Janine Mendes-Franco · July, 2012

Latest posts by Janine Mendes-Franco from July, 2012

Guyana: Olympic Dreams

  31 July 2012

Guyana-Gyal explains how the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in London “remind[ed] [her] to stay true to [her] dreams, no matter how mad they might sound to them people here.”

Jamaica: Campaign to Exonerate Marcus Garvey – Part 2

  29 July 2012

Jamaican diaspora blogger Geoffrey Philp has been working tirelessly to gather signatures for the online campaign to exonerate Marcus Garvey, who, in the early 1920s, was convicted and sentenced to prison on charges of mail fraud involving his Black Star Line shipping company. In this follow-up post, Geoffrey discusses why he thinks it is important for Garvey's name to be cleared and why it should be done under the Obama administration.

Jamaica: Campaign to Exonerate Marcus Garvey – Part 1

  27 July 2012

Marcus Garvey was a Jamaican political leader, writer and thinker who is considered a national hero in the land of his birth. But in the United States, Garvey is down on record as a convicted felon. In the first installment of this two-part post, Global Voices talks to one Jamaican diaspora blogger, Geoffrey Philp, who started an online campaign to clear Marcus Garvey's name.

Trinidad & Tobago: Panday on the Pulpit

  27 July 2012

“Mr Ramnath’s widow was driven to observe that she didn’t think her husband’s funeral would be used ‘as a platform to bash the government’. Spot the real neemakharam”: B.C. Pires blogs about a former Prime Minister's use of the pulpit to spew political vitriol.

The Bahamas: Comments on the Colorado Shooting

  24 July 2012

There has not been a significant reaction in the Caribbean blogosphere about the Colorado movie theatre shooting - which is being cited as one of the deadliest in recent U.S. history - save for two Bahamian bloggers, for whom the news hit close to home.

Trinidad & Tobago: Irresponsible Advertising

  18 July 2012

“The new tagline for the rum’s advertisements was ‘When it pours, you reign.’ My brain exploded. Really? Show images of soaking wet, drunk-looking women, in a campaign that explicitly gives complete domination to the “you” to whom the ads appeal?” Lisa Allen-Agostini wonders “what on earth [the advertising agency was]...

Jamaica: Half a Century of Independence

  17 July 2012

Come August 6th 2012, Jamaica will celebrate 50 years of independence from Great Britain. In this post, two bloggers - one from the diaspora and the other living on island - talk about how Jamaicans are preparing for the celebrations, how social media has had an impact and what the country has accomplished in the last half a century.

Guyana: Being Black

  9 July 2012

Imran Khan addresses the issue of racism in Guyana, saying: “[It] has become a country in which one is privileged to be Indo-Guyanese and cursed to Afro-Guyanese. It is not just not ok to be black in Guyana, it is a condemnation to a life of less.”

Jamaica: Pardon Garvey

  6 July 2012

Geoffrey Philp is a member of the diaspora agitating for the exoneration of Jamaican national hero, Marcus Garvey.

Cuba: The Significance of Palfrey's Swim

  1 July 2012

Today, two Cuban bloggers - one who lives in Havana and the other from the diaspora, living in Florida, discuss the attempt by Penny Palfrey, a 49-year-old British-Australian swimmer and grandmother, to swim the imposing stretch of water between Cuba and the Florida Keys.