{"id":2640,"date":"2013-07-17T09:36:57","date_gmt":"2013-07-17T14:36:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/library.brown.edu\/modernlatinamerica\/?page_id=2640"},"modified":"2013-07-17T09:36:57","modified_gmt":"2013-07-17T14:36:57","slug":"document-17-testimonies-of-guatemalan-women-patricia-herrera-1980","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/library.brown.edu\/create\/modernlatinamerica\/chapters\/chapter-5-central-america\/primary-documents-w-accompanying-discussion-questions\/document-17-testimonies-of-guatemalan-women-patricia-herrera-1980\/","title":{"rendered":"Document #12: \u201cTestimonies of Guatemalan Women,\u201d Luz Alicia Herrera (1980)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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From an article in Latin American Perspectives:<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Translated by Maria Alice Jacob\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

*The interviewer is a Guatemalan woman who is also involved in the struggles of the mass movement. These interviews appeared in Estudios Centroamericanos (El Salvador) in a special issue on Guatemala, 1978. The translator is a Brazilian student, a graduate from California State University, Los Angeles, who presently is a social worker in Los Angeles with emphasis on immigration and Latina women.*<\/p>\n

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Guatemalan women in traditional dress.<\/p><\/div>\n

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INTRODUCTION<\/p>\n

As a contribution to the knowledge of Guatemalan social reality, I offer\u00a0the following statements as they were told to me by the women themselves. Each is selected for a reason. Through the statement of the first woman, we discover thousands of Guatemalan women: poor peasants, agricultural workers, maids, industrial workers, unmarried mothers, and the women who are active in the struggle of popular organizations. Through the statement of the second woman, we see an example of a person from a wealthy background who opts for the interests of the great oppressed majority of Guatemalans. We present this second interview, knowing full well that it may generate the common psychological interpretation that this serious process of transformation is actually a manifestation of “social resentment.” With such an explanation the bourgeoisie tries to dismiss the choice of those who side with the majority of the people.<\/p>\n

FIRST WOMAN’S TESTIMONY<\/p>\n

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I was born in a little village on the southeast coast. I was fifteen when we moved to a parcel of land far away, still on the same south coast. My mother was a widow. There were four children, three girls and a boy. In the new place where we went to live, my mother established a little restaurant. We cooked for thirty people. We also picked cotton. My mother, my thirteen-year-old sister, and I would get up at one in the morning to do the household chores: cook corn, make tortillas, prepare the food and clean the house. At 6 o’clock all was ready, and at 7 a.m. we would take the bus to the cotton fields. I used to go with my sister to a plantation that employed between 150 to 200 cotton pickers, men and women.<\/p>\n

On the plantation, an active picker would pick 100 to 150 pounds of cotton. My sister and I would pick 100 pounds between us and be paid one cent per pound. We would take our own food with us. When it rained, we would work from 8 a.m. in the morning to 3 p.m. in the afternoon. If the weather was very humid, we would work from 12 noon to 3 p.m. in the afternoon.<\/p>\n

It is hard work under the hot sun on a cotton plantation. The women\u00a0wore hats to protect their heads from the sun. There would be many of us women with the sack of cotton tied to our waists. The foreman and the labor contractors made sure that the workers kept their attention on the picking and tried to keep them from establishing contact with their fellow workers.<\/p>\n

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Sometimes, when we were picking cotton, the airplane would fly over us, spraying insecticide, and the majority of the workers would get poisoned. We had to hide the water and food so that the poison wouldn’t get to them.<\/p>\n

The foremen were rough and would make the women use the plough by themselves if they left some cotton behind. They treated us badly and humiliated us. The indigenous workers were treated even worse than other workers. They were given only tortillas and beans to eat. Indigenous workers were forced to weigh their cotton on a different scale, undoubtedly to pay them less. The indigenous workers came with their whole families to work wives and children. The children were only five years old when they began to pick cotton.<\/p>\n

Working on the plantation, I was angry about earning so little. Working under the hot sun all day and for so little pay! The foreman and the labor contractors who took advantage of us thought they were kings. A man from the village – a contractor – hired the rest of the workers from the village to do the picking. The foremen were also exploited people but they chose to be on the side of the bosses. We would get home from work at 6 or 7 p.m. and after that feed the other workers – about thirty people outside of our family. Then we would do the dishes and start to cook corn all over again. We would cook 25 pounds of corn a day.<\/p>\n

“Serious work. Get up, get up, it’s time.” That’s how my mother would wake us up. So short was the night! We would go to bed at 10 p.m. the evening before and get up at 1 a.m. in the morning. At that time, I was fifteen years old and my sister was thirteen; since we were the eldest, we were made to do the hardest work. We also worked on the little plot of land that was given to my mother. On it, we would plant corn, maicillo (millet), and chile for everyday use. Sometimes we would sell the little bit that was left. For us, there were no Sundays, no good times. Only weeks of work.<\/p>\n

In 1963, through a friend, I got a job working as a babysitter and maid in Escuintla. I worked there for five years. The first six months they paid me seven quetzales a month to take care of a little girl from 7 a.m. in the morning to noon when the woman of the house, who was a secretary in an office, would get home. It was a big responsibility, and I really didn’t know how to take care of little children. The lady decided that since I was very affectionate with her little daughter, she would pay me 12 quetzales a month. Then she raised it to 20 quetzales a month. This was clear money for me since they gave me other things that I needed – shoes and clothes – and I sent the money to my mother. I worked in this house for five years. The little girl is now thirteen years old, and when she sees me, she says I am her second mother. “You took care of me and my mother didn’t,” she says.<\/p>\n

After this job I returned to my mother’s place in the village. The three of us sisters separated from my mother because she was with a man who didn’t like us. We rented a tiny house. With a little money that my mother gave us we started a store, and, there in the house, my sister (since she is a dressmaker) had her sewing machine, and we continued with the little restaurant, just we three. There we had thirty mobile military police and the people who passed by on their way to the fincas (ranches) for customers. The three of us lived happily. We earned very little, just enough to eat, more or less dress, and shoe ourselves.<\/p>\n

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After that, I came once again to work in Escuintla, in a soft-drink stand. There I worked only for room and board. During this time I had the stupidity to run off with a boyfriend. He studied in the capital and his parents paid for him to stay in a boarding house. From the soft-drink stand, I went with him to the capital. I lived a year and a half with him. We lived, on what his parents sent us, in a small room that didn’t have a place to cook so we bought our meals. I put up with this difficult situation for a year and a half. I went to work in a clothing factory. I was a seam-gatherer. It was my job to gather and trim. I earned four quetzales and twelves cents weekly. I didn’t know how to sew on the electric machines. There were times when I worked extra hours and then I would earn twenty quetzales a month. But I didn’t continue in the factory because he didn’t like me to work. At the same time, what we had didn’t cover anything. I became so desperate that I went home to my mother in the village, once again.<\/p>\n

My boyfrield fought with me a lot because I didn’t get pregnant. “You’ll never have a child; heaven knows what things you do” [he would say]. Well, it was just my bad luck that the month I left him I was already pregnant, but neither of us knew it then. Once when I was with my mother, I noticed how I was, and I told my sister and she told my mother. And my mother caused a big uproar. My mother did not like the boy and she was angry at me. My mother threw me out of the house on my own. I went to a friend’s, the one with the soft-drink stand and told her my problem, and I worked with her for room and board.<\/p>\n

After two months, my mother arrived to look for me and took me back to the house. I returned to the house and in the state I was in, no one would give me work. An uncle told me, “You can’t work in a bar anymore.” I told the problem to a neighbor who had a nixtamal (the dough used for tortillas) mill. She let me go there and grind for one quetzal a day. I felt very tired and worn-out working there. Everyday my belly grew larger. My friend found some women who would buy tortillas from me each day and she ground my corn without charging me a cent. Daily, I ground twenty pounds of corn, made and sold the corn. After that, I washed clothes for people, did embroidery and needlework, and bought small clothing to sell with the earnings of the needlework. My stepfather would say: “I will not maintain someone else’s children,” and my mother would get angry with me.<\/p>\n

I sent a message to my boyfriend about my pregnancy, and the response he gave was that the child I was about to have was no child of his, and he wouldn’t pass me one cent – at least until the child was born. My son was three months old when my boyfriend came to see him with his mother. They came with the idea of taking him away from me but, like the majority of mothers who struggle to keep their children, I wouldn’t give him up.<\/p>\n

My ex-boyfriend had married another girl and he wanted to keep me as his lover. He only arrived to see his child when he was drunkand never even brought him candy. One time he even arrived with a revolver, threatening us\u00a0from the window. My sister and I threw him out and punched him. Not until my son was three years old did I manage to convince his father to recognize him. I did it because children need to carry their father’s name.<\/p>\n

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My son didn’t like his father. Because he is not with us, he would say. He would notice that other fathers would bring their little children home from school. I’ve told him everything, and he doesn’t like his father. “Because he was bad with us, because of that, I only love you,” the child would say to me.<\/p>\n

I began working for the revolution some time ago. My stepfather was from a peasant organization. Aside from the fact that he was bad with us, sometimes, when he was in good humor, he gave us advice and we began to collaborate with the organization in the countryside. I, working as a babysitter, already collaborated.<\/p>\n

He did not think like me. He is a teacher but he doesn’t understand the necessity of organizing the workers. He didn’t know that I had those ideas and when he realized it, he told me not to get involved in anything, that this was bad for me. I told him that as long as I lived, I would continue struggling for an organization wherever I was and that there were no limits on where my commitment might take me.”You believe in a struggle that wil lnever triumph, one that won’t ever even end,” he would say. I went to work in a factory again, and there, convinced that I should stay, joined a union. I have girlfriends who say I am crazy, that I shouldn’t get involved in these things, that all I am going to get in return is unemployment or death. But I feel even braver when they tell me that I am going to end up dead. Also, it makes me want to know things I haven’t known before.<\/p>\n

I have had a lot of serious problems, but I have never been afraid. They have taken away my job . . . I think about my son. But he tells me: “If my mother dies, I will stay with the compa\u00f1ieros (comrades) . . . ” The compa\u00f1ieros are from the sindicato (union). Therefore, thinking about the welfare of my child has not kept me from organizing. Sooner or later we all have to die. It might be in some accident. My little boy already is aware of everything and I have taught him how one survives here. He already pays attention to the movements of the police . . . and advises us of them.<\/p>\n

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SECOND WOMAN’S TESTIMONY<\/p>\n

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What motivated you to join the struggle to transform Guatemalan society?<\/em><\/p>\n

I am going to answer you with what may seem to be a contradiction but it was, precisely, because of my nonproletarian class background. I come from what could be called the agro-export bourgeoisie. As a child, I customarily spent my end-of-the-year vacation at the finca. This vacation coincided with cutting and harvesting. It was there where the answers that were given to my innumerable questions didn’t satisfy my childhood curiosity about the conditions I confronted daily.<\/p>\n

My father considered the Indian a species half-way between human and animal. I noticed this in a number of incidents. For example, one day, seeing hundreds of men, women, and children descend from the mountains bathed in sweat, carrying enormous loads, I had an enormous feeling of pain and anguish. My father must have noticed it because he explained that Indians were born to do such work, that they were incapable of doing any other, that they\u00a0were dumb, lazy, drunken, that they had no desire to better themselves, and that they lacked our intelligence – those of us who were descendants of Spaniards.(He never referred to us as ladinos; he considered us to be located at the top of the social stratification among whites, and the term ladino was applied to the mestizo or white who did not possess a powerful name.).<\/p>\n

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At harvest time, the labor of mozos colonos (resident tenants), or rancheros (ranch hands) who live on the finca is not sufficient, and day laborers are contracted from more arid regions where from necessity they migrate to the fincas to supplement their precarious family income. They would arrive in trucks, piled up like animals, dragging along with them their misery and disease. They were put up in enormous galeras (sheds) which only had a few posts, a roof, and no walls. There, each family gathered around a fireplace previously placed, was given a comal (a piece of clay on which corn tortillas are cooked), an empty tin can of milk or whatever other product in which the corn could be cooked, a grinding stone, and naturally, tools. There wouldn’t even be a cloth dividing one family from another.<\/p>\n

I was strictly prohibited from entering these sheds because the Indians were said to have fleas, were dirty, and some were sick. One night, I remember, a child in one of the sheds began to cough. The next day, there were about five children coughing; the next week, all of the children had whooping cough. The sheds were almost in front of the house of the finca, and during the night you could hear the coughing of the little children as though it were part of a bad dream. A certain fear overcame me and I ran to my father’s room to tell my father that these children were going to die, that they were suffocating, and that we had to do something. My father took my hand and walked me back to my room, put me to bed, covered me up and said sweetly, “Don’t worry, they’re not children, they’re Indians.”<\/p>\n

Thus, I later saw, lined up in front of the house, some little caskets, painted white, accompanied only by the fathers, mothers, and others who were most likely relatives. The rest of their fellow workers were missing because the harvest had to continue. At night, much larger groups of people climbed up to the cemetery; many Indians, lighting the way with candles, lanterns of wood and paper, moving in silence or with low voices, speaking in low voices in dialect, carrying out their rituals. My father pointed out to me “these pagans who worship idols and get drunk and weep and wail in the cemetery.”<\/p>\n

“You see?,” he would say, “they don’t even care that their children have died; the only thing that interests them is the guaro (liquor); they are not like us.”<\/p>\n

My questions were endless. Innocently, I asked why shoes weren’t bought for them, why they weren’t given food, why the children had inflated stomachs, why they never laughed, why they spoke differently, why doctors weren’t called for them. Why? Why? Until one day, my father, tired of so much questioning, said, “Because they are Indians, understand? I don’t want to hear another word about the matter again.”<\/p>\n

I began to ask questions again and I received a beating. I learned, then, “not to stick your nose in matters that don’t concern you,” and I opted for silence. For several years I lived these experiences, always painful.<\/p>\n

I remember that in order to reach the finca, two jeeps were necessary, one for us and one for the baggage and food. One would suppose that these\u00a0were marvelous vacations; our friends and my father’s friends would arrive at the ranch, I would entertain myself and almost grow accustomed to the situation. But as I grew to adolescence, I began to judge my parents and their friends; now it was no longer necessary to ask questions any more. I knew by then; there was injustice and exploitation but not at the level of reason. I just felt it.<\/p>\n

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One of the last times I was there at the finca, there was a storm, rains that wouldn’t stop. The rivers grew and we had to return to the capital. The jeeps couldn’t pass to the other side. Up on their shoulders, I saw my mother and brothers and sisters who went ahead. All on the shoulders of Indians, dirty and sweaty. I swore I would never return, and so I never did.<\/p>\n

I had a turbulent adolescence. I lived in a world of total frivolity. Sex presented itself in a very natural manner. I had a group of friends who often got together to have fun. There were parties with everything – food, alcohol, even drugs. Accustomed as I was to not asking questions, I only observed. Inside me I had a lot of doubts: Why was it necessary for us to have stimulants in order to be happy? I saw this decadence, this rottenness, this promiscuity as natural, but I didn’t stop thinking. I was always looking for another path, another way out, another life.<\/p>\n

My parents didn’t stop worrying about me. They thought it wasn’t normal for me to be worried about such things. To them, it was irrational for me to be sad at seeing a beggar or kids who sleep on the streets covered with news- papers or drunkardslying on the streets. I was crazy! They sent me to a psychologist. Laziness was my problem. They registered me at the university so I would “do something.” It wasn’t the national university, of course, but the Catholic one (U. de Rafael Landiver). I wasn’t enthusiastic about it at first, but to my surprise, I met young men and women from the same background as my own, with the same concerns. We started to look together for solutions, read books, make hypotheses, and try to change the world. We were a group of seven people. Five of them have died, victims of repression.<\/p>\n

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How was your political education after that?\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

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This group of seven who shared the same ideas, not yet clearly defined, fell apart. I returned to being alone. I took a trip to Europe where I met an old militant who lived in political exile. He started telling me his personal experiences, answering my many doubts, lecturing to me, showing me the way. Back in Guatemala, I immediately tried to get involved in practice. That’s when I acquired my real education. Work and study sessions, propaganda activities for raising people’s awareness, practical tasks, and a totally different world with people totally different from those I had known. A new conception of the world and of life. A well-defined objective: contribute to the continuation of the revolution that was stopped in Guatemala in 1954, a revolution that Guatemala still needs.<\/p>\n

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What difficulties did you encounter in your practice?<\/em><\/p>\n

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The major difficulty I had was when I tried to join some popular class-conscious organizations. It was difficult at first to find the compa\u00f1eros and then, in the testing period, it was harder and longer for me than for any other person. I knew perfectly well that because of my class background, they\u00a0would, of necessity, create problems for me. I saw distrust in the eyes of my compa\u00f1ieros many times. In others, I saw resentment and even hatred. But I persisted, and after a year, I succeeded in getting them to let me work with an organization that was in the process of really linking itself to the interests of the great majority of Guatemalans. By way of introduction, I had a magnificent compa\u00f1iero who was assassinated later in 1972.<\/p>\n

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I entered the university once again but this time at the national university. For a few years my main work was study (outside of regular meetings that we had outside of class) and small practical tasks: leafletting, spray-painting, etc.<\/p>\n

Studying and practicing Marxism resolved the doubts of my childhood and adolescence. Now I know what the Indian is, what my father and other landlords like him are, what we – myself included – the salaried middle sectors are, what the urban and agricultural proletariat is.<\/p>\n

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In what way have you been affected by political repression in Guatemala?\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

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Before responding to this question. I’d like to relate what I know of the repression: in the houses of the bourgeoisie, particularly in that of my parents, there is economic aid to repressive groups. Fortunately, at the time when these right-wing paramilitary groups appeared, I already had a political formation, and I knew how to take advantage of all occasions. I knew many people in “La Mano” (National Organized Anti-Communist Movement), made up of groups of assassins who massacred thousands of peasants in the eastern part of the country under the orders of ex-President Arana Osorio. Many times I have had to bite my tongue. I would hear these men speak of us, vain-glorious about their exploits, telling how they personally fight against the guerillas, mentioning forms of tortures that Cuban exiles in Guatemala would provide them. I knew of their assaults and their links. All of this we studied and interpreted with the compafieros; they never said more in my house than what they wanted me to hear, but they always revealed more than they thought they did.<\/p>\n

I remember, for example, that in an assault on the Bank of Guatemala, they dressed up as priests. I knew, likewise, that it was the priest of a certain Church who gave them the cassocks. I saw them dressed up as women on one occasion (for purposes of disguise, they said). I saw my mother dye the hair of one of them. In short, I had them very close and what I most remember about them was the death outlined in their eyes. Such hard looks behind friendly smiles. Since they were dealing with paid groups, little by little they began to degenerate into common delinquents, and in doing so entered into conflict with their “papa” Arana who took responsibility for eliminating them\u00a0one by one after the supposed “pacification” of the eastern part of the country.<\/p>\n

These events were clear manifestations of the union between the Church and the dominant classes. “The faithful, above all the poor and the miserable, should be humble and accept the Christian dogma along with exploitation because God knows what he does. Some were born to be poor and some to be rich. It is the law of God.”<\/p>\n

I, personally, have not been a victim of repression. Nevertheless, many compa\u00f1eros in the struggle, which is much broader than the popular organization to which I belong, have been its victims. A few have managed to escape according to public bulletins I have read, but the majority have died. With so many of these Guatemalans (men and women) who have been captured or have died I feel solidarity!<\/p>\n

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What has been your relation with your compa\u00f1eros?\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

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As I told you in response to one of the earlier questions, it was difficult at first. But through organization work, carried out collectively, I achieved and won their trust. I had to pass several difficult tests and demonstrate my loyalty to the revolutionary struggle. Except for this obstacle, at a purely personal level, I have had the opportunityto work with a variety of compa\u00f1eros. There is, within our ranks, a system of values based on Marxism, totally different from those of the bourgeoisie. Love, for example, is dignifying, not degrading. Friendship exists. Jealousy, personal competition, egoism have disappeared and given way to new forms of behavior. We don’t need stimulants to be happy; we are happy with the smallest triumph, with a task completed well, with a good discussion around a cup of coffee. There is a certain puritanism without denying ourselves as human beings. Revolutionary discipline demands of us a behavior worthy of someone who struggles with the oppressed of Guatemala, our brothers and sisters. Undoubtedly there are still compa\u00f1eros who suffer from certain vices, many of them young. But I don’t worry about them: I know that the path they have chosen will rid them of these bourgeois remnants that appear from time to time.<\/p>\n

In this struggle, men and women have equal rights and obligations such that I can say that my relationship with both is very good.<\/p>\n

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Is there one compa\u00f1era that you would especially like to remember?<\/em><\/p>\n

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Not one, but many. All those with whom I have had the opportunity to work have left their mark on me. I knew the wife of the compa\u00f1ero who helped me to have courage. She suffered, too, for many years in the struggle from a nervous disease, and we all feared for her health. When her husband was assassinated we thought that she would die or suffer a nervous crisis which might leave her in bad shape. But what happened was the opposite: her revolutionary dedication tripled, and she committed herself completely to the new group of people who wanted to be incorporatedinto the struggle here in Guatemala. I know another compa\u00f1era, a single mother, who received a gunshot wound in a demonstration; she recovered and continued strong in her struggle. Without mentioning a lot of other cases, there is the unforgettable memory of a compa\u00f1era who was killed in Alta Verapaz in the fincas where there is horrible exploitation, where they still pay 25 cents a day. These are only three examples of women from among many others who have offered their lives to the unhalting struggle for the transformation of this class society.<\/p>\n

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What has been the historic participation of Guatemalan women in social change?\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Definitely the participation of women throughout the long history of Guatemala is undeniable. At the moment, I can think of the example of Maria Chinchilla who died struggling for changes in the schools and the working\u00a0conditions of teachers. Women within the dominant classes play a role too; remember, for example, the participation of women in the 1954 campaign to overthrow President Arbenz.<\/p>\n

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The best examples of women actively committed to struggle are found in the different forms of popular struggle. There are women committed to the different revolutionary organizations in the country who undoubtedly play the role of agents of social change by their participation.<\/p>\n

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In your opinion, what do women need to do to achieve their liberation?\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

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In this case, let me speak concretely of the revolutionary woman. The fundamental tasks that are necessary to achieve her liberation cannot be separated from the political emancipation of the population. To speak of personal liberation doesn’t make sense for us. Men and women linked to the revolutionary struggle work together for the liberation from dependency, under-development, and the ignorance that typifies us as a backward country, by means of a permanent struggle that will allow us to construct a society free of exploitation of man by man. It is only possible to speak of liberation in a society not divided in classes.<\/p>\n

Within all of the groups that struggle for the interests of the great majority of oppressed people, there are remnants of typical bourgeois machismo, and there, fundamentally, the revolutionary woman has a well defined task. These particular cases have to be eliminated through study, dialogue, criticism and self-criticism.<\/p>\n

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Is there some particular experience you would like to share?<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Yes, there is one. After several years in this struggle – ones dedicated exclusively to study of Marxism, education of young people and theoretical work – I became anxious to go out to the countryside. My revolutionary practice was limited to the theoretical work of publication, education, printing of documents, etc. One nice day in the month of July, two compa\u00f1eros and I went out destined for a place in one of the departments (provinces). At a determined spot, we left the car and began to walk until we encountered another compa\u00f1ero who took us to a concientizaci\u00f3n (consciousness-raising) meeting with other peasants. Everything was new for me. I had serious difficulties; being from the city, it wasn’t easy for me to walk, I slipped, fell, and bruised myself while my compa\u00f1ieros smiled and did everything possible to help me. Later, they gave me more appropriate clothing, men’s clothing with boots, etc.<\/p>\n

During the day, we rested a little but at night we walked all the time in order to finally arrive at different little towns, intersections, and fincas where we would meet with agrarian workers to talk about their struggle. No one helped me anymore, I had to do everything myself. I had to “season” myself, the compa\u00f1eros told me. There for the first time since I had first seen Indians in the service of my father, we talked together as equals, as comrades.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Source:<\/span>
\n<\/em><\/strong><\/span>Latin American Perspectives<\/em>, Vol. 7, No. 2\/3, Central America: The Strongmen are Shaking (Late Spring – Summer, 1980), pp. 160-168. Sage Publications Inc.\u00a0http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/2633329. Accessed:\u00a015\/07\/2013.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From an article in Latin American Perspectives: Translated by Maria Alice Jacob\u00a0 *The interviewer is a Guatemalan woman who is also involved in the struggles of the mass movement. These interviews appeared in Estudios Centroamericanos (El Salvador) in a special … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":0,"parent":1981,"menu_order":4,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"sidebar-page.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2640","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.brown.edu\/create\/modernlatinamerica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.brown.edu\/create\/modernlatinamerica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.brown.edu\/create\/modernlatinamerica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.brown.edu\/create\/modernlatinamerica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.brown.edu\/create\/modernlatinamerica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2640"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/library.brown.edu\/create\/modernlatinamerica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2640\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.brown.edu\/create\/modernlatinamerica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.brown.edu\/create\/modernlatinamerica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}