Harvard symposium reflects on race in Latin America

The Afro-Latin American Research Institute at the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University will host on December 4-5 the symposium “Afrodescendants: Fifteen Years after Santiago. Achievements and Challenges,” where activists from the Afrodescendant movement in Latin America, agency representatives, government officials, and scholars reflect on the antiracist agenda formulated at the Latin American Regional Conference Against Racism (Santiago de Chile, 2000).

This symposium is part of a broader effort by the Afro-Latin American Research Institute to define the new field of Afro-Latin American studies in dialogue with activists and other actors involved in the design and implementation of antiracist policies in Latin America. Participants in the symposium include activists from Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, Costa Rica, Honduras and Cuba and representatives from the Ford Foundation, the Inter-American Development Bank, the World Bank, the Economic Commission for Latin America, the United Nations Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, and the Organization of American States.

The symposium is done in collaboration with the University of Cartagena de Indias in Colombia, with support from the Ford Foundation and with additional funding from the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies, Harvard University.