NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

Every year I do a couple episodes for the local public radio program Beyond the Fence for KPRG. Here is one of mine from earlier this year which focused on the history of the Wusstig family on Guam, who I met through my work at the Guam Museum. The family is donating the headstone that was created for their ancestor while he was a POW in Japan during World War II. To download podcast of this episode and others head to this link.  *********************** Ep. 237 “Sailor, Musician and Forgotten POW: Remembering George Wusstig” (hosted by Dr. Michael Lujan Bevacqua and produced by Tom Maxedon with assistance from Alan Grossman and Robert Wang) aired on 3/11/16. During the Japanese occupation of Guam in World War II, a number of U.S. active duty and retired military men were taken as prisoners of war to Japan. One of those was George Ernest Wusstig who was born in Germany in the 19th century, migrated to the United States where he became a U.S. citizen, and settled

For this year's Regional Seminar I wanted to accomplish a number of goals. First, the primary goal was to give my presentation as an expert on the decolonization situation in Guam. Second, was to meet with people from the other Non-Self-Governing Territories to try to develop the foundation for a solidarity network to increase awareness and communications. Third, to conduct interviews for the Guam public radio program Beyond the Fence. And finally, just to conduct research for my own academic work. For the first three, things went smoothly at the conference. In fact, other than some technical problems with my digital recorder and my struggles with jet lag, things went far better than I expected. Interviewing people to learn more about the decolonization process, the diplomatic relations involved with it was a bit more difficult. Employees of the United Nations itself were politely mum when asked about things in any formal interview, saying that they had to clear things with tho

I have returned from yet another trip to Okinawa. This was my sixth trip there in five years. I have been there for conferences, symposiums, research trips and consultations. Although I have mainly spent time on the main island of Okinawa, in its southern densely populated area, last year I was fortunate enough to attend a conference in Ishigaki Island to the south. I have amassed quite a few posts about each trip, talking about the things I have witnesses and the things I have been told about. I even used interviews from some of my trips to create episodes for the Guam-based public radio program Beyond the Fence.  I am considering, re-posting some of my favorite posts from my trips. We'll see if I actually sit down to do this, or if it just remains a thought in my head. 

Adios Siñot Torres by Michael Lujan Bevacqua Guam Daily Post October 14, 2015 I spent last week asking several dozen people about the favorite classical musical choices of an eighty-eight-year-old Chamorro man who had just passed away. It was a saddening, sobering, but also inspiring experience. Jose Mata Torres, a man I’ve spent the last two years working with, passed away on September 28. Through the Chamorro Studies program at UOG, I assisted him with the researching, writing, editing, and eventual publishing of his memoir “ Massacre at Atåte .” The book recounts not only his general wartime experiences but also a truly heroic event where he was among a group of men in Malesso’ who rose up and killed or drove off the Japanese in their village in July 1944. I feel privileged to have helped him publish this book, which, he joked, schoolchildren may be forced to read for generations to come. When I learned of his passing, I immediately felt the

When we look at the media landscape of Guam it is pretty simple. There are two main newspapers. Their ideological difference is sometimes stark, sometimes not. The PDN reflects a clear ideological agenda most of the time. They are the mainstream source of print media, the towering megalith and as such they tend to see their job as guiding the island and sometimes saving it from itself. The Marianas Variety is a worthy challenger at times, showing more ideological breadth and willingness to be critical of things the PDN is not. But the Variety is ultimately a challenger and something which is out there, but not read as much or supported as much in terms of advertising.  For TV there is a similar dynamic, with two stations offering daily news, KUAM and PNC. PNC offers more ideological flexibility, whereas KUAM often times appeared chained to the ideology of the political families and parties it is closely associated with. Some argue that PNC has a similar bias to the opposite side o

I posted the information about this Beyond the Fence episode earlier in the year, but felt compelled to post it again today.  It is titled "Minagahet yan Dinagi Siha: The Revitalization of the Chamorro Language." It features presentations from myself and my friend Edward Alvarez that we gave during a conference in Okinawa earlier this year on the revitalization of island languages. At present I am the coordinator for the Chamorro Studies program at the University of Guam. For years I have been working on issues of language and cultural revitalization from "the outside." But now I have an official and formal role in those debates and in that ideological infrastructure. I am teaching classes at the University of Guam in Chamorro language and Chamorro culture and I couldn't be happier. But like anyone who becomes used to seeing the problems of the world from a distance, where they appear to be more easily resolved, once you enter the thick of them, the comple

I invite you to tune in to Beyond the Fence which airs every Friday at noon on Public Radio Guam-KPRG 89.3 FM, immediately following Democracy Now.  This one hour locally produced program features interviews with diverse individuals and coverage of public events offering analysis and personal perspectives on the local impacts of US global militarism in the Asia-Pacific, especially in Guam and the Northern Marianas.  It provides accounts of different forms of resistance, decolonization and sovereignty  struggles, and the challenges of building community beyond the fence.  Audio podcasts of most episodes are available for free and may be downloaded within five days of the original broadcast by going to www.kprgfm.com  and clicking on the link to Beyond the Fence or by going directly to http://kprg.podbean.com/ Ep. 154 “ Minagahet yan Dinagi Siha: The Revitalization of the Chamorro Language” ( hosted by Rosa Salas Palomo with production assistance of Joy White ) was

I don’t know if I ever mentioned this on my blog, but I am a co-host for the KPRG program “ Beyond the Fence .” This is a radio show that was started after the DEIS Comment period for the military buildup in 2010. The name “beyond the fence” was chosen because the show was originally intended to bring attention to the issues outside of the fence, so how the buildup would affect the rest of the island. The name also came to mean sometimes that those outside of the fence would be given a peak as to what happens inside the fence. Sometimes episode would deal with things that the military and its employees struggle with. It has evolved into more of a community program that talks about critical issues.   Episodes were initially focused on the military buildup and militarism in Guam, Micronesia and the Pacific. At present you can listen to episodes dealing with any pertinent local or regional issue. You can also listen to interviews with long time community activis