Yo Soy Blogger: New Forms of Communication in Cuba

Cuba never strays from American media for long. From reports on which presidential candidate is pandering for Cuban-American votes in Florida, to the debate on whether the economic embargo allows post-hurricane relief aid, this fall is no exception. Despite such interest, the average American knows very little about the realities of life in Cuba due to the US travel embargo and media that is often politically-biased (both on the left and the right of the political spectrum). However, since Fidel Castro passed the presidential torch to his slightly younger brother Raul this past year, a more liberal allowance of luxury goods (such as the legalization of cell phones and computers) has opened up passages of communication to enterprising Cuban citizens, and it is especially encouraging to note that Cuba's youth have been the first to master and capitalize on the tools to spread their voices throughout the global community. As a young American, I feel as though my generation is often criticized for eroding morals and increasing apathy, often it is said, due to the proliferation of technology. Yet I argue that political participation and social activism are in fact facilitated and even spurned by the new forms of technology, as witnessed in the recent presidential elections. It would seem that my generational peers in Cuba are also using  using the same resources as channels of change, which signifies an important process of democratization in Cuba, a country known to have little freedom of speech and political dissent.

Since Fidel Castro stepped down from power in February, many predictions and recommendations for a post-Castro transition to democracy have been explored in the academic and policy-making communities. Within this context, a focus on Cuba's youth as a key component of the transition has emerged. The Latell Report, written by Cuba analyst Brian Latell from the Cuba-Transition Project at the University of Miami, has published a number of articles of the state on Cuba's youth and their role in the political shifts that may be ahead. In the article "Cuba's Lost Generation," Latell warns that "popular expectations for liberalizing change already are high, especially among the youth...given their frustrations and the hardships they endure." He continues to say that this has indeed been recognized as a threat by the Cuban government, who have "openly acknowledged the dangerously profound alienation of Cuba's youth." In the international community, it is generally accepted that such levels of alienation often lead to political violence. Looking ahead to the transition, it is possible that new forms of dissent, such as the internet, have been capitalized on by the rising generation as an alternative to violence. In this respect, I find Raul Castro's efforts to gradually liberalize many government policies on the island as an acknowledgement of this and an attempt at a more peaceful transition. 

According to Latell, it is yet to be seen if Cuba's youth has substantial political organization to tangibly confront their leaders and this is echoed in an article by Sarah Miller Llana and Matthew Clark in the Christian Science Monitor. The article's title calls Cuban youth "Restless but Not Often Political," and starts off with a tag line of: "They just want the freedom to travel and access to the tech touchstones of their generation: iPods, Facebook, and text messages." What some may not be seeing is that the fight for such material items is political in itself, as the demand of these "tech touchstones" is, in the context of globalization, in fact a demand for the freedoms of speech and assembly. While the adult generation in the United States is use to viewing technology as an idle pastime for their youth, the recent presidential elections proved that text messages and Facebook are in fact tools for youth political organization. This is

also the case with our peers 90 miles south of the Florida straits, as seen in February when the call for such social liberalization certainly turned political. At the University of Information Sciences in Havana, students pressed National Assembly president Ricardo Alarcon for answers to questions that ranged from the right to travel, low wages, and access to the internet (see the image at the right which contains a Cuban youth wearing a t-shirt with the @ symbol, peppering Alarcon for answers). In what could only be possible in the current age of technology, a video of the meeting was later posted on the internet site YouTube, sharing with the world this unprecedented, open confrontation between Cuban youths and their government.

In a less formal and much more clandestine setting, Cuban university students capitalized on another form of technology to communicate with their American peers. In a video-conference organized by University of Miami Assistant Provost Dr. Andy Gomez, who is also a Senior Research Associate at the Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies, the Cuban students (whose names were kept secret) sat in an unknown living-room type setting and chatted with their peers for an hour. They asked for university materials and expressed the hope for more contact across the Florida straits, implying that the revolutionary zeal that has historically classified the Cuban milieu has possibly not been passed down to the rising generation. This is an example of an opening of dialogue across national lines--a new phenomenon for both American and Cuban citizens--which is facilitated by access to technology. The new voice that technology gives young Cubans is an alternative to their often limited options of dissent, including the last-resort option of violent protest which is predicted to be a possibility in Cuba's future (see Latell's report on "Cuba's Unquiet Youth"). 

Perhaps the most illustrative example of technology giving a big voice to a marginalized segment of society is the case of one young Cuban woman, Yoani Sanchez, who has used her blog Generation Y to express dissatisfaction with her local reality to readers around the globe. Sanchez's blog, in only a short while since Cuba gained limited access to internet, has promoted an ordinary young Cuban to one of Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People and garnered enough support in Cuba to pose a threat to the government (they shut down access to Generation Y in March). Sanchez dedicates her blog to "the people like me...Born in Cuba in the 1970s and 80s, marked by rural schools, Russian dolls, illegal emigration and frustration" and discusses a range of topics such as the effects of Hurricane Gustav, the difficulty to get food at government-owned stores and what visitors to the island should bring (potable water tabs, vitamins, school materials, soap, shampoo, children clothes). Apparently Sanchez is not alone as a Cuban blogger, as she lists over a dozen other Cuban blogs and sites in her linkroll. This popular site (see advertisement in the top left of post) not only shows the innovation of Cuban youth to express themselves in a sometimes repressive political environment, but also demonstrates the importance that participation in the global community has for our generation. As the Christian Science Monitor reporter Sara Miller Llana reports in her article about Yoani, when access to Generation Y was shut down in Cuba, she continued e-mailing her entries to friends abroad who then e-mailed her back the thousands of responses from readers, leading Sanchez to consider herself a "blind blogger." The advantages of this creative use of technology as a tool is best understood how Yoani Sanchez describes it to Sara Miller LLana: "though the government has been physically able to stop her, she says, the technology that has made her--inadvertently from her perspective--the spokesperson of her generation is beyond their grasp...'They can try to restrict technology, but we Cubans are very adept.'"

All of the cases we have witnessed in the past year, since Raul Castro came to power, show young people using new technology to advance their marginalized position through the communication of their needs, wants and realities. By garnering support and attention in their local and international communities, these young people are also indirectly getting a voice in the government, who must realize that if they do not pay heed to the voices of the rising generation, they could potentially face outbursts in the streets. This "informal democracy" that the youth are creating for themselves could, in the best of situations, lead to further social openings that would hopefully provide dissatisfied youth with more forms of expression. It is also an important revelation for us in the United States that the ways that young people are using technology go far beyond entertainment and social scenes.