Blogs

Towards an Uncertain Future  Dilma Rousseff’s acceptance speech, October 26, 2014 After lengthy thanks to colleagues and supporters and long pauses for cheering, and after explaining that she was using what remained of her voice and calling for some quiet, she began: My dear friends, we have reached the end of a campaign that mobilized […] read full post >>

Towards an Uncertain Future  Dilma Rousseff’s acceptance speech, October 26, 2014 After lengthy thanks to colleagues and supporters and long pauses for cheering, and after explaining that she was using what remained of her voice and calling for some quiet, she began: My dear friends, we have reached the end of a campaign that mobilized […] read full post >>

In these texts and videos, we see how in different ways human rights groups emerge across Latin America during the 1970s and onwards with clear targets. We see how when states become weak and are unable or unwilling to recognize human rights, violence, protests, and speaking up through mediums of communication technologies come about. In […] read full post >>

Of this weeks documents the final two were those which had the most impact on me. Documents 10.7 and 10.8 provoke very visceral reactions in me. I find they provoke this reaction because of the power behind their words. Both documents are a cry out tow... read full post >>

Of this weeks documents the final two were those which had the most impact on me. Documents 10.7 and 10.8 provoke very visceral reactions in me. I find they provoke this reaction because of the power behind their words. Both documents are a cry out towards terrible forces arrayed against them. These are the voices of the people of Mexico. The average citizen, worker, father, everyday people who live in fear every day. The strangest part to me is the line "this is not a surrender" yet the author asks "what do you want us to do?" While this may seem a contradictory statement, asking what the criminals want and at the same time stating they are not surrendering to the power of said criminals. I do not believe in truth that it is a surrender. This is a letter written in fear and in anger. Anger towards those who have taken so many lives and those who have failed to defend those lives. El Diario has no other recourse other than to simply shut down. To shut down would be to admit defeat and to truly surrender. The author instead asks what can be done to allow them to keep publishing. They accept the fact (not happily) that their city is ruled in essence by criminals and so they call upon this new authority to state clearly the rules that they must abide to. Not out of respect or acceptance of this new authority but out of simple survival.

    The second document is a somewhat different cry. It is a cry for opposition to both the criminals and government, both which have failed the author. The author calls upon the people of Mexico to stand up peacefully in the face of said violence and demand an end, a return to honor. He claims the criminals and government have lost their honor. Can a criminal truly have honor? These two authors show incredible bravery in the face of great intimidation by both criminal forces and that of their own government. They stand up in defiance and cry out at those which have failed them and their society. How does a government fail in its duties so greatly to create such an environment? read full post >>

Of this weeks documents the final two were those which had the most impact on me. Documents 10.7 and 10.8 provoke very visceral reactions in me. I find they provoke this reaction because of the power behind their words. Both documents are a cry out tow... read full post >>

Chapter 10, Speaking Truth to Power touches on some very important issues that are still crippling much of Latin America today; namely the utter failure of the supposed “war on drugs” and all the corruption and violence that has come from it. Since the 1970’s with Richard Nixon as president, the United States has led […] read full post >>

  “Political Essay on the Kingdom of New Spain” written in 1811 by American, Alexander von Humboldt, explores issues of race from yet another perspective. As an American, and particularly based out of New York, Humboldt has a frame of reference for coexistence (or lack there of) with both free blacks and respective indigenous groups. […] read full post >>

  http://dcc.newberry.org/collections/caste-and-politics-in-mexican-independence   This section of Ward’s text explicitly discusses, with an inherently British bias, the particularly Mexican casta system and general race relations and social motives. The perspective he contributes to this phenomenon is particularly interesting because he is not himself apart of the system by any account and therefore able to offer a […] read full post >>

  “Political Essay on the Kingdom of New Spain” written in 1811 by American, Alexander von Humboldt, explores issues of race from yet another perspective. As an American, and particularly based out of New York, Humboldt has a frame of reference for coexistence (or lack there of) with both free blacks and respective indigenous groups. […] read full post >>