July 23, 1959: Student protest and state violence as myth and memory in León, Nicaragua

HAHR - Hispanic American Historical Review

Volumn 85, Issue 2, 2005, Pages 187-220

  Barbosa, Francisco J ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 65849128087     PISSN: 00182168     EISSN: 15271900     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1215/00182168-85-2-187     Document Type: Article

References (105)

1. The jail was named for the year in which it was built, and it became infamous for the number of detainees killed allegedly trying to escape imprisonment there
2. This narrative of the events is based on interviews, judicial testimonies, newspaper accounts, and the GN "Protocolo de Hechos Encontrados," Archivo Nacional de Nicaragua (hereafter cited as ANN), Fondo Guardia Nacional (hereafter cited as FGN), box 3, file 277
3. I make here an artificial separation between popular and official merely to highlight the different ways knowledge is produced and legitimated. States have access to media and other forms of mass communication, as well as the force of arms, which privileges the discourses they seek to make hegemonic, and the state's power over the sites of "official" memory allows it to manipulate symbols in powerful ways. However, the diffusion of what might be called "popular knowledges" is no less important in politically contentious societies. Even though they lack the state's coercive techniques and control over certain forms of cultural production, popular knowledge constitutes a dynamic and important mode of symbolic articulation, especially because such symbols resist singular and fixed meanings. Precisely because the popular and the official exist within the same discursive field, they are necessarily in flux across such artificial barriers, as symbols and meanings are appropriated, rejected, or reworked. For example, a state seeking legitimacy might appropriate a popular meaning or symbol, just as a social group might use state discourse to argue for its own rights
4. See Roland Barthes, Mythologies (London: Paladin, 1973)
5. and Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality, Volume 1: An Introduction (New York: Vintage Books, 1990)
6. See Alessandro Portelli, The Death of Luigi Trastulli and Other Stories: Form and Meaning in Oral History (Albany: SUNY Press, 1991)
7. Luisa Passerini, Autobiography of a Generation, Italy 1968, trans. Lisa Erdberg (Hanover, NH: Univ. Press of New England, 1996)
8. and Fascism in Popular Memory: The Cultural Experience of the Turin Working Class, trans. Robert Lumley and Jude Bloomfield (New York: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1987)
9. Daniel James, Don̄a Marias Story. Life History, Memory, and Political Identity (Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press, 2000)
10. Kristin Ross, May '68 and Its Aftermath (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 2002)
11. Portelli, The Death of Luigi Trastulli, 2
12. Marcia Traña Galeano, "Algunas notas sobre el movimiento estudiantil Nicaragüense en la primera mitad del Siglo XX," Revista de Historia 1 (Jan. 1990): 97-109
13. For a thorough discussion of the complex and shifting relationship between the small but heterogeneous student movement and diverse sectors of the opposition to Somocismo in the immediate postwar period, see Jeffrey L. Gould, "Nicaragua," in Latin America between the Second World War and the Cold War: 1944-1948, ed. Leslie Bethell and Ian Roxborough (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1992), 243-79
14. Robert Arnove, Education and Revolution in Nicaragua (New York: Praeger, 1986), 2
15. Consejo Superior Universitario Centroamericano, El sistema educativo en Nicaragua (San José, Costa Rica: n.p., 1965), 48
16. Martin Carnoy and Joel Samoff, Education and Social Transition in the Third World (Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press, 1990), 320
17. "Declaratión del Sr. Francisco M. Reyes M.," 7 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277; translations of this and all other testimonies are mine
18. "Declaratión del Sr. Fernando Valle Argüello," 7 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
19. "Declaratión del Dr. Rafael Ortega Aguilar," 22 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
20. "Declaración del Sr. Gustavo Sánchez D., Universitario," 30 July 1959, and "Declaratión del Sr. Luis Angel Berrios Estrada, Estudiante," 13 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
21. "Declaración del Dr. José Pallais Godoy," 18 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
22. "Declaración del Br. Salvador Rivas Martínez," 18 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277. Martínez was in the third year of law school at the time of the July 23 tragedy
23. "Declaratión del Raso López, Benigno," 25 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
24. "Declaratión del Sub-Teniente (P) Rene Barbarena, GN," 24 July 1959
25. "Declaratión del Raso Martínez R., Julio #15873, GN," 21 Aug. 1959
26. "Declaratión del Raso Gutiérrez C., Benito #11115, GN," 26 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
27. Avendaña Sandino, 82; Margarita González (pseudo.), interview by author, Los Angeles, Dec. 1999
28. Francisco Medrano (pseudo.), interviews by author, León, Nicaragua, Aug. 1999 and May 2002
29. Joaquín Solís Piura, interview by author, Managua, Nicaragua, Apr. 2002
30. Luís Felipe Pérez Caldera, interview by author, León, Nicaragua, June, 2002
31. A useful lens through which to view student political protest such as the one examined here is certainly as a type of "street theater" with its own repertoires of cultural meaning, as did Jeffrey N. Wasserstrom in his analysis of student protest in Shanghai. See Wasserstrom's Student Protests in Twentieth-Century China: The View from Shanghai (Stanford: Stanford Univ. Press, 1991)
32. There are, of course, other important features of this hegemonic gender identity, such as the physical protection of women and the control and regulation of women's sexuality - something I will turn to later in the article - but I have chosen to mention here only those features which came to be salient during the protest
33. rely here primarily on R. W. Connell's Masculinities (Berkeley: Univ. of California Press, 1995), and in particular on Connell's definition of hegemonic masculinity as "the configuration of gender practice which embodies the currently accepted answer to the problem of the legitimacy of patriarchy, which guarantees (or is taken to guarantee) the dominant position of men and the subordination of women" (p. 77)
34. I would argue further that hegemonic masculinity is a normative discourse in that it promotes one set of physical characteristics, bodily practices, and gender performances over all others, as it often simultaneously intersects with and reinforces hierarchies of class and race. Thus, by implication, hegemonic masculinity sustains not only the subordination of women but also those men who do not meet its physical and performative criteria. My thinking here also benefits from the development of a vibrant literature on Latin American masculinities in recent years, part of the explosion in histories that make gender their primary category of analysis, including those that consider the articulation of gender and other forms of difference. Studies of masculine identities and the inclusion of masculinities in more general discussions of gender and sexuality have enriched our understanding of the way gender regimes may have functioned in various Latin American contexts. While these studies are too numerous to list here, the essays in the recent HAHR special issue on gender and sexuality offer an excellent introduction to the state of this burgeoning field; see the Hispanic American Historical Revinv 81: 3-4 (Aug.-Nov. 2001)
35. For a collection of essays that reflects the vitality and diversity of approaches in current work on Latin American masculinities, see also Matthew C. Gutmann, ed. Changing Men and Masculinities in Latin America (Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press, 2003)
36. "Declaratión del Raso Baca M. Antonio No. 15676, GN," 21 Aug. 1959
37. "Declaratión del Raso Pérez C., Eduardo No. -16345 GN," 25 July 1959
38. "Declaratión del Raso Martínez R., Julio #15873, GN," 21 Aug. 1959
39. "Declaratión del Raso Gutiérrez C., Benito #11115, GN," 26 Aug. 1959
40. "Declaratión del Raso Hernández L., Raúl #17071, GN," 26 Aug., 1959
41. "Declaratión del Raso Meléndez, Pablo #13973, GN," 26 Aug., 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
42. "Declaration del Raso Gutiérrez C., Benito."
43. "Declaratión del Raso Pérez C, Eduardo."
44. "Declaratión del Raso Alartínez R., Julio."
45. "Declaratión del Raso López, Benigno #14103, GN," 25 Aug. 1959
46. and "Declaratión del Raso Baca, Antonio."
47. Although Richard Millet's Guardians of the Dynasty skillfully traced the origins and development of the Guardia National and its role in the longevity of the Somoza regimes, little research has been done that would produce anything approaching a socioeconomic profile of rank-and-file guardsmen, let alone allow for a glimpse into the cultural world of the GN. See Millet, Guardians of the Dynasty (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1977)
48. "Declaratión del Sr. Enrique Martinez - Ex-Auxiliar - GN," 6 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
49. "Declaratión del Raso Prado, Dolores #9066, GN.," 26 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277. Luis Angel Berrios was a student leader singled out by the GN as one of the primary organizers of the protest
50. "Declaratión del Sr. Fernando Valle Argüello," 7 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
51. "Declaratión del Sub-Teniente (P) Rene Barbarena, GN," 24 July 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
52. "Declaratión del Joven Fernando Gordillo Cervantes," 5 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
53. "Declaratión del Br. Rolando Avendaño," 4 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
54. "Protocolo de Hechos Encontrados," ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277, pp. 5, 13-14
55. Fernando Gordillo, "La tarde del 23 (Crónica del 23 de Julio de 1959)," in Obra: Colección letras de Nicaragua, no. 32 (Managua: Nueva Nicaragua, 1989), 303
56. Rolando Avendaña Sandino, Masacre estudiantil(Managua: América, 1960), 82-90. The descriptions of the wake, mass, and funeral come from this account of July 23 published privately by Avendaña the year following the tragedy
57. "Protocolo de Hechos Encontrados," ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277, p. 12
58. "Declaratión del Sr. Juan Manuel NáVaz Zamora," 6 Aug. 1959
59. "Declaratión del Sr. Alfonso Altamirano Balladares," 6 Aug. 1959
60. and "Declaratión de José Angel Gómez Ramos," 12 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
61. "Declaración del Sr. José Angel Gómez Ramos."
62. Margarita González (pseudo.), interview by author, Los Angeles, Dec. 1999
63. While questioning biases in the documental record has long been a requisite of historical scholarship, it is only recently that scholars have begun to question the archive as a space of unmediated knowledge to to recast it not as a repository awaiting examination by the scholar's dispassionate eye and thereby yield an accurate historical record but rather a power-laden arena of cataloguing and classification. More importantly, the document itself has been theorized as a fiction, not a representation of some speck of reality but rather the product of power - an artifact of privileged discursive practices. The report in question is a from of privileged knowledge not because it is produced by the state but because of the procedure from which it emerges - it gains authority from the illusion that its myriad sources produce an "objective" representation of what actually occurred
64. Gordillo, "La tarde del 23," 289-306
65. "Protocolo de Hechos Encontrados," p. 4
66. "Declaration del Sr. Manuel Loredo Rugama," 14 Aug. 1959
67. "Declaratión de Rafael Orozco Guerrero," 14 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
68. "Declaratión del Joven José Angel Gómez Ramos," 12 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
69. "Declaratión del Raso Rostran U., Candelario #16536 GN.-," 24 July 1959
70. "Declaratión del Raso Gallo A. Domingo #16902 GN.-," 24 July 1959
71. "Declaratión del Raso Torres, José #17111 G.N. de Nic," 24 July 1959
72. "Declaratión del Sub-Teniente (P) René Barbarena"
73. "Declaratión del Cabo Obando V., Toribio No-9613 GN.-" 25 July 1959
74. "Declaratión del Señor Agenor Pérez Morales, Estudiante de Medicina," 29 July 1959
75. "Declaratión del Raso Cruz P., José No. 16909, GN.," 1 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
76. "Declaratión de Carlos Chamberlain C. Auxiliar GN.," 25 July 1959
77. "Ampliatión de la Declaratión del Raso Umanzor O., José #16911, GN.," 20 Aug. 1959
78. "Declaratión del Raso Rivas F., Alfredo #14614 GN.-," 24 July 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
79. "Protocolo de Hechos Encontrados," pp. 13-14
80. "Declaratión del Raso Umanzor, José # 16911 GN.-," 25 July 1959
81. "Declaratión del Br. German Sánchez, Estudiante," 20 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
82. "Declaratión del Raso Torres, José."
83. "Declaratión del Coronel Juan C. Prado GN.-," 24 July 1959
84. "Declaratión del Mayor (Inf.) Anastasio J. Ortíz G.N.," 24 July 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
85. See Ranajit Guha, "The Prose of Counterinsurgency," in Selected Subaltern Studies, ed. Ranajit Guha and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 1988)
86. "Relato de un sacerdote que presenció los sucesos de León," La Prensa, 25 July 1959, p. 10
87. "Informe Forense," 29 Aug., 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
88. "Declaratión del Sub-Teniente (P) (Inf.) Ulloa, Narciso, GN," 6 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
89. "Ampliatión de la Declaratión del Tnte-Cnel. Juan César Prado, GN., dada en la Ciudad de León Anteriormente," 11 Aug. 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
90. "Ampliatión de las Declaraciones Dadas por el Tnte. Gaston Cajina, GN." 6 August 1959, ANN, FGN, box 3, file 277
91. Matilde Zimmermann, Sandinista: Carlos Fonseca and the Nicaraguan Revolution (Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press, 2000), 57
92. Zimmermann, Sandinista, 75-77
93. See Tomás Borge, La patiente impaciencia (Managua: Vanguardia, 1990)
94. and Carlos, the Dawn is No Longer beyond Our Reach (Vancouver, BC: New Star Books, 1984)
95. Carlos Fonseca, Obras, 2 vols. (Managua: Ed. Nueva Nicaragua, 1985)
96. and Ortega Saavedra, Humberto. Cincuenta años de lucba Sandinista (Mexico City: Diógenes, 1979)
97. James, Don̄a María's Story, 119-25
98. Francisco Medrano (pseudo.), interviews by author, León, Aug. 1999 and May 2002
99. Joaquín Solís Piura, interview by author, Managua, Apr. 2002
100. Luís Felipe Pérez Caldera, interview by author, León, June 2002. 68. Margaret Randall, Risking a Somersault in the Air: Conversations with Nicaraguan Writers (San Francisco: Solidarity Publications, 1984), 26-27
101. Luís Felipe Pérez Caldera, interview by author, León, June, 2002
102. Carlos López (pseudo.), Alvaro Solís (pseudo.), and Marlon Pérez (pseudo.), interviews by author, León, Aug. and Sept. 2001
103. Most existing analyses of Latin American student politics focus on the participation of students in formal political life and discount less organized or more violent forms of protest. Orlando Núñez Soto has written specifically about Nicaragua, and his suggestive analysis of youth as a significant political force in Latin American societies undergoing social struggle is extremely valuable; see Núñez Soto, "The Third Social Force in National Liberation Movements," Latin American Perspectives 8, no. 2 (Spring 1981): 5-21
104. Thanks are due to the anonymous HAHR reviewer for suggesting that the examples of Kent State and Tlatelolco might be seen as analogous to the Nicaraguan case
105. Pilar Arias, Nicaragua: Revolutión. Relatos de combatientes del Freute Sandinista, 4th ed. (Mexico City: Siglo XXI, 1985), 25