Speaking tours

February-March 2003 -- Northern California

Guatemalan Youth: Creating a culture of Resistance

Representatives from two Guatemala youth-run organizations will tour Northern California to give presentations and cultural performances on their experiences of community organization, resistance and cultural survival in times of globalization, repression and community displacement.

IQUI BALAM: a youth popular theater group based in Villa Nueva, a recently settled “maquiladora” community on the outskirts of Guatemala City. Living in a community where young people face gang violence, police brutality and where the only work available is sweatshop labor and the street economy, Iqui Balam creatively addresses social and political issues through theater, dance and hip hop music.

STUDENT ASSOCIATION OF SANTA MARIA TZEJÁ: a scholarship organization formed by indigenous youth from returned refugee communities in the Ixcan, Guatemala. As children, most were forced to flee their communities during the armed conflict and grew up in exile in Mexico; in resistance communities in hiding within Guatemala or in military-designed “model villages” where the idea of creating community organizations was prohibited and considered “subversive”. The association is dedicated to supporting educational goals, alternative community development, as well as youth consciousness-raising and political involvement.

Interested in organizing public events for the speakers?

CONTACT: Sue Kuyper, lagira2003@yahoo.com

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