Global// Marching with Lady Liberty.
By Maya Hernandez
On the 4ᵗʰ March 2000, a crowd of farmworkers and activists took to the streets of Fort Myers and embarked on a 235-mile march to Florida’s Fruit and Vegetable Association in Orlando. This trek was a protest against the abuse, low pay, and gruelling conditions suffered by agricultural workers in major food corporations in Orlando. Protestors who participated in the march carried with them a giant papier-mache replica of The Statue of Liberty. This one-of-a-kind rendition of Lady Liberty hoisting up a bright red tomato was created by the artist Kat Rodriguez for the CIW’s march and was intended to capture the people who make up the American population and show how, as that population grew, these people managed to find ways to ‘negotiate…what it meant to be American’.
Global// Battered and Bruised: 2Pac Against the Criminal Justice System.
By Maya Hernandez
2Pac’s 1995 album Me Against the World is riddled with paradox: from portraits of perseverance and positivity to hopelessness and despondency. Despite these contradictory messages, one preoccupation remains constant: an indictment of the criminal-justice system. Although this subject is not new to rap music, it takes on a new light against the backdrop of Tupac’s run-ins with the law and sexual abuse accusations, his mother’s involvement with the Black Panther Party, and the passage of the largest crime bill in the history of the United States.
USA// Privilege, Property, and the Federalist Papers.
By Maya Hernandez
Alexander Hamilton and James Madison, who would later be joined by John Jay, in publishing the Federalist Papers to promote the ratification of the newly proposed Constitution. With their status in mind, it is not surprising that the American Founders have been criticized for having drafted systems of government that privilege the property of the well off at the expense of the wellbeing of the many.
USA// The selective hegemony of the law.
By Maggie Kupitz
While the legal system in the United States occasionally provides resources or avenues for its people to challenge specific inequalities, it also simultaneously – whether intentionally or unintentionally – reinforces various structures of inequality which are ingrained in our collective consciousness and in our institutions.