Abstract

This article presents the results of a study aimed at analyzing the meanings that the residents of a neighborhood attach to the presence a clandestine political imprisonment and torture center that operated during the Chilean dictatorship (1973-1990). Eight neighbors, five men and three women aged 60-86 years, participated in the study. A biographical approach was adopted, with life story being used as a data production instrument. Results reveal the process whereby the participants’ knowledge about the torture center was constructed. This knowledge about the horror is characterized as fragmented, caught between perception and action, and as something both known and unknown that ultimately embarrasses those who hold it. Aspects related to psychosocial trauma, memory, and the psychic and social working-through of political violence in common citizens are discussed.