Encuentro Iberoamericano Agenda Afrodescendiente en las Américas Iberoamerican Conference Afro-Descendant Agenda of the Americas Cartagena de Indias - October 16-18 of 2008 MEMOIRS 1 Encuentro Iberoamericano Agenda Afrodescendiente en las Américas 2 Encuentro Iberoamericano Agenda Afrodescendiente en las Américas Iberoamerican Afrodescendant Conference Afrodescendant Agenda in the Americas Memoirs Table of Contents Page Presentation .......................................................................... 7 Cartagena Declaration ......................................................... 10 General Objectives/Methodology ....................................... 13 Topics Discussed in the Work Tables ................................... 14 Inaugural Session ................................................................. 18 Interventions Paula Marcela Moreno Z., Minister of Culture of Colombia. Alvaro Marchesi. Secretary General, Organization of Ibero- american States-OEI-. Zulu Araujo. Director Palmares Foundation. Forum I: Global Tendencies: African Diaspora and the need of inclusion ......................................................................... 23 Interventions Nidore Ndiaye. Deputy Director, International Organiza- tion for Migrations. Agustín Lao Montes. Profesor University of Massachus- setts. Silvia García. Adviser, Iberoamerican General Secretariat (SEGIB). Message President of the Interamerican Development Bank Sr. Luis Alberto Moreno. Message Iberoamerican General Secretariat (SEGIB) President. Mr. 3 Encuentro Iberoamericano Agenda Afrodescendiente en las Américas Enrique Iglesias. Forum II: Culture as the basis of encounter and recreation of the ethnical global agenda .................................................. 62 • Intervention Doudou Diene. Lawyer and Special Rappor- teur against contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimi- nation, xenophobia, and other forms of intolerance. • Edouard Matoko. Director UNESCO Regional Office in Qui- to, Representation for Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, and Ve- nezuela. • Alberto Abello. Director Masters in Development and Cul- ture, Tecnological University of Bolivar • Rafael Palacios. Dancer and choreographer Discussion and conclusions, Forums I and II ........................ 95 Table I: The contribution of the afrodescendant to the cons- truction of the Ameritas: rewriting history ....................... 136 Interventions Howard Dodson. Director Schomburg Center . Alfonso Múnera. Historian. Waguemati Wabgou. GEACES, Nation University in Colom- bia. Discussion and Conclusions Table I. Table II: Exchange of experiencias of child and youth afrodes- cendants ............................................................................ 138 Interventions Axel Rojas. Proffesor, Cauca University. Miguel Pereira. Every Child, Peru. Discussion and Conclusions Table 2. 4 Encuentro Iberoamericano Agenda Afrodescendiente en las Américas Table III: Migration: ethnical and cultural diversity ........... 217 Discusion y Conclusions Table III Table IV: Cultural Afrodescendant Entrepeurnship ........... 217 Discusion y Conclusions Table IV. Table V: Political Representation ...................................... 218 Intervention. Giancarlo Salazar. Historian Discussion y conclusions Table V Table VI: The power of media and the positioning of diversity. ....................................................................... 220 Interventions Emma Kamau. Journalist Pedro Viveros. Social Communicator and Journalist Discusion y Conclusions Table VI 5 Encuentro Iberoamericano Agenda Afrodescendiente en las Américas 6 Encuentro Iberoamericano Agenda Afrodescendiente en las Américas Presentation The I Iberoamerican Conference on “Afro-Descendants Agenda of the Americas” offered a valuable opportunity to institute a col- lective position, of the States and particularly from the region’s Ministries of Culture, on the unquestionable Afro-Descendant contribution in building Pan-American societies and their re- spective advancement. Achieving the Millennium Development Goals and eradicating poverty face a great challenge in terms of building inclusive and diverse societies; full cultural expres- sion and recognition constitute an important development goal. These commitments were recorded in the Declaration of Carta- gena, Afro-Descendants’ agenda of the Americas, signed in San Basilio de Palenque, on October 18th /2008 by the Ministries of Culture of Angola, Bahamas, Barbados, Brasil, Colombia, Gua- temala, Guinea Ecuatorial, Jamaica, Mexico, Panamá, Paraguay and Dominican Republic, with the support of the Organization of Iberoamerican States. In the framework of a multilateral cooperation scheme, the Iberoamerican countries have defined cultural diversity as an axis of their common integration project. One of the columns of the region’s cultural diversity policy is the existing pluri-ethnicity and multicultural expressions, and it is in this framework where the differential approach for a representative Afro-Descendant com- munity becomes vitally important. Among the commitments that governments that signed the Cartagena Declaration, is to promote the formulation of specific 7 Encuentro Iberoamericano Agenda Afrodescendiente en las Américas guidelines for public policy on culture for ethnic populations in Latin America and the Caribbean, and to help strengthen ties between Afrodescendant communities, indigenous and native people of the Americas. The forced migratory process from Africa to the Americas has been the largest massive flow of people in the history of human- kind. More than 11 million men, women, boys and girls had to recreate their destiny despite adversity. Today, Latin America and the Caribbean have a population of approximately 150 million Afro-Descendants. The African Diaspora in the region represents around a 30% of the total population. The largest concentration is located especially in the Dominican Republic (90%), Brazil (50%), Cuba (30%), Colombia (20%) and Venezuela (10%) (CEPAL 2001). For many it is clear today that during decades the old and es- tablished logic of the “mixing of races”, as the unique sign of the Iberoamerican “identity”, has prevented us from seeing this overwhelming reality, obliterating the enormity of the contribu- tions of Afro-Descendants in all the aspects of public life. In fact, in Latin America’s case, there has been a generalized lack of at- tention, which is evidenced in a consequent naturalized cultural stigmatization and overshadowing. With some important excep- tions, several centuries of Afro-Descendant material and immate- rial cultural contribution have been omitted or underestimated in the cultural maps of the different Iberoamerican States, placing this population outside of what is known as history and culture. Hence, the urgent need to define an agenda that rescues and spreads the historic-cultural heritage, that determines a critical review of history and its massive dissemination within educatio- nal systems, that generates a process of identity strengthening and living memory through the new information technologies and that integrates ethnical cultural expressions, beyond the fra- mework of the exotic. 8 Encuentro Iberoamericano Agenda Afrodescendiente en las Américas On the other hand, the Afro-Descendant community totally inte- grated in building inclusive and diverse societies will set a step to- wards itself in the historic perspective, preparing and educating itself with excellence to build a cultural recognition in the frame- work of social globalization whose common denominator is the convening of differences and richness. This construction gives the region’s children and young people a fundamental role. They will have to be educated with full awareness of their ethnic condition as transversal axis of many knowledge fields. Culture can perform as a power vehicle in forming artistic, political, economic and so- cial leadership. Today, as we face a global multicultural society, the goal of this Conference was to define an agenda that contributes to valuing and taking over ethnic-cultural heritage, not with an obsessive and self-pitting look towards the past but rather with a critical view for the sake of building a history with future. Now, the political challenge is to cultivate the rich cultural expres- sions in each country (Promotion of cultural policies in a global- izing world, 2002), building roads to strengthen the importance of our cultural diversity and the ability of each country to ensure that their stories and experiences are available to its own citizens and the world that can lead to concerted action and, ultimately, a number of tools to address some of the issues within the broad field of cultural diversity, among which could include measures to promote cultural diversity as a source of value for human devel- opment, social cohesion and prosperity of societies. Una segunda versión de este Encuentro se realizará en febrero de 2010 en Salvador de Bahía – Brasil y su Comité ad-hoc se reunirá en Washington DC en febrero de 2009. 9 Encuentro Iberoamericano Agenda Afrodescendiente en las Américas Cartagena Declaration Afrodescendant Agenda in the Americas The Ministries of Culture of the Bahamas, Barbados, Brazil, Co- lombia, the Dominican Republic, Equatorial Guinea, Guatemala, Jamaica, and representatives of Angola, Mexico, Panama, Para- guay, the Organization of Ibero-American States (OIS), the Inter- national Organization for Migration (OIM), the Regional Office in Quito of the United Nations Educational,