Epic Summer Travels, 2014

It's been almost exactly two years since my last post, which means it's been almost two years since my last adventure - my last BIG adventure that is. The last couple years have been filled with minor journeys, taking me back to New Orleans and North Carolina, to Southern California and north to Toronto.

The next five months will see me covering more miles than I ever have. I already completed the first leg of my trip, to Chicago for the Latin American Studies Association's annual congress. For years now, I've had this idea that Chicago would be my city, and it didn't disappoint. Thanks to the generosity (and stamina!) of good friends, I covered a lot of ground. I was even treated to a personal tour of Humboldt Park, the city's Puerto Rican neighborhood, which has been the site of incredible urban renewal and community development projects in recent years. My guides were the indomitable Margaret Power and her dear friend, José López, whose brother Oscar has been a person of great interest to me in my research over the last few years. Oscar is a Vietnam War veteran who's currently serving out a 70+ year prison sentence for his involvement with a Puerto Rican liberation organization during the 1970s. He is currently the longest-serving political prisoner in the United States. (You can sign a petition to free Oscar Lopez here.)

I'm back in Hershey now, finishing up some work before heading to an SSRC workshop in Berkeley, where I will workshop my dissertation project with a group of other graduate students from different programs and disciplines. After the workshop, I'll be visiting the Bancroft Library to look at their collection of prints from Mexico's Taller Gráfico Popular (TGP), a political print-making workshop that has been in operation since the 1930s. I'll follow up my time at the TGP with a personal tour of SF, which I have been promised will involve a Redwood forest and some of the best Peruvian food to be found in the US. After that, it's on to a quick, 3-day jaunt in SoCal before heading off for my six-week research trip: two weeks in Guatemala and four weeks in Mexico City, which promise to be full of good food and good friends, some old and others new. I'll be in BC for most of August, catching up with family and friends, and witnessing the marriage of my best friend. I can't wait. You can catch me in Germany in September, if you happen to be in Cologne or Berlin during the first half of the month. Otherwise, I'll be much easier to track down by October. I'm pretty sure I'll be happy not to pack my suitcase for a while when it's all said and done.

Speaking of suitcases, I have one to pack. A rather large backpack, if you really want to know. So I'll leave you all for now, but I promise I'll write again soon.