El cuatro de julio/July 4th

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Photo from alchetron.com. Click HERE. 
¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Sonia Pierre! (1963-2011)

A human rights advocate in the Dominican Republic who worked to improve the conditions of people of Haitian descent living there, Pierre received the Amnesty International Award in 2003, the Robert F Kennedy Human Rights Award in 2007, and the International Women of Courage Award (presented by Michelle Obama) in 2010. Born in Villa Alta Gracia, San Cristobál, Dominican Republic to Haitian parents (her mother had migrated with a temporary work permit in 1957 and her father had entered the country illegally), Pierre was raised in a batey, or migrant worker camp, where many of the Dominican Republic's Haitian population lives. One of twelve children, she slept alongside them on the dirt floor of the tiny barrack where they lived. When she was 14, she helped organize a five-day protest of sugar cane workers, leading to her arrest, but also to better conditions for the workers, such as improved living quarters, pay raises, and better tools. She became the director of MUDHA (Movement of Dominican Haitian Women), which worked to combat sexism and anti-Haitian sentiment in the Dominican. She was a critic of the Dominican Republic's policy of not offering full citizenship to the children of Haitian workers and petitioned the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in 2001 on behalf of two Dominican-born girls of Haitian descent. In 2005 the court found that the government had discriminated against them and called for reparations and apology (the Dominican Supreme Court would later reject this ruling). Pierre  died in 2011 from a heart attack while being rushed to the hospital in her hometown of San Cristobál. To see her interviewed (in Spanish) by the Global Fund for Children, click HERE. For her obituary in The Guardian, click HERE.

For resources for teaching Spanish, Level 1 through AP, CLICK HERE.






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