070191 SE Research Seminar (2015S)

While the larger part of Latin America decolonized in the early 19th century, with Haiti leading the way as the only country ever to be founded by a successful slave revolution, the colonized regions of Asia and Africa mostly went through this process after the Second World War. And yet, there are various connections and mutual influences between the three continents. The Mexican Revolution constituted an important reference for revolutionary processes around the world, and even more so did the Cuban Revolution. In 1966, the Tricontinental Conference was held in Havana: 150 years after most of Latin America & Caribbeans's independence, different forces of this continent joined the struggles of Asia and Africa: Vietnam, Algeria, Zaire, Angola, to name but some of them. This exchange created significant political and intellectual networks in the Global South.
Our seminar will focus on the contributions of the larger Caribbean region to this process: contributions that originated from social and revolutionary movements in Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean itself. We will also look into the ideological transfers between different anticolonial actors: the Non Aligned Movement, Tricontinentalism, and the diffusion of Cuban guerilla strategies in Africa, Europe, and the USA.