Anti-Colonial Texts from Central American Student Movements 1929–1983
Edited by Heather A Vrana
Few people know that student protest emerged in Latin America decades before the infamous student movements of Western Europe and the U.S. in the 1960s. Even fewer people know that Central American university students authored colonial agendas and anti-colonial critiques. In fact, Central American students were key actors in shaping ideas of nation, empire, and global exchange. Bridging a half-century of student protest from 1929 to 1983, this source reader contains more than sixty texts from Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador, and Costa Rica, including editorials, speeches, manifestos, letters, and pamphlets. Available for the first time in English, these rich texts help scholars and popular audiences alike to rethink their preconceptions of student protest and revolution. The texts also illuminate key issues confronting social movements today: global capitalism, dispossession, privatization, development, and state violence.
Key Features- Makes available for the first time to English-language readers a diverse archive of more than sixty foundational documents and ephemera accompanied by an introduction, section introductions and further reading
- Expands the geographic scope of anti-colonial movement scholarship by presenting anti-colonial thought in the most contentious decades of the 20th century from a region peripheral even within anti-colonial and postcolonial studies
- Advances anti-colonial and postcolonial studies by taking urban students as critical actors and so recasting thematics of the peasantry, the rural/urban divide, and religion
- Suggests a new social movement chronology beyond the so-called "Global 1968," or the common notion that student movements peaked in May 1968 in Paris, New York City, Berkeley, and Mexico City
Notes on Translations
Notes on Sources
Introduction
Further Reading
Chapter 1: Central American Modernities, 1929-1944Guatemala
‘In Complete Tyranny,’ El Estudiante (1920)
Manuel Galich, ‘The Manifesto of 1942,’ in Del pánico al ataque (1949)
AEU, Manifesto (1946)
El Salvador
Address, Dr Miguel Rafael Urquia, El Estudiante (1933)
Address, Br Reinaldo Galindo Pohl, La Universidad (1944)
Nicaragua
Excerpts, Central University of Nicaragua, Report of its Foundation (1941)
David Sánchez Sánchez, ‘The Student Body as a Political Force,’ El Universitario (1945)
Juan F. Gutiérrez, ‘Let’s Build the Fatherland,’ El Universitario (1946)
Costa Rica
‘"In Costa Rica we are proud of our freedom of thought…’ La Tribuna (1931)
Excerpts, Manuel Mora Valverde, Imperialism: Our sovereignty before the State
Department (1940)
Honduras
Jorge Fidel Durón, ‘Function of the University,’ Revista de la Universidad (1949)
Jorge St. Siegens, ‘Cooperativism in Honduras,’ Revista de la Universidad (1950)
Chapter 2: Enduring Militarism, 1952-1959
Guatemala
Committee of Guatemalan Anticommunist University Students in Exile (CEUAGE),
‘Standing up to the Red Dictatorship in Guatemala’, Boletín de CEUAGE (1953)
Committee of Anticommunist University Students (CEUA), Plan de Tegucigalpa, (1954)
‘AEU Versus Discrimination,’ Informador Estudiantil (1956)
Editorial, El Estudiante (1957)
‘Association of Law Students contesting Decree 1215 of the Republic, declares Carlos
Castillo Armas traitor to the Fatherland’ (1958)
El Salvador
AGEUS, ‘Manifesto,’ Opinión Estudiantil (1956)
AGEUS, ‘Solidarity with Nicaraguan exiles,’ Opinión Estudiantil (1956)
‘Communiqué,’ Opinión Estudiantil (1956)
Nicaragua
‘Here are the murders and their Victims,’ El Universitario (1960)
‘COSEC Receives Cablegram from SOMOZA,’ El Universitario (1960)
Honduras
‘National Constitutional Assembly of 1957,’ from Historico-Juridical Study on the
Autonomy of the National Autonomous University of Honduras (1957)
‘Organic Law of the University of Honduras,’ Legislative Decree 170 (1958)
Chapter 3: Dependency, Development, and New Roles for Student Movements, 1960-1981
Nicaragua
‘Cuba and Latin America, Yes! Yankees No!’ El Universitario (1960)
Excerpts, Student Centre of the National University (CUUN), Imperialism (1971)
Guatemala
Jaime F. Pineda S., ‘The Participation of University Students in National Life,’ Tribuna
Económica (1962)
USAC Rector Roberto Valdeavellano Pinot, ‘Communiqué’ (1974)
Excerpts, ‘International Monetary Fund, Tentacle of Capitalism,’ 7 Días en la USAC
(1980)
‘Letter from a Thief to his Neighbours’ (1976)
Costa Rica
FEUCR, ‘History signals our position,’ El Universitario (1970)
‘Why I participated in the actions on the 24th’ El Universitario (1970)
Editorial, El Universitario (1970)
Honduras
‘Joint Declaration by the Federation of Honduran University Students (FEUH) and the
General Association of Salvadoran University Students (AGEUS),’ Boletin del Instituto de Investigaciones Económicas y Sociales (1974)
‘The Murders of the CIA,’ Presencia Universitaria (1976)
El Salvador
Excerpts, University High Council, Freedom and culture with regard to the debate about
the university (1964)
AGEUS, ‘On the agrarian problem,’ El Universitario (1979)
Excerpts, AGEUS, Healthcare in El Salvador, another reason for the popular struggle,
(1981)
Chapter 4: Revolution and Civil War, 1966-1981
Nicaragua
Carlos Fonseca, ‘A Message to Revolutionary Students’ (1968)
Guatemala
Editorial, No Nos Tientes (1966)
JPT, ‘Who Will Benefit from the War in Belize?’ Juventud (1977)
AEU, ‘The Guatemalan student movement in the struggle for the respect of democratic and human rights…’ (1977)
Oliverio Castañeda de León, Speech to the AEU (1978)
El Salvador
‘Declaration of the University of El Salvador’s High Council on the National Situation,’
El Universitario (1979)
Communiqué, Opinión Estudiantil (1980)
‘Guatemala: In the difficult struggle for its freedom…’ Opinión Estudiantil (1980)
José María Cuellar, ‘1932’ and ‘Wars in My Country’
‘Poetry from a heroic woman from our pueblo,’ Opinión Estudiantil (1981)
Honduras
‘Honduras – Nicaragua: Form a Solidarity Committee,’ Presencia Universitaria (1976)
Excerpts, Armando Valladares, ‘Achievements and Meaning of Our University
Autonomy’ in Universidad y Autonomía: un encuentro del presente (1978)
Chapter 5: Revolutionary Futures, 1976-1982
Costa Rica
R. Morua, ‘We the students say: "We want to build our tomorrow,’’’ El Universitario
(1970)
Honduras
Federation of Honduran University Students (FEUH), ‘Public Declaration,’ Presencia
Universitaria (1976)
Excerpts, Enrique Astorga Lira, ‘Marginal Models of Agrarian Reform in Latin America:
the Case of Honduras,’ Alcaraván (1980)
Excerpts, Editorial, El tornillo sin fin: the virile Organ of the university students of
Honduras (1981)
Guatemala
Excerpts, ‘Bulletin No. 2 of the Huelga de Dolores’ (1980)
Saúl Osorio Paz, ‘Open Letter to the University High Council’ (1980)
El Salvador
‘Salvadoran students facing imperialist intervention in El Salvador,’ Opinión Estudiantil
(1981)
AGEUS, ‘Agustín Farabundo Martí, Example of anti-imperialist struggle and of the popular war for liberation,’ Opinión Estudiantil (1982)
Nicaragua
Daisy Zamora, ‘Commander Two,’ ‘Report of the Demonstration in Front of the US
Embassy Protesting the Pino Grande Manoeuvres,’ and ‘Song of Hope,’ from Clean Slate (1993)
Jaime Wheelock, ‘The University for Economic Independence: The Militant University’
in For National Independence through Revolution: The Militant University (1983)
Conclusion
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Heather Vrana’s anthology, Anti-Colonial Texts from Central American Student Movements, 1929-1983 is an exceedingly important contribution to the scholarship and in particular the pedagogy of Central American history. The texts reveal two overarching themes across the decades. First, there is a striking coherence and continuity to anti-imperialist (or anti-colonialist) thought emanating from both students and administrators and, before 1960 from various political tendencies. That thought, often inspired by Central American nationalism, was linked, in turn, to a fierce devotion to university autonomy. Yet, as the texts make extremely clear, students made no effort to isolate the university from the struggles of workers, peasants, and marginalized sectors. Often poignantly, the students demanded their physical and moral integration into the broader society. The students’ high level of communication with relatively uneducated sectors of the citizenry was remarkable and will prove highly instructive to American and British university students. Vrana has done an excellent job of digging through a number of often difficult archives in order to present this wide array of well-translated texts from the five Central American republics.
