Key Points on the Literacy Campaign

Key Events of the Literacy Campaign:

• Summer 1957: Sierra Manifesto decreed that upon victory there would be an “immediate start of an intensive campaign against illiteracy”
• April 1959: Literacy Commission established to lay the groundwork for an eventual campaign
• September 26, 1960: Fidel Castro announces Literacy Initiative at the General Assembly of the United Nations
• October 1960: Literacy Commission replaced by National Literacy Commission to prepare for the broad effort in 1961
• Late 1960: National Literacy Commission produces major teaching materials (Alfabeticemos, Let’s Alphabetize, and Venceremos, We Shall Triumph). Both had significant political content
• November 1960-August 1961: Census to locate illiterates was conducted on an ongoing basis. 985,000 were located by August ‘61
• January 23, 1961: Castro announces that Conrado Benitez was assassinated by counterrevolutionaries while teaching in Las Villas
• January 28, 1961: Castro announces that all secondary and pre-university schools would close on April 15. This freed 100,000 literacy workers from the ranks of students older than 13 years. // Same time that “Conrado Benitez Brigades” were formed
• April 1961: Bay of Pigs invasion. Distracted Fidel for a few days, but gave more impetus to the literacy campaign as a tool to combat hostility from outside by strengthening the Revolution
• May 1961-August 1961: Members of Conrado Benitez Brigades are trained at Varadero beach.
• August 1961: Fidel Castro calls up 30,000 brigadistas obreros from the Confederation of Cuban Workers
• September 1961: National Literacy Congress convened to celebrate, criticize, and plan improvemenets in the literacy campaign
• September 18, 1961: Fidel Castro says that teachers would be required to work on the literacy campaign for the last three months of the year (no longer a voluntary program)
• Late November, 1961: Manuel Asunce (literacy worker) killed by counterrevolutionaries. Gives impetus to the final few weeks of the campaign much like the Conrado Benitez’s murder gave impetus to the start of the movement.
• December 15, 1961: Trains with literacy workers pour into Havana celebrating success (similar to entrance of victorious guerillas in 1959- Fagan, 53)
• December 22, 1961: Grand finale of the illiteracy campaign // In his speech Castro emphasized the theme that “while the mercenary [US-backed] army had been drawing up battle plans to attack Cuba, the Cubans had been drawing up battle plans to eradicate illiteracy” (Fagan 54) // At the end, one out of four eligible Cubans had participated as volunteers in the literacy campaign

Analysis:

One of the literacy campaign’s successes was the mobilization of both the literacy workers and the illiterate towards political ends. Parts of this analysis stems from Fagan and part stems from course lectures.

Facing the end of guerilla warfare, which had defined the very existence of the revolutionaries, there needed to be some cause, some mechanism to make revolutionaries out of young people who had not had a chance to fight in the Sierra Maestra. To crystallize commitment to the revolution, according to Castro, young people and teachers had to go out and spread its work to the masses. The youth involved in the literacy campaign were agents of social change, but, perhaps more importantly, their political fervor was galvanized by the transformative experience of bringing the Revolution to the masses.

The goal of teaching those who were illiterate to read was a noble one; however, literacy can also be seen as a proxy to political participation and support of the Castro regime. As Professor Dominguez said in one of the Q&A sessions, many were taught that “F is for Fidel” and “I is for Imperialism.” Those who were taught to read had their eyes opened to the written word at a time when only government-run newspapers or approved books were legally available. Was the goal of the Castro regime social justice or political consolidation and loyalty? It is difficult to tell for sure, but the answer is probably a combination of both. They were creating a revolution in the name of improving the situation of the lowest classes, but they also had to ensure that they maintained the support of the lower classes through political mobilization.