Local Gazes from the Fernando Ortiz Forum in Matanzas

With a keynote lecture by Doctor of Science María del Carmen Barcia, National Prize in Social and Humanistic Sciences 2003, dedicated to the African factor in Cuban history, the 15th Fernando Ortiz Scientific Forum began this Friday within the program of the Festival of Origins in the city of Matanzas.

The Casa de la Memoria Escénica also hosted the presentation of the book Bolondrón a través del tiempo; apuntes e iconografía (Bolondrón Through Time; Notes and Iconography) by historian Víctor Orlando Martínez Bernal, and the presentation of nine papers related to the aboriginal presence in the first colonial centuries and the influence of the different ethnic components on national and local culture.

The research addressed topics such as the archaeological interventions of El Yayal in Holguín; the Indo-Antillean material legacy in the configuration of national identity; the presence of aborigines in Matanzas between the 16th and 17th centuries; the traces of Anglophone emigration at the Reynaldos sugar mill in Guantánamo; and the Francophone Caribbean in the ethnocultural context of San Germán in Holguín.

In the afternoon hours, a panel was dedicated to the 40 years of the Research and Development Group of the Provincial Directorate of Culture in Matanzas, one of the motivations to which the academic gathering is dedicated.

A total of 31 papers will be presented, in person or virtually, in four work commissions until next Sunday, September 20, at the Casa de la Memoria Escénica, with the participation of researchers, historians, and specialists from seven provinces of the country during the 15th Fernando Ortiz Scientific Forum.