Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Puerto Ricans – History'

Religion
Ph.D.
This dissertation focuses on lay Catholic ministry to Puerto Ricans in Philadelphia when Frank Rizzo was mayor. Gramsci’s concept of “organic intellectuals” is employed to explain the praxis of the Philadelphia Young Lords, an organization formed in a Puerto Rican neighborhood during the confrontational politics of the 1970s. The dissertation advances previous scholarship on the Young Lords by offering reasons to consider these youthful leaders as lay Catholic advocates of social justice in Philadelphia and describes the role of faith convictions as they pursued social justice in the style of the biblical prophetic burden. Through interviews and textual analysis, the dissertation traces the evolution of lay volunteerism before the Second Vatican Council as foundational to the Young Lords’ application of liberation theology. The Young Lords in Philadelphia also followed the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party’s definition of the people’s multiracial identity and the Nationalists’ defense of Catholic principles. Their experiences are inserted into the general history of Philadelphia, a city which Quakers had founded as a cluster of urban villages, producing a distinctive pattern of ethnic enclaves of Philadelphia’s row house neighborhoods. The city’s Catholicism had structured parish life upon the civic culture, and initially extended this model to its Puerto Rican ministry. However, racial polarization at a time of municipal crisis under Rizzo invited new pastoral strategies towards civil right and the Vietnam War. Despite the Young Lords’ reliance on Marxist principles and the confrontational politics of the Black Panthers, local Catholic clergy supported many of their efforts. The dissertation explores the symbolic capital gained by the Young Lords which made them into a vanguard organization in the city’s fields of political and pastoral interaction.
Temple University--Theses

The Orlando Metropolitan Statistical Area became the fastest growing Puerto Rican population since 1980. While the literature has grown regarding Orlando's Puerto Rican community, no works deeply analyze the push and pull factors that led to the mass migration of Puerto Ricans to Central Florida. In fact, it was the combination of deteriorating economies in both Puerto Rico and New York City (the two largest concentrations of Puerto Ricans in the United States) and the rise of employment opportunities and cheap cost of living in Central Florida that attract Puerto Ricans from the island the diaspora to the region. Furthermore, Puerto Ricans who migrated to the region established a support network that further facilitated future migration and created a Puerto Rican community in the region. This study uses the combination of primary sources including government document (e.g. U.S. Censuses, Orange County land deeds, etc.), local and nation newspapers, and oral histories from Puerto Ricans living in Central Florida since the early 1980s to explain the process in which Puerto Ricans formed their identity in Orlando since 1980. The result is a history of the Puerto Rican migration to Central Florida and the roots of Orlando's Puerto Rican community.
ID: 031001370; System requirements: World Wide Web browser and PDF reader.; Mode of access: World Wide Web.; Adviser: Luis Mart?¡nez-Fern?índez.; Title from PDF title page (viewed May 20, 2013).; Thesis (M.A.)--University of Central Florida, 2012.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 125-130).
M.A.
Masters
History
Arts and Humanities
History; Public History

Puerto Rican people and culture are the result of the often violent contact between the colonizing forces of Spain, the African people they later enslaved and the indigenous population of the island. Over time, the blending of these three diverse peoples, each with their own unique culture and traditions, resulted in a new population currently known as Puerto Rican. Little information is available, however, regarding Taino culture and society prior to European contact, and even less is known about their ongoing contributions to Puerto Rican culture. This thesis brings together accurate information about the indigenous people of Boriquen. It attempts to correct distortions and untruths about Taino culture, providing alternative interpretations and giving recognition to the Taino legacy which remains a part of Puerto Rican culture today.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, San Diego, 2007.
Title from first page of PDF file (viewed June 11, 2007). Available via ProQuest Digital Dissertations. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 185-196).

The focus of my study is on two history textbooks intended for the 7th grade, one retired from the Puerto RicanDepartment of Education (PRDE) in 2002, titled “Puerto Rico: Tierra Adentro, Mar Afuera” (Picó & Rivera, 1991) and the textbook that replaced it, “Historia y Geografía de Puerto Rico 7” (Cardona, Mafuz, Rodríguez, et al. 2002), currently in use within of the PRDE. Using critical pedagogy as my theoretical lenses, I analyzed how the Puerto Rico-United States historical relationship is conceptualized within these two history textbooks, released under the administration of two different political parties. The historical events chosen for analysis match the beginning of the Puerto Rican-United States’ political relations until its current state of affairs. These events are: the United States’ invasion to Puerto Rico in 1898; the Foraker Act of 1900; the Jones Act of 1917; and the Organic Law 600 (or “Estado Libre Asociado”) in 1952, which defines today’s political relations between the two countries. I refer to the work of three historians (Alegría et al, 1988; Silvestrini & Luque de Sánchez, 1988; and Scarano, 2000) as a mirror to explore how the events are conceptualized within the analyzed textbooks and how these are conceived and written by historians. I analyzed the selected textbooks utilizing the Norman Fairclough’s (1989, 2003) approach to critical discourse analysis. Critical discourse analysis (CDA) is the study of written and spoken texts to reveal the discursive sources of power, dominance, inequality and bias. I compared how the selected historical events are described within the work of Puerto Rican historians, versus how these are conceptualized within the textbooks selected for analysis. During the process I examined the wording used, events included, events omitted, and the nature and extent of details provided for each, among other linguistic features. The analysis suggest that the conceptualization of the Hispanic-American War and the 54 years after US invasion to Puerto Rico correlates to the political agenda of the political parties in power at the moment of the production of each history textbook. Moreover, I aimed to explore how the conceptualization of the PR-US relations might participate in the self- destructive discourses among the Puerto Rican population, as identified by other researchers on the field of psychology and sociology
Mi estudio analiza dos libros de texto para estudiantes del 7mo grado, uno retirado del Departamento de Educación de Puerto Rico (DEPR) en año 2002, titulado “Puerto Rico: Tierra Adentro, Mar Afuera” (Picó & Rivera, 1991) y el texto que le remplazó, “Historia y Geografía de Puerto Rico 7” (Cardona, Mafuz, Rodríguez, et al. 2002), actualmente en uso dentro del DEPR. Utilizando la pedagogía crítica como el marco teórico de mi investigación, analizo cómo se conceptualiza la relación histórica entre Puerto Rico y Estados Unidos en ambos libros de texto, ambos distribuidos bajo la administración política de partidos políticos diferentes. Los eventos históricos analizados pretenden abarcar el comienzo de las relaciones políticas entre ambos países hasta su relación actual. Estos eventos son: La guerra Hispano-Americana en 1898; la Ley Foraker, en 1900; la Ley Jones, de 1917; y la Ley Orgánica 600 (o “Estado Libre Asociado”) en 1952. Como ventana hacia los eventos históricos analizados, me refiero al trabajo de tres historiadores puertorriqueños (Alegría et al, 1988; Silvestrini & Luque de Sánchez, 1988; y Scarano, 2000) y comparo cómo estos eventos son escritos y conceptualizados por historiadores, versus cómo son representados en los libros de texto escolares. El análisis se llevó a cabo utilizando el modelo de análisis de discurso crítico de Norman Fairclough (1989, 2003). Análisis del discurso crítico es es el estudio de texto escrito o hablado a fin de de-construir discursos de poder, dominancia, inequidad y prejuicio. Durante el proceso se examinó el lenguaje utilizado en ambos textos, eventos incluidos, eventos omitidos, y la naturaleza y detalles provistos para cada uno de ellos, entre otras características lingüísticas. El estudio sugiere que la conceptualización de la Guerra Hispano-Americana y los 54 años posteriores a la invasión estadounidense en Puerto Rico están correlacionados con la agenda política de los partidos políticos en el poder al momento de la distribución de los libros de texto analizados. Adicionalmente, exploro cómo la percepción de las relaciones políticas entre PR y EEUU pudiera participar en discursos auto-destructivos presentes en la población puertorriqueña, como han identificado otros investigadores en el campo de la psicología y la sociología

The present work seeks to identity possible sources of the persistent link between the Spanish language and national identity in Puerto Rico. By examining mass media discourse in the 1940s as a turbulent period of language policy conflict between the Island and the U.S. federal government, I suggest that the federal imposition of language policy without the consent or approval of local politicians or educators was influential in the construction of national identity that included language as a major defining factor. Local elites reacted to the colonial hegemony by defining Puerto Rican identity in opposition to American identity. The construction of identity in 1940s is characterized by a cultural conception of nation that redefined national symbols (such as language) in social rather than political terms in order to avoid disturbing the existing colonial hegemony.

In the three decades surrounding the Spanish-American war (1880-1910), three prominent Puerto Rican artists, Francisco Oller (1833-1917), Manuel E. Jordan (1853-1919), and Ramón Frade (1875-1954) created a group of paintings depicting "el jíbaro," the rural Puerto Rican farm worker, in a way that can be appropriately labeled "nationalistic." Using a set of motifs involving clothes, customs, domestic architecture and agricultural practices unique to rural Puerto Rico, they contributed to the imagination of a communal identity for creoles at the turn of the century. ("Creole" here refers to individuals of Spanish heritage, born on the island of Puerto Rico.) This set of shared symbols provided a visual dimension to the aspirational nationalism that had been growing within the creole community since the mid- 1800s. This creollismo mythified the agrarian laborer as a prototypical icon of Puerto Rican identity. By identifying themselves as jíbaros, Puerto Rican creoles used jíbaro self-fashioning as a way to define their community as unique vis a vis the colonial metropolis (first Spain, later the United States). In this thesis, I will examine works by Oller, Jordan and Frade which employ jíbaro motifs to engage this creollismo. They do so by painting the jíbaro himself, his culture and surroundings, the fields in which he worked, and the bohío hut which was his home. Together, these paintings form a body of jíbaro imagery which I will contextualize, taking into account both the historical circumstances of jíbaro life, as well as the ways in which signifiers of jibarismo began to gain resonance amongst creoles who did not strictly belong to the jíbaro class. The resulting study demonstrates the importance of the mythified jíbaro figure to the project of imagining Puerto Rican creole society as a nation, and the extent to which visual culture participated in this creative process.

This written thesis is a companion to a 30-minute documentary video of the same title. The documentary is a presentation of the historical conflict between the United States Navy and the people of the island of Vieques, Puerto Rico. For over 60 years the island was used by the United States Navy as a military training facility. The documentary attempts to present an analysis of the struggle between citizens of the island and the Navy. This written component presents a summarized history of Puerto Rico, Vieques and the conflict with the United States Navy. In addition, the preproduction, production and post-production process of the documentary are discussed. A theoretical analysis of the filmmaker's approach and technique are addressed and analyzed as well. The thesis's goal is to provide a clear understanding of the Vieques conflict to United States audiences who do not a familiarity with the topic. The thesis is presented from the perspective of a person who grew up in Puerto Rico.

The Bronx Cocked Back And Smoking is a collection of multifarious prose performances recounting the historical, personal, social, political and cultural constructs of a city birthed by violence. This body of work is accompanied by video, audio, photography, and theatre performance texts. St. Mary’s Housing project, in the Bronx, is the foundation where most of this literary work takes place. The modern day Griot (storyteller) is a Poet, guiding his audience through the social inequalities and disparities that plague St. Mary’s community. The Poet shares personal traumatic insights while simultaneously utilizing writing as a form of survival to the conditions of the Bronx. This multi-platform performance highlights the metaphorical and physical concerns with the cycle of violence. This question is answered through the Poet’s choice by selecting the pen over the gun.

This dissertation examines how the work of four Puerto Rican poets – Julia de Burgos, Clemente Soto Vélez, Martín Espada, and Naomi Ayala – demonstrates a poetics of resistance. While resistance takes a variety of forms in their poetic discourse, this project asserts that these poets have and continue to play an integral role in the cultural decolonization of Puerto Rico, which has been generally unacknowledged in both the critical scholarship on their work and the narrative of Puerto Rico’s anti-colonial struggle. Chapter One discuses the theoretical concepts used in defining a poetics of resistance, including Barbara Harlow’s definition of resistance literature, Edward Said’s concepts of cultural decolonization, and Jahan Ramazani’s theory of transnational poetics. Chapter Two provides an overview of Puerto Rico’s unique political status and highlights several pivotal events in the nation’s history, such as El Grito de Lares, the Ponce Massacre, and the Vieques Protest to demonstrate the continuity of the Puerto Rican people’s resistance to oppression and attempted subversion of their colonial status. Chapter Three examines Julia de Burgos’ understudied poems of resistance and argues that she employs a rhetoric of resistance through the use of repetition, personification, and war imagery in order to raise the consciousness of her fellow Puerto Ricans and to provoke her audience into action. By analyzing Clemente Soto Vélez’s use of personification, anaphora, and most importantly, juxtaposition, Chapter Four demonstrates that his poetry functions as a dialectical process and contends that the innovative form he develops throughout his poetic career reinforces his radical perspective for an egalitarian society. Chapter Five illustrates how Martín Espada utilizes rich metaphor, sensory details, and musical imagery to foreground issues of social class, racism, and economic exploitation across geographic, national, and cultural borders. Chapter six traces Naomi Ayala’s feminist discourse of resistance that denounces social injustice while simultaneously expressing a female identity that seeks liberation through her understanding of history, her reverence for memory, and her relationship with the earth. Ultimately, this dissertation argues that Burgos, Soto Vélez, Espada, and Ayala not only advocate for but also enact resistance and social justice through their art.

This project explores the military and political mobilization of rural and urban working sectors of Puerto Rican society as the Island transitioned from Spanish to U.S. imperial rule. In particular, my research is interested in examining how this shift occurs via patterns of inclusion-exclusion within the military and the various forms of citizenship that are subsequently transformed into socio-economic and political enfranchisement. Analyzing the armed forces as a culture-homogenizing agent helps to explain the formation and evolution of Puerto Rican national identities from 1868 to 1952, and how these evolving identities affected the political choices of the Island. This phenomenon, I argue, led to the creation of the Estado Libre Asociado in 1952. The role played by the tens of thousands of Puerto Ricans in the metropolitan military in the final creation of a populist project taking place under colonial rule in the Island was threefold. Firstly, these soldiers served as political leverage during WWII to speed up the decolonization process. Secondly, they incarnated the commonwealth ideology by fighting and dying in the Korean War. Finally, the Puerto Rican soldiers filled the ranks of the army of technicians and technocrats attempting to fulfill the promises of a modern industrial Puerto Rico after the returned from the wars. ^ In contrast to Puerto Rican popular national mythology and mainstream academic discourse that has marginalized the agency of subaltern groups; I argue that the Puerto Rican soldier was neither cannon fodder for the metropolis nor the pawn of the Creole political elites. Regaining their masculinity, upward mobility, and political enfranchisement were among some of the incentives enticing the Puerto Rican peasant into military service. The enfranchisement of subaltern sectors via military service ultimately created a very liberal, popular, and broad definition of Puerto Rico’s national identity. When the Puerto Rican peasant/soldier became the embodiment of the Commonwealth formula, the political leaders involved in its design were in fact responding to these soldiers’ complex identities, which among other things compelled them to defend the “American Nation” to show their Puertorriqueñidad . ^

For Latinos living in the continental United States, migration is an experience that is at once familiar, as a historical phenomenon that shapes our lives, and ephemeral, as a series of momentous events in the lives of individuals, families, and communities that are rarely memorialized. Latino migration has contributed to a redesigned ethnic landscape in the northeastern U.S. although this migration is far less discussed as a contested site of Latino migration than that into the western United States. The two largest groups of Latinos in the Northeast, Dominican and Puerto Rican migrants and their descendants, have recorded the narratives of their migrations in cultural texts through autobiography, folklore, prose, and poetry. The texts I discuss, by Pura Belpré, Pedro Henríquez Ureña, Antonia Pantoja, Junot Diaz and Angie Cruz are a part of North American literary history as well as Latino literary history. The core question guiding this research is: how do migration narratives reveal new perspectives, speak back, or contradict our existing understanding of Dominican and Puerto Rican migrations? A secondary question is in what ways do these texts contribute to a collective memory for Latino communities and thereby add to our understanding of ethnic identity? I argue these texts reveal the heterogeneity of the migrants' identities and their migration experiences. Four of the five authors identify with an Afro-Latino diasporic identity and contribute to our memory of Afro-Latino culture. The texts express the differential experience that women and men migrants have in their lives premigration in their home countries, as well as their lives post-migration. A close reading of migration narratives yields evidence of the migrants' agency, contradicting notions of passive Latina women and passive migrants who unquestioningly accept oppressive cultural practices. Tracing the moments of the migrants' agency in the texts balances structural arguments that suggest that migration was almost inevitable since the migrants came from very poor countries. These migration texts reveal erasures, correct stereotypes, and amend existing knowledge with subjugated knowledges that come from the migrants' first person perspective. The new perspectives contribute to a usable past for Latino communities.