CCS Assistant Professor of Humanities Dr. Marco Cabrera Geserick presented this week on the topic of Memory and the Filibuster War in Costa Rica this May. Sponsored by the Secretary of Culture of the government of Costa Rica, he talked about “The Rise and Fall of May 1st: Commemoration and Politics in the Memory of the Filibuster War” at the Cultural Historical Juan Santamaria Museum, in Alajuela, on May 3rd, and at the Museum of Popular Culture, in Barva, on May 6th.
The presentations analyze the changes on historical commemoration of the victory over the Filibusters in the 1856-1857 war, which preserved the sovereignty and Independence of Central America. As central to Costa Rican national identity, the commemoration of the filibuster war, notwithstanding, shifted several times since their inception, due to the need to revise the narrative of the war according to the change in national politics.