Abstract
In this paper, I discuss the ways in which personal and collective accounts of trauma are transmitted and adapted via Salsa, the most popular and emblematic musical style of Cali, Colombia. As both a tool of resistance and entertainment patronized by cartels, Salsa’s complicated history reflects that of Colombia, a culture rooted in oral tradition that resists the confines of subalternity through music. I argue that as part of Cali’s cultural identity, Salsa serves as a method of preserving histories through incorporating words, dance moves, and figures from Indigenous and African traditions found in Colombia to cultivate a unique sound. Using accounts of the Colombian Armed Conflict, I demonstrate that these attempts to grapple with the unimaginable manifest themselves in the musical stylings of Cali Salsa as a means of creating a living memory and confronting trauma.