NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

The issue of wall funding in the United States for President Trump is another point at which we can see ideological lines become distorted and distinct when moving from the community of the colonizer to the community of the colonized. Left and right, liberal and conservative have particular meanings within a community and within groups within a community. Part of the colonizing process is not solely those things which the colonizer does to forcibly integrate the colonized peoples, but also the ways in which the colonized peoples may accept a particular framework for understanding themselves and their issues. This is a key point people often miss. Colonialism isn't inherently conservative and therefore decolonization is liberal. Colonialism can be both faces and many more. There can be liberal forms of colonization and conservative ones. Movements or conversations that are liberal or progressive in the US can still be colonial.  We are reminded about this every once in a whil...

My first forays into the world of public discourse and engagement came on the pages of the Pacific Daily News through letters to the editor. For years I conducted research in the Micronesian Area Research Center library and through interviews with politicians, activists and manåmko', but the thoughts and ideas that were spawning in my head didn't have many outlets save for discussions in classes or with trusted elders or friends. In 2004 I gave my first public presentation on the issue of decolonization or critical Chamorro Studies, when I shared a section of my research at a forum titled "World War II is it Over?" organized by the Guam Humanities Council at the Agana Shopping Center. I spoke alongside Dr. Patricia Taimanglo, the late historian Tony Palomo and Guam military historian Jennings Bunn. After that, I spent several years in graduate school presenting at conference around the US, often times to empty rooms, as Guam papers tended to be very low on the prior...

Third parties or alternative political parties are such strange creatures in the United States. I have identified as a Democrat for much of my life, although a very progressive Democrat in almost every way, to the point where often times somebody such as Ralph Nader or Jill Stein seems to speak for me more clearer than a Barack Obama or a Hillary Clinton. Part of my weirdness for them is simply the fact that I live in a colony of the United States, and my affinity for one party over the other is pretty irrelevant. Although we can participate in the primary process for Democrats and Republicans, we are barred, like other territories from participating in the general election. So, while I may want a certain candidate to win, may feel " este i gayu-hu hunggan, ha gof kuentusiyi yu'" a lot of it is made pointless by the colonial difference, the political gap between Guam and its colonizer. But each time there is an election in the United States for President, I always fee...

Gof ya-hu si Rachel Maddow.  Gof malåte' gui'. Gof maolek gui' kumuentos yan maneksplika.  Guaha taotao ni' gof sinimai i hinasson-ñiha ni' patida. Ya gi este na botasion gi sanlagu, nai si Donald Trump muna'fafamta' meggai na chatminalate, gof presisu nu Guahu i kuentos-ña yan tiningo'-ña si Maddow. Estague i transcript annai ininterview gui' ni Playboy Magazine annai ma na'huyong i primet na tåya' kesnuda na issue gi Febrero gi på'go na såkkan. ********************** Rachel Maddow Talks Hillary, Hate Mail and More in Our First Non-Nude Issue By David Hochman February 4, 2016 Playboy Upstairs in MSNBC’s studios at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Manhattan, Rachel Maddow is practically mainlining the news of the day. Her staff of 20 (women outnumber men and diversity of skin color, gender expression and age is clearly valued) calls out headlines as Maddow scribbles in micro-script on a white...