30 Years Later

            30 YEARS LATER

On October 19, 1983, the 4-year-old Grenadian revolution, the only Black revolution in the English speaking Western world, was effectively halted by an internal coup followed six days later by an American military invasion.The United Nations General Assembly condemned the invasion.

The ostensible reason for the incursion carried out under President Ronald Reagan, was to stabilize the country and save American students studying at an American offshore medical school in Grenada. The Reagan administration had been hostile to the revolution from its inception. Reagan’s expressed fear was that Cuba (helping Grenada build a new international airport) was erecting missile bases in Grenada and supporting a socialist government in the country.

 In spite of Grenada’s best efforts to normalize relations between the two countries, the United States government refused to meet with leaders of Grenada’s People’s Revolutionary Government. 

REMEMBERING AND REVISITING THE GRENADA REVOLUTION

OCTOBER 12, 2013 1-4 PM

UC BERKELEY   • LeConte Hall  •   Room 1

      http://www.berkeley.edu/map/3dmap/3dmap.shtml

 

Multimedia Presentation

Kathy Sloane, Free Lance Photographer 

Kathy Sloane’s photographs are the only archive of images made in Grenada during its revolutionary period. The rest were destroyed during the American invasion. She worked in Grenada for UNICEF, and under the People’s Revolutionary Government for the Ministry of Women’s Affairs, Agriculture and The Department of Tourism in 1982 and 1983.

Panel Discussion           Moderated by Dr. Hardy Frye 

Laurie Lambert, Assistant Professor African American and African Studies

University of California at Davis

Lambert is a native of Grenada. Her recent dissertation, Worlds Real and Invented: The Grenada Revolution and the Caribbean Literary Imaginary , traces the transnational scope of the Grenada Revolution, analyzing the ways in which literature and techniques of narration are used to amplify and concretize the impact of small island political culture on the entire Caribbean and African Diaspora.

Eugene “Gus” Newport, Mayor of Berkeley 1979-1986

Long time activist and currently national consultant in Community Development.

Under Newport, Berkeley hosted Grenadian  PRG Government ministers in Berkeley in 1982 and 1983. 

In 1990, The Grenada Foundation sent him to Grenada as part of a delegation to observe the elections.

Don Rojas, Communications Director, The Praxis Project

During the Revolution (1979-1983) Rojas was press secretary to Prime Minister of Grenada, Maurice Bishop. In the ensuing 30 years he has served as the first Communications Director of the NAACP, Media Manager for Oxfam America, Executive Editor of the New York Amsterdam News and General Manager of  the Pacifica Radio station WBAI.

Sponsored by  African American Studies Department.and Dr. Hardy Frye  

Of particular interest to students of Diaspora Studies, African American Studies, Peace and Conflict Studies and Latina American Studies