IDENTIDADES 1 ENGLISH IDENTIDADES 9 ENGLISH | Page 33

Race, Class and Gender

Let's talk about
racism and
discrimination from
the perspective of art
Marthadela Tamayo González
Arco Progresista - New Country
Antilla, Holguin, Cuba

T

he X Anniversary of the
Committee Citizens for Racial
Integration (CIR) was celebrated
at the headquarters with the educational
cultural workshop Let's talk about
racism and discrimination from the
perspective of art. This initiative was
open to all actors —in their diversity—
of the Cuban civil society, who are
sensitized with the need to enhance the
debate on racial issues in the public
sphere and to develop structured
dialogues on the reality of the African
descent given the absence of applicable
state policies.
Juan
Antonio
Madrazo
Luna,
Coordinator of CIR, briefly described
the work content of the organization. He
referred to the support by institutions
such as the Cuban Integration Platform,
the Caribbean Affirmative Corporation
in the Colombian Caribbean, the Cuban
Human Rights Observatory and the
Institute of Race, Gender and Equity
Human Rights. He also insisted on
looking for new actors not only among
the activists, but also within the
communities, where new leaders of
opinion could feel committed, starting
from the art, with the fight against racial

discrimination.
The workshop was conducted from the
participatory dynamic perspective. The
artists were the main actors in an
exercise of brainstorming on how to
tackle racism and to deal with it starting
from community work and popular
culture. It was also addressed what
contributions can be made by the
popular culture and religiosity. The
critic, teacher and artist José Clemente
Gascón talked about the influence
exerted on the community by priests of
popular religions from African origin,
and about the footprint of the syncretic
cults in the Cuban art.
The Coordinator of CIR summarized
the book The African Footprint in Cuba
(2015),
by
researcher
and
anthropologist Juan Antonio Alvarado
Ramos, who synthesized the historical
and
ethnographic
knowledge
accumulated in more than three decades
of research in Cuba and among the
Bakongo and Ambundo peoples in
Angola. The book facilitates the
dissemination of knowledge about the
complex life stories of enslaved
Africans and their descendants. Thus, it

32