El Barrio Rallies Against Book Banning in Puerto Rican Schools
By Robert Waddell, October 22, 2009
In protest to five banned books in Puerto Rican high schools, poets, writers and activists joined together on Sunday October 11th to be photographed in Spanish Harlem. The participants wore black, were blind folded and held up the banned books to signal their outrage over the obvious First Amendment violation. Those who had their photos taken wanted to show solidarity with Boricuas on the island.
The photo was taken on 104th street and Lexington Avenue in Manhattan in front of the Pedro Pietri Memorial Mural on the wall next to Michelle Cruz’s East Harlem Café.
“We all collaborated on this,” said Adal Maldonado, who co-founded the Puerto Rican Embassy and the Spirit Republic of Puerto Rico with the late Reverend Pedro Pietri.
On Friday September 11, this year, Deputy Secretary for Academic Affairs of the Department of Education of Puerto Rico, Dr. Juan J. Rodriguez prohibited 11th grade high school students from reading 5 books because he said the works contained coarse and vulgar language. The five books were "Mejor te lo Cuento: Antologia Personal," by Juan Antonio Ramos, "Aura" by Carlos Fuentes, “Reunion de Espejos” by Jose Luis Vega, “Personal Anthology” by José Luis González and “Burial of Cortijo” by Edgardo Rodriguez Julia.
Soon after, New York artists and activists quickly mobilized to make their voices heard and protest the book banning, which for many is a throw back to a dark chapter in American history, especially for the island of Puerto Rico. Today, Puerto Rico faces an economic crisis where many public workers have been laid off and the government is interested in privatizing local services.
“My reaction was this is de-evolution,” said Maldonado. “This is what’s going on in totalitarian fascist governments. That’s not how an open and free society works. (Banning books) this is how it starts. Limit, and limit something else then it gets out of hand.”
Poet and Professor Sheila Candelario said that she was alarmed when she heard that 11th graders are being denied access to these books.
“They’re targeting high school students,” said Candelario. “When a colony openly bans books that becomes crucial in the evolution of the repression and oppression of our island, it’s when things like this happen, which means it’s getting even more intolerable.”
“…censorship in education, and in general, has been going on in the US as well as in Puerto Rico for eons,” wrote poet Sandra Maria Esteves in her essay, “My Two-Cents on Censorship.” Considered the Madrina of the Nuyorican Poets Movement.
The artists and activists who participated in the photo protest agree that along with censorship, young, impressionable minds were being denied information as a United States and Puerto Rican citizen.
“In banning these books from our students,” said Candelario, “they’re not being taught these important pieces of literature. I'm outraged. But, we’re building a bridge to let our brothers and sisters on the island know that we’re here and we feel it too, that we’re one nation.”
This story was developed through the Education Beat Writing Fellowship at the New York Community Alliance. |
