NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

Independent Guåhan will honor the legacy of Richard Flores Taitano and discuss reforming local government in June GA Independent Guåhan (IG) invites the public to attend their June General Assembly (GA) on Thursday, June 28, from 6:00 – 7:30 p.m. at the Main Pavilion of the Chamorro Village in Hagåtña. The educational focus for the evening will be on how Guåhan’s government can be radically reformed in an effort to provide more checks and balances and participation for the island’s residents. Media coverage and social media chatter provide regular reminders of Government of Guam corruption and malfeasance. Many feel that the levels of corruption are so high that they provide an obstacle to ever achieving independence. In this month’s GA, Independent Guåhan will discuss ways that the government of a decolonized Guåhan could be reformed to reduce corruption and also provide more means by which people can participate in the functioning of their democracy. Models from other Pac

I have spent untold hours in the collection of the Micronesian Area Research center going through stacks upon stacks of newspapers looking at ads of those running for political office in Guam. Although I don't mention it much, when I began my masters thesis at the University of Guam in Micronesian Studies, my initial topics was actually political campaigns in Guam and analyzing Chamoru discourse in campaigns. I conducted around 50 interviews over several months, with a wide range of people. My intent was to reveal what role Chamoru "culture" or "language" or "identity" played in the organizing of political campaigns, the outreach, the strategizing or rationale. My own motivation for taking on this project was tied to the 2002 Guam gubernatorial campaign. I was a young Chamoru grad student, who had started learning speaking Chamoru the year prior and was functionally, albeit awkwardly fluent in Chamoru. I was spending most of my free time in MARC

After World War II, Chamorros launched into a period of aggressive Americanization, which you could argue is still going on until today. This Americanization had many levels and dimensions to it. There were clear desires amongst most Chamorros take on the material and consumer comforts America seemed to offer. There were also clear moves by some to ensure that there children were properly or at least passably Americanized, most notably through the refusal to use the Chamorro language with them. There were frameworks of economic, social and political dependency that were created and eventually celebrated by Chamorros themselves. There were also dramatic shifts in lifestyle due to land loss and trauma from the war, which made things such as cultural maintenance difficult because occupations and life-ways were changing so quickly. Alot of these shifts could not be helped, but simply came about because the US is so much larger than Guam, and it produces ideological content and material

Jose Mata Torres, who I've spent the past two years working with, passed away earlier this week. I worked with him for more than a year in getting his memoir "Massacre at Atate" published. We held a book launch in February of this year and more than 200 people showed up to hear the story of how the people of Malesso' suffered during World War II, and when faced with possible annihilation at the hands of the Japanese, decided to fight back. We had begun work on another project and I am hoping that I can finish it in his honor. We would meet regularly sometimes three or four times a month and I will miss those meetings so much. Below is a list of accomplishments and other bio-data for Mr. Torres. ************************** Jose Mata Torres was born November 26, 1926 and died September 28, 2015. He was born in the village of Malesso’ and was a lifelong resident of the village. He married Carmen Lizama Torres and they had two daught

For the past year I have been assisting one of the men who fought the Japanese at Atate, Jose Mata Torres with the publication of his memoirs, “The Massacre at Atate.” Torres was a young man at the time who and wasn’t a main organizer for the attack but he said that he had never felt more inspired or exciting in his life, than to see the men from his village rise up and in order to defend their families and their lives, face off against their violent occupiers. On February 24th at 6:30 in the CLASS Lecture Hall at UOG, the book “Massacre at Atate” is being released. There will be a reading by Jose Torres and then a panel discussion afterwards. Please come and join us for this important step for Chamorro Studies, but also just the remembering of Chamorro history and in turn Chamorro possibility. As I come near to the end of this project it reminds me of something I posted earlier, last year titled "Three Massacres." It was originally posted on this blo

BOOK LAUNCH AND BOOK SIGNING “The Massacre at Atate” by Jose M. Torres This memoir tells the story of the courageous people of the village of Malesso’, who under Japanese occupation, fought and killed their captors, and liberated themselves. Published by the Micronesia Area Research Center Thursday February 26, 2015 5:30 pm – 7:30 pm UOG CLASS Lecture Hall The evening will feature a reading by the author, a panel discussion about the events in Malesso’ during World War II and a chance to meet the author and buy copies of the book. Refreshments will be provided. For more information contact Professor Michael Lujan Bevacqua At 735-2800 or mlbasquiat@hotmail.com

At the start of the month I was interviewed by the Marianas Variety on the topic of NaNoWriMo or National Novel Writing Month. I have participated in this since 2012 and it is the highlight of the later part of the year for  me. The goal is to make it to 50,000 words from November 1st to November 30th. I've done it for the past two years, and I'm struggling to make it this time as well. I lost several days due to curriculum writing (I've already written about 50,000 words in terms of curriculum writing this month). I'm supposed to be at 25,000 words by now, but I'm only at 22,000. I will complete my goal however as the story "The Legend of the Chamurai" that I have been working on for the past three years has to be written and it is exciting to see it take shape each year.  Here is my interview below. ***************** 1. How many years have you participated in NaNoWriMo? This is my third year, I hit the 50,000 mark in

"Translating the Garrido Manuscript" Michael Lujan Bevacqua Marianas Variety 3/26/14 This Thursday, March 27 a very special presentation will be held at the University of Guam and titled “The Garrido Manuscript: A Unique Glimpse of the Chamorro Language in 1798.” The public is invited to come and learn about the translation of the oldest document known written in the Chamorro language, from 1798, more than 200 years ago. The presentation will begin at 6 pm and take place in the College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences Lecture Hall at UOG. This presentation is sponsored by the Micronesia Area Research Center and the Chamorro Studies Program. Dr. Carlos Madrid, a research associate at MARC has spearheaded the project with essential assistance from Jeremy Cepeda, a Chamorro teacher at Simon Sanchez. Lenoard Iriarte from I Fanlalai’an Oral History Project, Pale’ Eric Forbes, Rosa Palomo from the Micronesian Language Institute and myself also a

MARC. Colonial studies Working Group  PRESS RELEASE The Garrido Manuscript: A Unique Glimpse of the Chamorro Language in 1798 by Dr. Carlos Madrid and Jeremy Cepeda. University of Guam, CLASS Lecture Hall Thursday, March 27, 2014 – 6 pm. Expected duration of the event: 1 hour. A one-of-a-kind document written in the Chamorro language of the 18th Century is being brought to light as a result of research recently conducted at the Micronesian Area Research Center, University of Guam. The Micronesian Area Research Center and the Chamorro Studies Program are presenting a translation of this document to the community and offering a rare look into what the Chamorro language looked and sounded like more than 200 years ago. In 1798, Manuel Garrido, a Chamorro and official of the Spanish Government of the Mariana Islands was asked to translate into Chamorro news received from Manila regarding the victory of Spanish and Filipino soldiers against British shi

This past Thursday, the Chamorro Studies Program was proud to feature a lecture by the Queen of Chamorro Music, Flora Baza Quan. She provided the second lecture for the Chamorro Experience gi Fino' Chamorro series. She spoke on topics ranging from her mentors, the stories behind some of her famous songs, what it takes to be a musician on Guam and how Chamorros need to take a stand and start to truly value their own cultural and creative artists in order to sustain them. It was such an incredible honor to have someone like her who has done so much for the Chamorro community to come and share her experience gi Fino' Chamorro.  Below is a short bio about her and her accomplishments. Photos and excerpts from her talk will be shared on the Chamorro Studies Facebook page. Head there to see them. ********************* Flora Baza Quan is a renowned Chamorro singer and songwriter who has been performing and recording for more than thirty years. Known affe

For most people in life, the history of your family is something behind you and nowhere near as important as getting to work on time, getting kids through school, or watching to see who will win next on “The Voice.” It is something almost all will say has value, but like so many things, it gains the most value only after it is out of your reach. Stories of your family are always there as you drive on the road of life. You will see signs that hint at how you should ask grandma or grandpa questions about your family, but most people just keep on driving. Only when it is too late and you can’t ask those questions, then do you look into the rear view mirror with longing, wishing that you had stopped and wishing you had heard those stories while they were still alive. For most of my life on Guam, I spent it living in my grandparent’s house in Mangilao. From my grandfather, Joaquin Flores Lujan (Bittot) I have learned about Chamorro blacksmithing and how to make tools like the kamyo,

The past few weeks have been crazy. You may or may not have noticed this on the lack of posting. The sparse amount of posts in no way means that I haven’t been doing anything. The truth is the opposite, I have been doing way to much lately. Sen tinane’ yu’, ya esta liso yu’ para bei lalango. I am working on two Administration for Native American Grants. One to standardize Chamorro curriculum at the college level. The other to create a publishing house at the University of Guam that will publish Chamorro children’s books. I’m not writing them alone, but for those familiar with ANA grants, there always seems to be an endless amount of workplans, appendixes and so on to tweak and fine tune. Another grant that I need to finish by next month is for the Guam Preservation Trust, and is requesting support to hold a mini-conference in the fall on language and culture shifts amongst Chamorros today. I am working with Faye Untalan, who teaches Chamorro at UOG on th

Dirk Ballendorf who taught for many years at UOG, most prominently in the Micronesian Studies program died last week. He was the second local historian, along with Tony Palomo to pass away last week. I knew Dirk Ballendorf while I was a student at UOG and even took one class with him while I was getting my MA in Micronesian Studies. Dirk was a character, in so many different ways. The class I took with him was Economic Development in Guam and Micronesia and for the Guam sections he actually brought in Tony Palomo to speak to us about economic development on the island. He did know about Guam History but it wasn't his focus or his expertise and so he invited Palomo to come and help him. It was an interesting class. Both Ballendorf loved to make silly jokes and include anecdotes when they talked and so it was like two old warriors trading anecdotes of people long dead and places long gone. The seminar was like a big card game where everyone else played with cards, while these two