Author: Critical Ethnic and Community Studies

How to paint our own mural: the need for transnational solidarity in the undocumented peoples’ struggle

Juan Pablo Blanco
TCCS Student ’19

A mural in Belfast, Ireland with "Ireland stands with Catalonia" written on a peace wall.
Mural in Falls Road, Belfast supporting Catalunyan self-determination. Photo Credit – Extramural Activity 2017.

I remember walking down Falls Road in Belfast, Ireland in the spring of 2015. I was still dumbfounded by the sight of the “peace lines”, the harrowing barbed wired steel walls that separate predominantly republican neighborhoods from loyalist neighborhoods.

However, as I walked through what is referred to as the international wall just a few blocks over, my mood changed and I could not help but feel empowered by the messages of solidarity and strength that these murals proclaimed. From Palestine solidarity messages, support for the self determination of Catalunya and the Basque Country, to the image of a smiling Leonard Peltier, one can see that the message was that Irish liberation could not happen without it also working for the liberation of all oppressed peoples.

This was my first trip outside of the U.S. since I had migrated 16 years prior due to my undocumented immigration status. Back then, as someone who was just starting to get involved with organizing and activism, I could not help but think why there didn’t seem to be any transnational movement like this uniting undocumented peoples around the world.

I am originally from Argentina, a country that as of 2010 had 1.5 million undocumented people living within its borders (statistic from the Council on Hemispheric Affairs), and I have seen the racist and xenophobic narratives on immigration that are prevalent among many Argentinians being carried to the U.S. as people migrated even when many of them become undocumented themselves.

Photo from a march with undocumented immigrants in Argentina holding sign that reads, translated, as "Migrant Workers Present."
Undocumented immigrant activists and allies in Buenos Aires mobilizing against Argentine president Mauricio Macri’s controversial mandate to limit immigration. Their sign reads “Migrant Workers Present.” Photo Credit – Prensa Roja Internacional 2018.

This false consciousness makes people think that their experiences are somehow categorically different from that of other irregular migrants throughout the world. What could a transnational movement of and for undocumented peoples and people with precarious migratory statuses do that these movements alone cannot?

What could a transnational movement of and for undocumented peoples and people with precarious migratory statuses do that these movements alone cannot?

I don’t have a definite answer to that question yet. However, as globalization has internationalized the economic systems that often become catalysts for migration patterns, why shouldn’t an international problem be faced with a transnational solution?

This does not mean that local groups will stop working on their particular campaigns, since after all the socio-political paradigms of the states they reside in will dictate what will work and not work for them. What it means is that this local work can continue to happen and a space where perspectives could be shared, tools and strategies worked out, and solidarity and cooperation be fostered can be created to make each local movement more powerful and revolutionary. We only need to pay attention to other movements that have become transnational in scope and how that has affected the kind of work they are able to do.

The Indigenous peoples struggle can be a very salient example. As Guillermo Delgado, human rights activist and anthropologist at UC Santa Cruz, writes: “ …a cross-border indigenous movement in the Americas needs to be seen as an intellectual space that allows for the ample circulation of proposals, including the need to press for dialogue on policies—especially those sponsored by the international financial institutions—that directly affect indigenous peoples.” Bodies like the World Council of Indigenous Peoples, or the Indigenous Peoples’ Network, have shown that solidarity and cooperation have not only been able to achieve changes in international law, but more importantly have allowed Indigenous people to put pressure on states in a more profound way than they would have solely from within that state’s borders.

A photo of a mural in support of Kurdish self-emancipation and resistance in La Plata, Argentina.
Mural in support of Kurdish self-emancipation and resistance in La Plata, Argentina.
Photo credit: Comité Solidaridad con Kurdistan – La Plata 2016.

I was lucky enough to be invited to a panel at the University of Toronto on Canadian undocumented youth and access to education. The panel, “Reality of Shadows: The Reality of Undocumented Youth,” brought together students, activists, an immigration lawyer, a sociology professor at the university and the co-founder of a Toronto refugee center.

This was an incredible opportunity to not only get myself acquainted with the barriers undocumented migrants are facing in Canada but also see the ways people are mobilizing and organizing against these same barriers.

For example, undocumented students in Canada, even if they graduate from a Canadian high school, have little chance of being able to enroll in a college or university. In response to this, FCJ Refugee Center has created a pilot program called Access to Education at York University in Toronto giving access to 10 undocumented students without having to apply as an international student, the first of its kind.

This is incredible work that is happening across our northern border where undocumented people as a whole are not part of the national conversation as they are in the U.S. A way for activists and organizers in the U.S. to learn from the work that is being done in Canada needs to be created because the mainstream media is not paying attention to this issue.

A lot can be learned by activists and organizers in the U.S. from what is happening in Canada, and vice versa. This struggle needs to go beyond the borders that deem us undocumented in the first place, and bring together the incredible mobilizing that is already happening all across the world. The big question for me at the moment is how exactly this can begin.

Foundations of family grief, growth and resilience: Learning from intergenerational legacies

Ester Rebeca Shapiro Rok, PhD
(aka Ester R. Shapiro)
TCCS Core Faculty and Associate Professor of Psychology

This current spring semester, I am on sabbatical from teaching. My fourth in nearly 30 years of teaching at UMass Boston, this sabbatical will definitely be my last before retirement.

In 1994, I published Grief as a Family Process: A Developmental Approach to Clinical Practice.  Twenty-five years later I am completing my forthcoming book, Culture, Families, Grief and Growth, at a very different time in bereavement studies, clinical practice, and my own life.  Following Bluck et al (2014; Shapiro, 2018), I draw on intergenerational reminiscence as time travel both to complete my book and to respond to challenges of my own and my family’s evolving family lives.

Like my own optimistic-immigrant family, I believe in the complex, contested past as a renewable resource in facing new life challenges.

As a scholar of the intergenerational life course, and deeply appreciative of the complexity and contingency of our interdependent selves, I am especially interested in life course transitions as opportunities for creative transformation, identifying existing and new resources even in harsh environments under adverse circumstances.

Hannah/Anita, Basia/Berta my paternal great-grandmother, and Yache/Yochebed, saying goodbye at brothers’ & fathers’ gravesite before immigrating to Palestine & Cuba
“Three Daynofska Sisters” – Rubezhevich, Poland (1928). Hannah/Anita, Basia/Berta my paternal great-grandmother, and Yache/Yochebed, saying goodbye at brothers’ & fathers’ gravesite before immigrating to Palestine & Cuba.

The three sisters, my paternal grandmother and great-aunts, photographed in 1927 (see photo above) at their father’s and brother’s grave, were commemorating a family loss at the moment they were launching their migrations, one step ahead of the coming Holocaust.

From them, I learned that in times of desperate need, we look harder for inner and outer resources supporting survival and sometimes, unexpectedly, the new learning directs us to thrive through what we call “resilience.”

Looking back on my 65 years of life and nearly three decades as a university professor at UMass Boston, most recently as part of the TCCS community, I feel very fortunate that the formerly bookish girl I once was ended up a teacher and perennial student among students and colleagues both of whom teach me so much.

As a Cuban Eastern European Jewish American immigrant and the first in my family to graduate from college, I had no idea how to prepare for the life of learning I avidly pursued.  I did so against the wishes of my immensely practical family who had survived two World Wars, the Holocaust and the Cuban revolution through an unwavering commitment to family loyalty, material security, and a cafeteria-style choose-what-you-like approach to Jewish values.

The TCCS program’s transdisciplinary, community-partnered approach that centers on the questions we want to ask, the honoring of knowledge gained from lived experiences, and our striving to better understand the workings of inequality towards enhancing social justice, have changed the way I write about both societal inequality as a factor and culture as a resource in promoting grief and growth after a loved one’s death.

*   *   *

Unexpectedly, I am writing this narrative from Hollywood, Florida, where I am taking my turn to accompany my frail, elder parents and support their caretaking team.  My 86-year-old mother, Sara (pictured below), is considered a miracle of science by her cardiologist: She has advanced Alzheimer’s disease and a severe heart condition.

Three Shapiro sisters and their mother, Sara – Hollywood, Florida (2018)
Three Shapiro sisters and their mother, Sara – Hollywood, Florida (2018).

Too frail for heart surgery with much of her past no longer accessible, she preserves her deepest habits in her generosity and loving-kindness. She is cared for at home by an affectionate, dedicated team of Latinx-immigrant caretakers whose long hours deprive their own daughters of their mothers’ time.

My 88-year-old father, Jaime, is also present. An old-school Cuban exile patriarch at war with his inexorable aging and anyone who reminds him of his vulnerabilities, he works hard every day to remain in control of the household, the family business which he shares with his 91-year-old brother, and his own precarious health.

My father was born a year after the 1928 photograph of my relatives in Rubezhevich, Poland. Consistent with Jewish custom, his Hebrew name is Nachemie/Consolation, honoring his mother’s deceased father.  My grandmother, Basie/Bertha, and her family left for rural Cuba in 1936, sponsored by her sister, Hannah, who was by then married and financially successful.

I was always an avid listener to my family’s stories, and I don’t think it was accidental that both my sisters and I all became family therapists working in Boston’s Latinx communities.

I drew on these family stories from the beginning of my “journey of inquiry,” that is, as a young woman defying my family’s patriarchal script and as a student of socio-politically contextualized family life course transitions.

I was interested in studying the multi-layered developmental processes that facilitated or impeded gender equity.

Completing qualitative studies of gender traditional and non-traditional families and of the adult life-course transition in becoming a first or second-time parents, I graduated from UMass Amherst in 1979 seeking to understand how our family relationships influence who we might become. Working with feminist scholars across disciplines, I learned to appreciate the societal forces and family choreographies guiding our interdependent selves, even while working as a clinical psychologist in a field emphasizing individual experience and biomedical diagnosis. (DSMII, focused on Freudian categories of psychopathology, was being replaced by DSMIII, focused on biomedical diagnosis alongside a “remedicalization” of psychiatry.)

After surviving a harsh internship experience in which my interest in socially-contextualized, developmentally-informed clinical practice was diagnosed as signs of a “borderline personality,” I was fortunate to continue into a postdoctoral training program at Children’s Hospital/Judge Baker Children’s center where faculty members in psychiatry, like Jessica Daniels — now the first African American woman President of the American Psychological Association — and many others remained focused on community-based, socially-informed psychiatry, psychology, social work and nursing as part of social resource/social justice and policy-oriented interdisciplinary teams.

I was fortunate to begin my immersive, challenging and deeply-rewarding learning from the greatest teacher – death – while I was still early in my career in my late 20’s.

I decided to focus on understanding grief and growth as shared life course transitions with special attention on supporting positive-shared development rather than predicting psychopathology.

I had learned from my psychiatric hospital internship to question imposed diagnostic categories in favor of person-centered lived experiences and a respectful, collaborative approach in working towards patient goals. I was supported by teachers and colleagues in the Judge Baker Children’s Center/Children’s Hospital Family Support Center and an extraordinary team focused on how economically-disadvantaged and racially-targeted families drew on social and cultural resources to cope with grief and transform their lives.

They gave me the courage to challenge Freudian and other imposed theories that predicted psychopathology for those that did not “decathect”/detach from the deceased, and to explore emerging sources of knowledge supporting a family-centered developmental perspective focused on who died, how they died, and how we go on with lives informed by loss and preserving family legacies that include culturally meaningful, continuing bonds that are both spiritual and psychological.

Now, at age 65, I write about this learning as a survivor of breast cancer, accompanying my frail, elderly parents and their generation through new forms of aging and death, and learning from my students who have experienced the many intersections of death and social inequality.

My life, the settings in which I practice and teach, and the field of bereavement care within psychotherapy, have been significantly and meaningfully-transformed since I began my studies.  As a teacher in both TCCS and our culturally-focused, social justice-informed Clinical Psychology Doctoral program, I think a lot about the sources of knowledge I carry with me which will cross generations and help my students find their own path on their own “journey of inquiry.”

I find that the holistic, social justice-oriented, transdisciplinary approach of TCCS meaningfully supports the challenging work of transdisciplinary synthesis and communicates new knowledge in highly specialized fields including bereavement, traumatic loss, and life course development embracing both suffering and opportunities for healing and transformation.

I was moved to discover that Chicana feminist Gloria Anzaldua credits Carl Jung and his appreciation of cultural archetypes as foundational to her understanding of the step-wise movement from internalized oppression to personal and political transformation (Shapiro and Alcantara, 2016).

I bring this exploration into my TCCS course, Community Health and Equity, where we continue our intergenerational learning.

Within our TCCS and UMASS Boston communities, I appreciate our shared commitments/compromisos to accessible and impactful education, recognizing that teaching and learning in the service of justice expands opportunities for us and for generations to follow.

References

Bluck, S., Alea, N., & Ali, S. (2014). Remembering the historical roots of remembering the personal past. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 28(3), 290-300.

Shapiro, E. (1994).  Grief as a Family Process: a Developmental Approach to Clinical Practice.  NY: Guilford Press.

Shapiro, E. (2018).  Transforming Development through Just Communities:

A Life-Long Journey of Inquiry.  In Comas-Diaz, L., and Vasquez, C. (Editors) Latina Psychologists: Thriving in the Cultural Borderlands.  NY: Routledge.

Shapiro, E., and Alcantara, D. (2016).  Mujerista Creativity: Latin@ Sacred Arts as Life-Course Developmental Resources.  In Bryant, T., and Comas Diaz, L. (Eds.).  Womanist and Mujerista Psychologies.  Washington, DC: APA books.

Zine Culture as Reclamation, Resistance, and Resilience

Izzie Villanueva, TCCS Student ‘19

Editor’s note: In fall semester of 2017, Izzie Villanueva curated a zine for TCCS 610: Topics in TCCS offered by Aminah Pilgrim, Senior Lecturer of Africana Studie and core faculty of the Transnational Cultural and Community Studies program at UMass Boston. The following post is about this zine.

Playing off an abbreviation of “magazine”, zines are becoming an increasingly popular publication medium for artists, poets, and more. Zines are alternative publications to spread knowledge, narratives, and truths. Currently, many activists look to this platform to spread awareness on a variety of issues, combat inequities, and simultaneously advocate for their rights to exist and create communities. The presented zine incorporates the knowledge of community organizing and identity-validation to disrupt the oppressive ivory tower of higher education.

Colorful cover of zine created by Izzie Villanueva

I used the image from our TCCS handbook as the overall cover of the zine. By blurring the image (especially blurring the outlines of a cityscape and buildings that was there previously) and enhancing the opacity of the colors, I wanted to reflect on how the pieces presented in the zine have their own differences, but still come together to collectively create one tangible piece of art. Furthermore, this symbolizes how my cohort and I have all come from different walks of life but are now together in the TCCS program.

Two poems in the zine

I started this zine by incorporating poetry by my classmates Jimena and Taina (whose work appears above left and right, respectively) as they reminisce upon their homeland as they transition to the United States. 

For Jimena’s piece, the background is an image I found in a fashion magazine of woman of color shaving her armpit hair. After reading Jimena’s piece, I thought about how blue is socially constructed to be the opposite of red.

I thought about how femininity is socially constructed, influenced by different ethnic cultures, but usually automatically linked to womanhood. I also thought about the things that are supposedly unallowed on a woman’s body such as hair or menstruation blood.

Is a nation state inherently tied to womanhood as it is depicted as one’s ‘motherland’? If she is drowning will others save her or will they simply say the water is simply tears and she is being overly emotional?

For Taina’s piece, I envisioned a letter being sent thousands of miles away; not only does the letter supercede human-imposed borders, it travels through land, sea, and time. Taina had informed me this piece was written several years ago and no longer held much relevance to her current life.

I argue, this is the beauty of poetry and reclaiming one’s narrative; when each piece of poetry is created, it holds relevance and significance of a specific moment in time and life.

I used an actual cardstock letter to illustrate this stagnant moment, but also consider how one’s interpretation as person moving in the diaspora, is always changing.

Poems in the zine

Continuing, I incorporated pieces by Myles and Grace (above left and right, respectively) to critically assess the word ‘America’. The image behind Myles’s piece is a white man wearing a red and white shirt with blue jeans.

Although not explicitly clear, it symbolizes the secret pervasiveness of colonialism that fuels ‘American culture’ and white supremacy – just because one cannot see it, does not mean it is not there.

Grace’s photo is essential in showing what the Americas truly are and subverts what U.S.-centric media portrays it to be. Both pieces are held together by a question mark sticker and a sticker of the American flag to question the validity of ‘Americanness’ as depicted by the U.S.

Poems from the zine

Pieces by Jimena and Jeanette (above left and right, respectively) are incorporated to continue thinking about ‘Americanness’ and what is expected in regards to language.

Many of us first generation immigrants or second generation children might have grown up with the rule of not speaking English at home; yet, the education system of the United States imposes this language, leaving us either confused or forced to forget our native tongue.

For Jimena, she previously abhorred speaking in English in Costa Rica, but now is forced to use it as her primary language. Whereas for Jeanette, she felt strange speaking in Spanish in a classroom setting because of how ingrained European settler colonialism permeates in the K-12 education system of the United States. The background is scattered with stickers one might find given to assignments for (native English speaking, adhering to colonialism, aligning with the system) elementary school students.

Poems from the zine

These pieces by Fernanda and Juan (above left and right, respectively) demonstrate the stark contrast of how others perceive assimilation and how it actually is in practice. Assimilating to a new nation should be sweet and seemingly easy to transition into with new identities easily assigned and adhered to (the bunnies for Fernanda’s piece hold complacent faces as they take in their new environment and eat the sweets of capitalism, not daring to question the process). Yet, even when this is supposedly achieved, more confusion appears as navigating ones new identities is no where near simplistic.

Juan’s piece is on different pieces of paper that must be flipped up to be read fully and the background is a space galaxy.

This symbolizes the seemingly never ending quest to understanding nationality, ethnicity, and how they play into one’s understanding of lived experiences and identity.

Poems from the zine

I wrote these two pieces at the end of the summer, right before moving to Boston. For the first piece, I used images of some of the students I have worked with in the past as a physical reminder of some of the communities I am pursuing a master’s degree for. Throughout the semester I found myself having to look at old photos to help me continue with school.

For the second piece, I formatted the page to look like a letter I was sending back home to remind my home communities, as well as myself, I would be okay, and there were other communities outside of California that would support me just the same as they would.

I believe flowers symbolize growth and not only surviving in harsh environments, but also thriving. Despite the initial fear of facing the ivory tower and imposter syndrome, I believe I am now more confident and ready to thrive in graduate school as a queer person of color.

Photograph of students in the 2017 cohort of the TCCS program

I wanted to end the zine with something that encaptured the reason why my cohort and I are in TCCS – to make a change and be advocates of social justice. Samnang took a photograph of our TCCS 612: Community Formations class.

I believe the photo is essential in documenting ways we are disrupting traditional academic norms while creating and fostering community building among one another.

Allie’s quote is truly a reminder of how each of us in TCCS deserves to be in a seat, in a classroom, in graduate school: We will use tools outside of the master’s house in order to bring a better future for our communities.

 

Scholars for Puerto Rico Relief

A house floats in water after flood waters from Hurricane Maria

Professor Marisol Negrón
Assistant Professor with tenure of American Studies and Latino Studies

Originally published on October 11, 2017 on Avidly, a channel of the Los Angeles Review of Books.

Available at
http://avidly.lareviewofbooks.org/2017/10/11/scholars-for-puerto-rico-relief/

*The fundraising campaign referred to in the essay ended on January 30, 2018.

Two weeks after Hurricane Maria struck Puerto Rico, conditions are still dire and in some regions actually worsening. In the wake of Hurricanes Irma and Maria, approximately 3.5 million residents were without electricity, and without secure access to food, water, medical care, transportation, stable telecommunications, and other necessities. The latest reports show that continued support for Puerto Rico’s residents is needed — particularly as the media’s attention turns elsewhere.

We are scholars committed to supporting Puerto Rico relief and recovery efforts in the aftermath of Hurricanes Irma and Maria. We join others who are increasing awareness of the humanitarian and environmental crisis in Puerto Rico and raising funds for ongoing emergency recovery efforts.  All funds raised by Scholars for Puerto Rico will be donated to three community-based organizations who are integral to both immediate and long-term sustainable recovery in Puerto Rico:  Casa Pueblo, Organización Pro Ambiente Sustentable, and Taller Salud. 

Since the passage of Hurricane Maria, numerous accounts continue to circulate of the widespread destruction of homes, schools, hospitals, and even whole towns in Puerto Rico. Many Puerto Ricans, both there and in the diaspora, remain unable to reach family and friends throughout the territory because vast swaths of Puerto Rico remain without communication. Moreover, reliable news outlets in Puerto Rico estimate that once communication and transportation are reestablished throughout the territory, the official death toll from Hurricane Maria could soar. Still, the U.S. federal government’s response to the crisis in this US territory has been lackluster at best, even though Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens.

Puerto Rico was a colony of Spain until the end of the Spanish-American War in 1898. Considered a war prize, Puerto Rico, along with several other territories, became a colony of the United States. The Jones-Shaforth Act passed by Congress in 1917 granted Puerto Ricans citizenship. However, those residing in the US territory of Puerto Rico do not enjoy the same civic rights as their mainland counterparts. For example, while residents of Puerto Rico can be drafted into the military, they cannot vote for President and lack voting representation in Congress. Puerto Rico’s limited representation has left the territory with few advocates within the U.S. government to push for meaningful and sustained federal relief during this time of crisis.

Puerto Ricans have long been treated as second-class citizens due to the territory’s colonial status. Hurricane Maria has exposed the continued effects of colonialism on the territory since the early 20th century. The Merchant Marine Act of 1920 (also known as the Jones Act) requires that all goods shipped to Puerto Rico arrive from U.S. ports, on U.S.-constructed ships, with U.S. crews. The Jones Act therefore greatly raises the cost of transporting goods as well as their purchase prices once they arrive in Puerto Rico. In the wake of Hurricane Maria, the Jones Act inflates the time and cost of transporting supplies, personnel, and equipment for Puerto Rico’s recovery efforts from foreign countries.  Ships carrying aid to Puerto Rico from countries like the Dominican Republic and Cuba, which have both offered help, cannot deliver aid directly to a port in the territory. They would instead have to travel to a port on the U.S. mainland before transporting aid to their Caribbean neighbor. On September 28, the Trump administration suspended the Jones Act for ten days to facilitate hurricane relief. However, with recovery efforts expected to take months, a reimposition of the Jones Act will obstruct the ability of aid to reach Puerto Rico in a timely fashion.

Since Hurricane Maria, the federal fiscal control board installed by the US government in 2016 to oversee the territory’s finances has only authorized $1bn to fund the recovery. This is nowhere near the amount Puerto Rico will need to not only rebuild, but create a more sustainable and disaster resistant infrastructure. The federal government has also failed to announce a moratorium on Puerto Rico’s debt repayment or consider any form of debt forgiveness in light of Maria’s catastrophic effects.

The physical and technological infrastructural collapse that followed Hurricane Maria was enabled by more than a decade of austerity measures imposed by the local and federal governments to deal with Puerto Rico’s mounting debt. These austerity measures starved public utilities of the funds needed to make repairs and upgrades and left Puerto Rico’s infrastructure particularly vulnerable. Puerto Rico cannot be rebuilt on a foundation of austerity and colonial neglect.

We must support and aid community-based organizations in Puerto Rico working to rebuild the territory amidst structural inequalities of colonialism and inadequate support from the federal government. In addition to the most basic supplies, Puerto Rico needs billions of dollars to rebuild its infrastructure, homes, and institutions like hospitals, government buildings, and schools. Community-based organizations like Casa Pueblo, Organización Pro Ambiente Sustentable, and Taller Salud are central to the recovery and rebuilding of Puerto Rico. 

  • Casa Pueblo, an organization dedicated to community empowerment and the protection of natural and cultural resources;
  • Organización Pro Ambiente Sustentable (OPAS), an environmental organization whose programming efforts focus on education about and management of sustainable resources; and
  •  Taller Salud, which works to improve the lives of girls and women, particularly in under-resourced communities.

We stand in solidarity with Puerto Rico and all those committed to not only rebuild but transform Puerto Rico with long-term sustainable recovery and recuperation initiatives …

Update 2/1/2018:

The initial campaign raised $28,756. A second campaign raised an additional $8,254 to support relief and recovery efforts of the three organizations below:

  • IDEBAJO, a consortium of organizations in the Jobos Bay region that advocates for environmentally preferred alternatives in community development;
  • Comedores Sociales de Puerto Rico, a grassroots food distribution initiative that began in 2013 in response to the economic crisis;  and
  • PECES, an organization that fosters social, economic, and educational development in under-resourced communities.

For additional information, we recommend the Puerto Rico Syllabus, which contains materials for thinking critically about the Puerto Rico debt crisis and the destruction caused by Hurricane Maria, the storm’s aftermath, and what the storm revealed about the colonial relationship, debt and austerity, and the unequal vulnerability of Puerto Rico’s residents. The syllabus also includes additional teaching tools and media resources for use in classrooms.

Scholars for Puerto Rico*

*Scholars for Puerto Rico is not a group, but rather an effort to raise funds for recovery efforts in the territory. Several scholars worked collaboratively to bring this fundraising campaign to fruition: Frances Aparicio (Northwestern University), Arlene Dávila (New York University), Zaire Dinzey-Flores (Rutgers University), Lorena Estrada-Martínez (University of Massachusetts Boston), Lawrence La Fountain-Stokes (University of Michigan), Marisol LeBrón (Dickinson College), Marisol Negrón (University of Massachusetts Boston), Jade Power-Sotomayor (University of Washington Bothell), Lorna Rivera (University of Massachusetts Boston), Petra Rivera-Rideau (Wellesley College), and Wilson Valentín-Escobar (Hampshire College).

Scholars for Puerto Rico is in partnership with Scholars for Haiti and thanks Yveline Alexis, Nadège T. Clitandre, Marlene Daut, Darlene Dubuisson, April Mayes, and Kyla Wazana Tompkins for their support.

Authorship note: Professor Negrón is one of several scholars who worked collaboratively to organize the effort to raise funds for community organizations engaged in relief and recovery efforts after Hurricane Maria. Scholars for Puerto Rico is not a group, but rather an effort to raise funds for recovery efforts in the territory. Several scholars worked collaboratively to bring this fundraising campaign to fruition: Frances Aparicio (Northwestern University), Arlene Dávila (New York University), Zaire Dinzey-Flores (Rutgers University), Lorena Estrada-Martínez (University of Massachusetts Boston), Lawrence La Fountain-Stokes (University of Michigan), Marisol LeBrón (Dickinson College), Marisol Negrón (University of Massachusetts Boston), Jade Power-Sotomayor (University of Washington Bothell), Lorna Rivera (University of Massachusetts Boston), Petra Rivera-Rideau (Wellesley College), and Wilson Valentín-Escobar (Hampshire College).

Originally published on October 11, 2017 on Avidly, a channel of the Los Angeles Review of Books. Available at http://avidly.lareviewofbooks.org/2017/10/11/scholars-for-puerto-rico-relief/

Using a faucet is a privilege

Zainab Salejwala
TCCS ’19

Image of a dirty faucet

“Something is wrong and nobody is listening…We’re fighting for social justice and reparations but we’re [also] sick…”

Using a faucet is a privilege. Sounds funny right? Maybe a little. What about pipes and faucets that aren’t orange-y brown that has clean water? Doubly-privileged?

On Thursday, February 8th, I attended a lecture called Flint Rising in the McCormick Lounge that overlooks the UMass Boston harbor. The sky turning soft pastels, the water unmoving heavily contrasted the harsh topic of the event- the water crisis in Flint, Michigan.

The problem started on March 2011 when there was a $25 million deficit. In 2014 the state was building a new pipeline to deliver water from Lake Huron but the city switched to Flint River, a river that is a non-drinkable water source and has been historically contaminated. Two activists who have been at the forefront of this issue are Nayyirah Shariff and Gina Luster. When the issue happened, Michigan passed an emergency law but never declared a state of emergency.

Both Nayyirah and Gina talked about how they started to notice the water changing colors to the way it smelt ranging from “tea, honey, dark liquor, dead body, straight bleach to trash.”

Gina would call the state and water systems, but they would keep telling her that it was probably just a “flush” where the water system is cleaned and it tastes a little chemically and bad for a few days. But as days turned into weeks and as weeks turned into months, the water didn’t improve. And it still hasn’t improved even today.  This is how you dismiss a whole population.

Two water activists from Flint, Michigan, speaking at UMass Boston.
Nayyirah and Gina speaking at UMass Boston

Gina, 40, started losing weight, having broken teeth, fainting, and needing to walk with a cane. Nayyirah has seizures. In the middle of talking Gina paused, inhaled and let silence stretch out. And she explained, “Sorry, I need to catch my breath.”

Gina also mentioned how her daughter also gets rashes from the water.

Her daughter only knows of attending school with her backpack full of a day’s supply of water bottles and yellow caution tape or black trash bags wrapped around the water fountains. Nayyirah stressed, “How can you dismiss a whole population?”

To answer that question, Pulido (2016) states: “..[P]eople of Flint are so devalued… based on both their blackness and their surplus status… the devaluation of black bodies has been a central feature of global capitalism” (p. 1).

Gina again stressed, “What kind of message is my daughter getting when she sees those caution tapes?” Nayyirah mentioned that there is no tracking of health programs, no counseling and no curriculum or public health education in response to what is happening.

The water in Flint had extremely high levels of lead which can cause serious health problems. The government kept lying to its citizens and providing them with misinformation. Flint residents who decide to leave do not qualify for health services in other neighboring states.  This is how you dismiss a whole population.

For instance, the government would tell residents to boil water which, in reality, makes the lead and other toxic substances more concentrated and harmful. This is how you dismiss a whole population.

The water facility that the city decided to utilize had “not been fully operational in almost 50 years, was understaffed, and some of the staff were undertrained it is not surprising that it was difficult to achieve effective treatment”  (Masten, 2016, p.27). This is how you dismiss a whole population.

In Flint, there was also a community of people who only spoke Spanish but the government refused to translate fliers about the dangers of their water supply.  This is how you dismiss a whole population.

A sign reading "Water Pickup" from Flint, Michigan

The situation in Flint reminds me of the Dakota Access Pipeline. Both situations in Flint and North Dakota are about environmental injustice heavily tied to racism, capitalism, hegemony of english, the privatization and access to resources. Both these crises “require attention to the past and how wealth, power, and poverty have historically been created” (Pulido, 2016, p.4). Water is a human right and you should not be able to profile of it.

I can’t believe how the poisoning of the public water supply in Flint has continued for so many years.

Nayyirah and Gina are still fighting for justice. The city is going to stop giving out free water at the end of the month (February 2018) and I hope that, individually and as a program, we are able to take action and help the citizens of Flint, MI.

When you wake up and brush your teeth. Unscrew the cap. Capitalism. When you want to rinse your vegetables under the sink for your salad. Racism. Hold up the two gallon water bottle with your sore arms that have not habituated to the weight of the water although you have been doing this for years now. Lead. Legionnaires. Or brew tea in the afternoon. “Tea… Honey… Dark Liquor…”. Broken promises by the government. Break the seal. When you want to bathe and fill up the tub. Listen to the plastic bend and make guttural sounds. Look at the faucet which is a constant reminder of what should be but isn’t. Bottle by bottle. Drop by drop. Next time you drink clean water, think of Flint, Michigan.

References:

Susan J. Masten. Simon H. Davies. Shawn P. McElmurry. (2017). Flint Water Crisis: What Happened and Why?”Journal American Water Works Association. Vol. 108 No. 12, p. 22.

Pulido,L. (2016). Flint, Environmental Racism, and Racial Capitalism, Capitalism Nature Socialism, 27:3, 1-16, DOI: 10.1080/10455752.2016.1213013