of very different Argentinas. Rosas ruled in an agrarian society of landlords and rural workers; Peron ruled in a predominantly urban society in which internal migrants to cities and the children of immigrants strove for greater participation as well as for recognition as part of the nation. María Eva Duarte de Perón, universally known as Evita, is undoubtedly the most renowned Argentine woman. President Perón's wife played an important role in the political and social recognition of underprivileged groups, mainly workers and women, until her early death in 1952. While political opponents dismissed her by stating that she was a bad actress with questionable morals, the popular sectors were encouraged by carefully crafted governmental propaganda and idolized her, seeing her as a saintly figure. After her death people lit candles next to photographs representing her surrounded by a halo.

Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, a liberal president of Argentina from 1868 to 1874, is probably better known for synthesizing the dilemmas of Argentine identity in his famous literary work, Facundo . This text is seen by some critics as the cathedral of Argentine culture. It describes a fragmented country which is torn between civilization and barbarism, with a rural backward interior dominated by authoritarian charismatic populist caudillos who refuse to enter into an orderly and rational modern way of life. Sarmiento is held responsible for bringing the country into the modern, literate world; he is the teacher par excellence, the founding father of the Argentine school system, and a role model to be followed—even today attending school every day is equated with "being a Sarmiento."

Sarmiento is either glorified or vilified, but no Argentine is indifferent to him. Although Facundo is meant to attack a rural order and the gaucho way of life, Sarmiento prose ironically continues to mystify the pampas.

While Facundo was intended to highlight the backwardness of the mestizo population, Martín Fierro by José Hernández exalted the values of gaucho culture. Despite their differences, both literary works became canonical texts for those attempting to define Argentine culture.

Argentines are quite uncertain about who they are. They oscillate between seeing themselves as a highly educated western nation and defining themselves as a Latin-American mestizo nation. This often obsessive search for a national soul became exacerbated when this relatively young nation was dramatically transformed by urbanization and the influx of immigrants. Uncertain about the existence of commonalities, many Argentines tried to find clues about themselves by looking at how other nations saw them. Success of Argentine national or cultural products abroad is translated as approval of the whole national body. Whoever or whatever thrives outside national boundaries rapidly metamorphasizes into even more powerful cultural symbols. It happened with tango after it succeeded in Europe, with soccer and soccer players like Maradona, with tennis players such as Guillermo Vilas and Gabriela Sabattini, with Nobel Prize winners such as Bernardo Houssay, Perez Esquivel, and Saavedra Lamas, with classical dancers such as Julio Bocca, with music composers as different as Alberto Ginastera and Astor Piazzola, with tango singers such as Carlos Gardel, and with folklore singers such as Mercedes Sosa.

Popular card games and table games also express the dilemmas of national culture and the way Argentines sometimes view themselves. One of the most popular card games is truco (trick). Supposedly a gaucho game in which country men displayed their ability to deceive their adversary, the game is accompanied by subtle body movements to warn partners about a player's strategy, and by recitation of country-inspired poetry. Country men known as payadores used to be valued for their ability to improvise in oral poetry duels showing their wit, sense of humor, and double entendre. Although payadores are a minority today and are unknown to the majority of the national population, many of their playful linguistic games are still present in everyday nicknames, jokes, and many other popular expressions as varied as graffiti and songs created by soccer fans and members of political parties.

For decades, estancieros (large landowners) were the richest and most politically powerful citizens. They constituted the ruling elite of the country for generations. For years, young children learned to accept this existing social order by playing games such as El Estanciero , a local version of Monopoly ,in which the players accumulate land, ranches, livestock, and grains. Likewise, the yearly massive attendance to an exhibition in Buenos Aires commonly known as "the rural exhibit," legitimizes the dominant commercial activity of the nation as producer of cattle and grains, ruled by a class of landowners. Although the economy and social structure of Argentina has been dramatically transformed and the landed elites have lost considerable power, it is still commonly suggested that young women marry an estanciero to secure their own and their family's future.

The Argentine flag, the national anthem, and the escarapela (a small ribbon or bow worn on patriotic occasions) are the objects of officially prescribed rituals that must be followed by the population at the risk of serious sanctions. These rules had been strongly enforced during authoritarian regimes to the point that people risked imprisonment or even death if they failed to follow them. The population at large feels very strongly about these symbols: they display flags when the country is participating in world soccer cup matches or in war times such as when Argentina fought against the British during the Malvinas/Falklands conflict in the 1980s. At a popular level, large drums are always also present at any massive demonstration.

The ruling classes mobilize territory and sovereignty to develop a sense of national identity. The Malvinas/Falklands War clearly illustrates the importance of territory in the construction of national territory. Since early childhood, Argentines are repeatedly exposed to narratives emphasizing the importance of territory to the nation. They are taught that the British attempted to occupy the country on two occasions during the early nineteenth century, but the population resisted bravely by throwing burning oil from the roofs of their homes in Buenos Aires. Since the British occupation of the Malvinas Islands in 1833, statements claiming that the "islands are Argentine" and the demand for recovery have always stirred nationalist feelings. Argentine's takeover of the islands was presented as a way of healing wounds inflicted on the national body and as a means to recover dignity.

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