photos from the edge 21 - A VICTORY FOR CULTURAL RIGHTS

photos from the edge 21
A VICTORY FOR CULTURAL RIGHTS IN CALIFORNIA'S CENTRAL VALLEY
Photoessay by David Bacon
American Community Media, 10/2/25
https://americancommunitymedia.org/arts-entertainment/a-victory-for-cultural-rights-in-californias-central-valley/

Dancers from the Grupo Folklórico Nueva Antequera perform a Mazateco dance from Huautla de limenez in the La Cañada region, in which the men try to steal kisses from the women.

Organizers of the Guelaguetza held in Fresno last Sunday felt it was a victory.  According to Sarait Martinez, director of the Centro Binacional para el Desarollo Indigena Oaxaqueña, which organized the event, "preserving our culture is itself a means of survival, and as indigenous people from Oaxaca we have celebrated the Guelaguetza now for 25 years.  But this year it was especially important to do this, because of the threats of detention coming from ICE and the Trump administration.  We could not let that stop us."

The Guelaguetza is a celebration featuring a fabulous display of dancers in elaborate masks and tall headdresses, performing to music from home. Indigenous towns in Mexico, particularly in Oaxaca, often each have their own dance; the Guelaguetza brings them together in all their vivid variety.  This year's festival in Fresno was called "Resistance, Culture, Roots, Tradition."  The Centro Binacional and its sister sponsoring organization, the Frente Indigena de Organizaciones Binacionales, called the Guelaguetza "an offering or sharing, and in this celebration we joyfully offer everyone our dances, the flavors of our food, regional music, and the traditions of Oaxacan culture."

The main Guelaguetza is held in Oaxaca itself, but over the last four decades, the number of Mixtecos, Triquis, Chatinos, and other Indigenous peoples in the U.S. has grown so large that there are now several Guelaguetzas held each year north of the border.  One 2016 study estimated that 350,000 indigenous Mexican migrants live in California. 

This year, however, the Oaxacan community in Madera decided not to hold it for fear that people would be in danger of ICE raids.  The Los Angeles Guelaguetza, often California's largest, was cancelled after the city was caught in the intense series of raids and occupation by the National Guard.  Martinez said that the threat of raids didn't deter the dozens of young people who came to volunteer to help organize the event.  She estimated the crowd of attendees at several thousand.  

The Fresno Guelaguetza was held at Fresno Community College, and because of city funding through Measure P it was free last year and Martinez hopes the funding will come through this year as well.  It was broadcast live on Radio Bilingue, a chain of bilingual radio stations broadcasting to communities throughout the southwest.  Some of its programming is in indigenous languages, and can be heard in Oaxaca itself.

indigenous Oaxacan communities in the U.S. organize dance troupes that prepare all year for the event.  The groups provide an opportunity to show off the vibrant culture, and to give young people growing up in the U.S. a chance to learn the language and dances, and to imagine a home they may have never seen.  Many go on to perform in the dance troupes that travel through the state, dancing throughout the summer and fall.

The late Mixteco community leader Rufino Dominguez-Santos explained in a 2006 oral history that dances and language are not just a way to celebrate identity, but are an essential glue that keeps communities together, helping them survive in a hostile environment. "Beyond organizing and teaching our rights," he explained, "we try to save our language. Even though 500 years have passed since the Spanish conquest, we still speak it. We are preserving our way of dancing, and rescuing our lost beliefs - that nature is something sacred for us, just as it was for our ancestors."

To see a full selection of the photos click here.

Miriam Lopez, co-founder with Raul Cortes of the Ballet Folklórico Nueva Antequera, braids the hair of a young woman as the group puts on the costumes to perform one of the Sones Istmeños in the Guelaguetza.

 

Two monos, or giant figures dressed in the style of a Oaxacan town, lead the calenda, the traditional procession that starts the Guelaguetza, and which invites the community to come.

Los Rubios de Llano Verde, a dance from the Mixteca region of Oaxaca, is performed by dancers from the town of San Miguel Cuevas.

In the style of the viejos tiliches de Putla Villa de Guerrero a young man has substituted the mask of SuperBarrio for the traditional sombrero.  The rags worn in this costume are a remembrance of the rags worn by campesinos of Putla in the nineteenth century.

Food stands line the plaza during the calenda. This one advertises aguas, or drinks made from Oaxacan squash (chilacayote), oranges and guavas, along with aguas from other fruits and vegetables.

The Grupo Folklórico El Valle de Santa Helena performs China Oaxaqueñas while a mono dances with them.

A young girl dances with the older women from the Grupo Folklórico El Valle de Santa Helena.

Dancers in the Grupo Folklórico Nueva Antequera wear the elaborate and brilliantly embroidered costumes from the Istmo de Tehuantepec.

After a set of dances, the performers hand out fruit to people in the audience.  It is a tradition that recognizes that after sitting in 90-degree sun for hours people get thirsty and hungry.

photos from the edge 20 - FARMWORKERS AND DEPORTEES - SURVIVAL IS RESISTANCE

photos from the edge 20
FARMWORKERS AND DEPORTEES - SURVIVAL IS RESISTANCE
by David Bacon
Zeke, the Magazine of Documentary Photography, September 2025
https://www.zekemagazine.com/content/-farmworkers-and-deportees

MT VERNON, WA - 2022 - Pablo Ramirez works in a crew of farmworkers weeding a field growing organic cabbage plants for seed at Morrison Farm.  Because it is an organic field, the grower doesn't use herbicide, and instead hires a small crew to weed the field before harvesting the seeds.  

These photographs document the work and unique culture of indigenous farmworkers from southern Mexico who are now employed in farms up and down the West Coast. The images also document a new environment in the context of the current wave of ICE raids and anti-immigrant hysteria. People arriving to work in U.S. fields come from communities that speak languages that long predate European colonization, and their dances, food, music and culture have deep historic roots. As those farmworker communities today resist the immigration raids and anti-immigrant hysteria spread by the Trump administration, this culture has become a means for survival.

The photographs begin with the work itself - the reason people have come and the way communities support themselves.This work also supports society as a whole - if farmworkers don't work the rest of society doesn't eat.

The documentation continues with photographs in which indigenous culture is evident. Some show the traditional dances in the festivals, called the guelaguetzas, that help keep indigenous culture alive. Because this display of culture during the current anti-immigrant repression is an act of defiance and courage, the participants call them guelaguetzas of resistance.

How people organize to resist and counter exploitation is also part of culture. The photographs show organizing in the fields and the targeting of one organizer by ICE who has been forced into self-deportation. Other images document angry anti-raid protests - people out in the streets, not cowering behind closed doors.

The final set of images shows one of the important consequences of the deportation machinery and violence. In Tijuana, deportees and violence victims live together on the street and in shelters - ripped from their lives at home, trying to survive as best they can.

This series of photographs is part of the documentation of work and migration I've worked on for over three decades. It has been published in magazines and newspapers, exhibited in several countries, and published in three books:   Communities Without Borders, In the Fields of the North/En los campos del norte, and More Than a Wall/Mas que un muro.





MT VERNON, WA - 2023 - Benito Lopez cuts the tops of the remaining tulip flowers after the field is harvested, in a tulip field belonging to Washington Bulb. The workers are members of Familias Unidas por la Justicia, and are indigenous Mixtec immigrants from Oaxaca, Mexico. Benito Lopez is a leader of the union.

MT VERNON, WA - 2023  - Benito Lopz, Juana Sanchez and other members of Familias Unidas hold a meeting to decide if they will continue working in another field.

LOMPOC, CA - 2023 - A worker swings a bunch of stock flowers he's cut onto a huge bunch in a field in Lompoc, near Santa Maria. A DoL job order for H-2A workers, by labor contractor Fresh Harvest, covers workers called ' Flower Harvester (Stock and Larkspur flower types).' H-2A workers are recruited in Mexico for a few months work, and then have to leave the U.S.

SANTA MARIA, CA - 2012 - Sabina Cayetano, a Mixtec strawberry picker, and her son Aron and other members of her family sleep in one room in their Santa Maria apartment.

SANTA MARIA, CA - 2024 - Strawberry workers march through Santa Maria demanding a living wage Most are indigenous Mixtec migrants from Oaxaca and southern Mexico, but who now live in the U.S.  The march passed in front of the Santa Maria Fairpark, where the strawberry festival was organized by growers to celebrate the beginning of the picking season. Few farmworker children can afford to go to the fair. This girl's sign says 'Salarios dignos por mis padres' or 'Dignified wages for my parents.'

HEALDSBURG, CA - 2025 - Dancers from Las Azucenas de Maria, a group from the San Joaquin Valley, perform with the elaborate head dresses and flowing skirts of the chinas Oaxaqueñas, a dance from the chinas barrio of the city of Oaxaca de Juarez. Dancers from the many ethnic groups of Oaxaca, now living as migrants in the United States, came together at the annual festival of Oaxacan indigenous culture, the Guelagetza, which took place while the Trump administration attacked indigenous communities with immigration raids and threats. The event's organizer called it a Guelaguetza de Resistencia, or a Guelaguetza in Resistance.

HEALDSBURG, CA - 2025 - The Tiliche invites people to the Guelaguetza in Healdsburg

HEALDSBURG, CA - 2025 - A group of young musicians came to the Guelaguetza from Half Moon Bay, three hours south of Healdsburg. For indigenous Mexican farmworkers, traveling long distances runs the risk of being stopped by immigration authorities and held for deportation.

HEALDSBURG, CA - 2025 - A woman in the devil mask, a member of the Grupo Diablos Mixtecos de Oaxaca. In their informal network, members perform and share ideas at each others' events, which has led to the incorporation of more women into the dance, and new styles of masks.

HEALDSBURG, CA - 2025 - Food stands line the plaza during the Guelaguetza. The cook at this food stand has made Oaxacan mole from chocolate, sesame seeds, chile and other ingredients. Eating traditional food is another expression of determination to preserve indigenous culture in the face of the anti-immigrant wave of deportations.

HEALDSBURG, CA - 2025 - A musician carries his huge bass drum keeping time for the dancers in the Calenda, a march around the town plaza that begins the Guelagetza.

HEALDSBURG, CA - 2025 - The oldest dancer, a member of Las Azucenas de Maria, at the annual festival of Oaxacan indigenous culture, the Guelagetza.

MT VERNON, WA - 2023 - Alfredo 'Lelo' Juarez with his partner and niece in a march of migrant farmworkers and their supporters, calling for unions and human rights. Lelo is a leader of the farmworker union, Familias Unidas por la Justicia. He was arrested in March by ICE, and held in the notorious detention center in Tacoma until July, when he agreed to return to Mexico in order to get out of the prison.

MT VERNON, WA - 2023 - Lelo speaks to a May Day march of migrant farmworkers and their supporters, calling for unions and human rights.

FT BRAGG, CA - 2025 - Immigrant families march through downtown Fort Bragg, protesting the wave of immigration raids by the Trump administration. Angry marchers carried signs with denunciations that declared "MAGA: Mexicans Ain't Going Anywhere!"

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - 2025 - Miguel Molina is an immigrant rights activist and radio personality in Santa Rosa. He came to San Francisco to demonstrate against the Trump administration on Labor Day, in one of a thousand similar demonstrations around the country.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - 2025 - A domestic worker activist in the city's Mission District demonstrated against the Trump administration on Labor Day.

SANTA MARIA, CA - 2025 - At the beginning of a march to protest immigration detentions, a volunteer passes out 'red cards' - part of a know-your-rights campaign to help immigrants facing immigration enforcement agents.

SANTA MARIA, CA - 2025 - A young woman holds a sign recognizing the work her parents have done as farmworkers. In this farmworker march many young people came to demand a living wage for their parents and to protest immigration raids. They marched for their parents who couldn't come themselves because of threats from their employer and the risk of immigration raids.

OAKLAND, CA - 2025 - Community and immigrant rights organizations rally in Oakland's Latino Fruitvale district protesting immigration raids and the use of the National Guard in Los Angeles. The sign carried by these young immigrant women says 'For my father, who was deported. Watch me from Heaven, Papa. This is Our War!'

SANTA MARIA, CA - 2025 - A young boy from a Mixtec farmworker family walks in front of a banner with the hand-drawn portrait of Cesar Chavez, in a march of immigrant and farmworker youth and families.

SAN MATEO, CA - 2025 - Immigrant youth and families, and their supporters marched from San Mateo City Hall to San Francisco, protesting the wave of immigration raids by the Trump administration. Their purpose was to make the Mexican community visible in order to inspire a fightback to Trump fascism.

SAN MATEO, CA - 2025 - Youth marches like this are not the polite petitions of victims pleading for a softer repression. They are angry protests - people are out in the streets, not cowering behind closed doors. A common sign says "I drink my horchata warm because Fuck ICE!" Horchata is the iconic rice drink that has become a symbol of Mexican culture, and is usually served with ice.

SAN MATEO, CA - 2025 - Immigrant youth and families, and their supporters march from San Mateo City Hall to San Francisco, protesting the wave of immigration raids by the Trump administration.

SAN MATEO, CA - 2025 - Marches of iImmigrant youth and families met widespread community support. Here Victor Uno, a national officer of the electrical workers union, greeted a march with other union members. Uno's family were interned during World War Two.

DELANO, CA - 2025 - Farmworkers and supporters demonstrated in Delano, where the United Farm Workers union was born, to celebrate the birthday of Cesar Chavez and protest the wave of immigration raids by the Trump administration. California Attorney General Rob Bonta marched with Lorena Gonzalez, executive secretary of the California Labor Federation and Yvonne Wheeler, President of the Los Angeles Labor Federation.

DELANO, CA - 2025 - Farmworkers protested the wave of immigration raids by the Trump administration. Protesters linked the hysteria against immigrants and indigenous people promoted by the Trump administration to the murder of Emily Pike, a 14-year old Apache girl in Arizona, one of many missing and murdered indigenous youth and women.

TIJUANA, BAJA CALIFORNIA NORTE, MEXICO - 2025 - Deportees and homeless people living on the street at a food distrubution in downtown Tijuana organized by World Food Kitchen.

TIJUANA, BAJA CALIFORNIA NORTE, MEXICO - 2025 - A deportee among the homeless people living on the street, lined up for food at a distribution in downtown Tijuana.

TIJUANA, BAJA CALIFORNIA NORTE, MEXICO - 2025 - A young woman rests on her bunk in a casa de refugio, or sanctuary home, for refugees and deportees from the U.S. This casa is administered by the Templo Embajadores de Jesus.

TIJUANA, BAJA CALIFORNIA NORTE, MEXICO - 2025 - A young disabled man and a group of children in casa de refugio, or sanctuary home, for refugees and deportees.

TIJUANA, BAJA CALIFORNIA NORTE, MEXICO - 2025 - At the casa de refugio administered by the Templo Embajadores de Jesus,  Daniel Ortega and Irma Cortez find sanctuary from the violence of the cartels in their home state of Michoacan.

photos from the edge 19 - BERKELEY'S STUDENT AND WORKING CLASS HISTORY

photos from the edge 19
BERKELEY'S STUDENT AND WORKING CLASS HISTORY
By David Bacon

Berkeley's famous leftwing politics was a product of the civil rights and student movements of the 1960s, and students left the local high school campus to join the thousands in San Francisco protesting racism in hiring at the Sheraton Palace Hotel, and later the auto dealerships on Cadillac Row.  When student leader Tracy Sims was suspended on their return, the students struck the school to win her reinstatement.  Radical photographer Paul Richards took a famous photograph of Sims in a voter registration demonstration, one of the many causes she championed.  

That protest tradition continued into the 1990s, when students blew out of class at Berkeley High to fight Proposition 187, which would have made education and health care illegal for undocumented immigrants.  That walkout was one of many immigrant rights demonstrations that followed in the years since.

But Berkeley also has a working class history that is much less discussed.  In the years after World War 2 it was an industrial city, with factories along the edge of the bay.  After the wreckage of deindustrialization of the 1980s and 90s, the biggest one left was the huge Pacific Steel foundry on Second Street.  As long as it was up and running, the workers there were militant strikers for better contracts, and supporters of the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa.  In the foundry's final years they fought the plant's impending closure, and marched against a "silent" immigration raid in which over 200 workers lost their jobs.  Today Pacific Steel is an empty shell covered in graffiti, waiting for a developer with deep enough pockets to clean up the contaminated soil beneath it and build condos or biotech labs.

Meanwhile, the city's working class protests surrounded what became its largest employer, the University of California.  Many bitter strikes swept through the campus, finally winning union rights and contracts over the years.  The same working class upsurge brought fast food workers into marches down Bancroft Way, part of the national movement for $15 an hour and a union.  When the pandemic hit, the workers of the city, especially immigrants and workers of color, made the coffee, dumped the garbage bins, and did the essential tasks that made life possible for everyone else.

Berkeley's activist students and workers are the real reason why the city's progressive politics became well known.  Their history today is celebrated in the poetry of Rafael Jesus Gonzalez, founder of the Mexican and Chicano Studies program at Laney College and the city's first poet laureate.  In Lompoc Federal Prison for trying to block a test of the MX Missile at Vandenberg Airforce Base, he wrote (https://marshhawkpress.org/rafael-jesus-gonzalez-the-gasp/):

I am here for the unfinished song,
the uncompleted dance,
the healing,
the dreadful fakes of love.
      I am here for life
             & I will not go away.

This history will be celebrated in an exhibit, "Berkeley's Latino Community" organized by the Berkeley Historical Society and Museum, starting September 21 at 2pm, at 1931 Center Street.  Some of the following photographs are part of the exhibit.

Mexican and Chicano students lead a blowout at Berkeley High School in protest of Proposition 187, which would have prevented undocumented students from going to school and their families from receiving healthcare.  Blowing out of classes is a form of protest with a long history at the school.

Before a meeting of the Berkeley City Council activists and public officials protest efforts to end Temporary Protected Status (TPS) and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) for immigrants.

Rafael Jesus Gonzalez, Berkeley Poet Laureate.

Antoniio Junio, a journeyman molder at Macauley Foundry, learned his trade at the Subic Bay Naval Base in  the Philippines.

Workers at Pacific Steel go on strike to win a better union contract.

A protest at Pacific Steel against the threatened closure of the foundry, which led to the loss of hundreds of union jobs, most of which were held by Latino and Black workers.  Ignacio Dela Fuente, leader of the Molders Union, and Calvin King, chief union steward at the plant, led the protests.

Workers from Pacific Steel march from City Hall to the foundry on Second Street, protesting the firing of hundreds of workers because of their immigration status.  Then-council member Jesse Arreguin was one of many public officials who spoke at the workers' rally at city hall.  Metzli Blanco Castaño, daughter of a fired worker, spoke in front of the plant.

Incarnacion "Chon" Rivera drove a truck picking up recycled trash for the Ecology Center during the coronavirus crisis, an "essential" job.

Martin ran the espresso machine in the first months of the pandemic, when there were no masks, and he made one out of a paper towel.

Latino workers laying asphalt for new paving on Jefferson Street.

A Mexican worker sets tiles in the yard of a Berkeley house.

Fast food workers march down Bancroft Way to protest discrimination against Latinos and demanding better wages.

A march at the University of California to protest injustice against Latino and other blue collar campus workers.

Day laborer Fidel Antonio negotiates with a local gardener on Hearst Street, where many workers wait for jobs.  He and other day laborers eat lunch at the Multicultural Instiute, before he goes back to his one-room home.