Guantánamo Public Memory Project

Tag: Art

Exciting GPMP News

Exciting GPMP News Thumbnail Image

In the past few weeks there have been some very exciting developments for GPMP….. First off, three weeks ago GPMP was granted funding from LAMP (Latin American Microform Project) for digitization of The Guantanamo Bay Gazette. Old editions of the Gazette are now being digitized and uploaded to GPMP’s online GTMO archive, hosted by Dloc (The Digital…

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Leon Golub and the details of superhero stories

Leon Golub and the details of superhero stories Thumbnail Image

We cannot know what really happens in the world. On second thoughts, this claim is a generalisation; an omniscient being does of course know what occurs everywhere at every infinitesimal fraction of time. Nobody I have met, however, possesses this extraordinary capacity, and it is possibly true to say that most of us do not…

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Art & GTMO: Manufacturing Visuals to Represent the Invisible

Art & GTMO: Manufacturing Visuals to Represent the Invisible Thumbnail Image

Last year, John Filostat, spokesman for Joint Task Force Guantánamo, announced that the military would stop informing the public about GTMO detainees who go on hunger strike. “The release of this information serves no operational purpose and detracts from the more important issues,” Filostat explained. The decision to stop disclosing this information, formerly used as…

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Longing for Home

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  My first memories of Guantánamo are from the Haitian refugee crisis in the 1990s. As a kid I imagined how those people must have felt searching for a better life in the United States only to be held at this military base, uncertain of when they would be released. At that time I was…

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Art of Guantánamo

Art of Guantánamo Thumbnail Image

When first hearing about Guantánamo, I was not very interested in learning about the sire. It was not until I explored the readings, photos, and videos associated with the Guantánamo Public Memory Project that I wanted to understand more about the place the issues it represents. I learned that GTMO is more than a prison.…

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The Colorful Voices of Guantánamo

The Colorful Voices of Guantánamo Thumbnail Image

Prior to this course, I had little knowledge of the history of the naval base located at Guantanamo Bay (GTMO). Like many Americans, it was difficult for me to comprehend what was going on there because we are so detached from the site and comfortable in our lives, a distance compounded by the amount of…

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Restricted Reading

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  There is a never-ending debate in library science on what types of content should be withheld from the bookshelves. Subjects like pornography seem like a universal “no.” But between the obvious “yeses” and “noes,” there are shades of gray, as with the recent controversy over the popular E.L. James novel. Without clear-cut lines, it…

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Public Memory and the History of the McRib

Public Memory and the History of the McRib Thumbnail Image

If you are a politically conscious person in the least, you probably have an opinion on Guantánamo Bay, the American Naval Base cum Temporary Detention Center for Haitian/Cuban Refugees cum Indefinite Detention Center for Enemy Combatants, quixotically located on the southeastern edge of Communist Cuba. Though the existence of the base has been public knowledge…

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Guantanamo Post 9/11: The Limits of Art as Therapy

Guantanamo Post 9/11: The Limits of Art as Therapy Thumbnail Image

Zak was the pseudonym of Guantanamo’s Arab-American cultural advisor.  In 2008, Zak and the Joint Task Force initiated art classes at Guantanamo Bay detention camp as a way of controlling behavior.  Zak affirms, “…we want to keep their brains stimulated…once [the prisoners] are engaged and busy, they leave the guards alone…” The Prisoners are encouraged…

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The Haitians and HIV

The Haitians and HIV Thumbnail Image

While researching Guantánamo, I was amazed at how little I actually knew about the history of this US base. For me, Guantánamo was a place where terrorists went to wait indefinitely for a trial that would never happen. My understanding has since changed dramatically. Although the post 9/11 history of GTMO has become a topic…

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