Crime and hypocritical dignity in El juguete rabioso

Abstract

This study analyzes the issues of exclusion and alienation in the context of biopolitical power in the narrative of Roberto Arlt in early 20th-century Argentina. It focuses on how El juguete rabioso depicts the marginalization of the “knowledge of the poor” versus the “knowledge of power”. While knowledge and technology seem to offer a utopian ideal of social mobility, the right to learn is not guaranteed, and public spaces such as libraries reveal the hypocrisy of capitalism. This article also examines how paternal authority in Arlt’s narrative operates as a form of biopower that controls and oppresses marginalized characters, such as orphans. These representations reflect the capitalist social unconscious that evaluates human worth according to economic utility. The research demonstrates how Arlt critically explores social control mechanisms through biopolitics and modernization, establishing boundaries that segregate and dehumanize the excluded.