Riley, Keith

Name:

Riley_temple_0225M_12473.pdf

Size:

219.0Kb

Format:

PDF

Download

Genre

Thesis/Dissertation

Date

2016

Author

Riley, Keith

Advisor

Simon, Bryant

Committee member

Simon, Bryant
Talton, Benjamin

Department

History

DOI

http://dx.doi.org/10.34944/dspace/2227

Abstract

This paper examines activists in the United States that supported the socialist Nicaraguan government of the Sandinista National Liberation Front and opposed efforts by the Reagan Administration to militarily undermine Nicaragua’s new government during the 1980s. Such scholarship examines the rise of a leftist political coalition organized around supporting Nicaragua’s government and this solidarity movement’s eventual demise after the Sandinistas lost their country’s 1990 Presidential election. The work ultimately asks how did U.S. leftists and progressives of the late 1970s and 1980s perceive Nicaragua’s new government and how did these perceptions affect the ways in which these activists rallied to support the Sandinistas in the face of the Contra War? In answering this question, this paper consults a variety of primary sources including articles from socialist newspapers, the meeting minutes and notes of solidarity organizations, and oral histories with former activists. “I Have My Mind!” also consults cultural sources such as the protest and art benefit flyers and the lyrics to punk rock songs of the period to make its claims. This Masters Thesis argues that U.S. Americans’ solidarity with the Sandinistas relied upon a romanticization of Nicaraguan revolutionary reforms representative of movement participants’ own political aspirations.

ADA compliance

For Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) accommodation, including help with reading this content, please contact scholarshare@temple.edu

Collections

Theses and Dissertations

"I Have My Mind!:" U.S.-Sandinista Solidarities, Revolutionary Romanticism, and the Imagined Nicaragua, 1979-1990