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Hard Rows: The Amazon after Chico Mendes
SERINGAL CACHOEIRA, BRAZIL–It doesn’t look much like a battlefield. A huddle of wooden huts raised on stilts crowns a grassy knoll. Tidy dirt paths stitch the way between the houses. Lush orange trees dot the hill, throwing deep shadows, and at the crest,
Climbing Society’s Mountains – The Disability Rights Movement Arrives
Back home in Austin, Texas, Bob Kafka and Randy Jennings usually fight each other. Yet both came to Washington the same week leading delegations of Texans to lobby for passage of a civil rights bill for disabled people. They shared the same goal,
Clearing a Path from the Ghetto to Choate
In Judith Berry Griffin’s office on Boston Common, a watercolor called The People Could Fly hangs on the wall. It portrays blacks of every age and size taking to the sky like birds. As president of ABC: A Better Chance, Inc., Griffin’s job
The Palestinian Revolt: New Miseries in an Endless Feud
WEST BANK–Well into its third year, the most recent Israel/Palestinian conflict continues to grind along unrelentingly. Israel’s control of the 1.7 million Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip is maintained through military occupation, provoking an internal political and moral debate
The Push for Diversity in America’s White Male Faculties
Until recently, the broad debate over race relations at the nation’s colleges and universities focused largely on students. No longer. Pushed by a series of dramatic events during the past year, that often fractious discussion has now expanded to include those who teach
Cold War Resartus
Whether or not the endless winter of menace known as the Cold War is actually over, it already seems bracketed in history. At the beginning was competition between Washington and Moscow for politico-economic control of a destitute Europe, lethalized by the spread of
Gypsy Liberation In Hungary
Text and Photos by Victoria Pope MISKOLC, Hungary–On streets without names, collapsed sheds circle the slag-heaps of the metal factory. Pigeons coo among the refuse. When dawn breaks, the wake-up sounds of coughing and coal-shoveling echo through the treeless hinterland. The gypsy community
A Contra Rampage–With Blessings from the United States
The October 1983 attack by U.S.-financed contra rebels on the northern Nicaraguan town of Pantasma was, militarily, a brilliant surprise strike, a classic town takeover, one of the few that the rebel forces ever achieved. It was also one of the single most
“A Flood From Below”: The Downfall of Irrigation
SHEPPARTON, Victoria, Australia–When spring came to the Riverine Plain of northern Victoria in September 1989, Peter Avram’s peach orchard slowly awakened and burst into leaf, just as it always had before. Peter Avram, a peach grower in Victoria, examines trees killed by rising
Coca, Campesinos, and a Controversial General
Until recently, Tarapoto was a sleepy agricultural town located deep in Peru’s tropical midlands. The lush fields surrounding the town were worked by industrious small farmers cultivating rice, corn, and other staples. Nighttime entertainment consisted mostly of casual strolls around the central plaza.
The Alarming Increase in Alcohol-Damaged Children
Malvina is a million dollar baby. Malvina has fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS). Her mother, a young Indian woman from Alaska who drank heavily while angrily denying her pregnancy, sought medical assistance only after the first labor pains signaled Malvina’s imminent arrival. During her
Little Food, Bad Water: The Tatters of Poland’s Rural Life
Text and Photos by Victoria Pope BOJARY, Poland–in this cluster of small villages near Bialystok, Poland, there is a funeral every month and a wedding every two years. The planting cycle, like the life cycle, is out of kilter. Though it’s harvest time,
The Contras Murdering Their Own: A Grisly Retribution
In 1983, leaders of the CIA-financed Nicaraguan contra army ordered the detention of four field officers accused of insubordination, graft and murder. Argentine and Honduran military officers interrogated the detained, and then the rebel general staff ordered them executed. With dozens of rebel
Death Traps
Gary Zahm remembers it as just a feeling, a vague impression that something was wrong at the Kesterson National Wildlife Refuge, which he had just been put in charge of. Mostly, it was the smell. “I’ve worked in alkaline marshes all my career,”
From the Cold War to the Drug War
As Moscow’s satellites spin wildly out of control, all the world’s eyes are focused on Checkpoint Charlie, Wenceslas Square, and Europe’s leap into the post-Yalta future. But what about the rest of the world? If the Cold War is ending in Europe, can
Crime and Impunity in Chile: Perverting the Law of a Legalistic Land
Item: A teacher is kidnapped by the secret police, and his family files a petition for judicial protection, which is rejected after the government asserts the man is not in custody. Several months later, he is found in a prison camp, recovering from
Beating Alcohol Through Tribal Self-Help
A giant of an Indian knocked at a door in Custer, Montana on a sultry afternoon in the late 1940s. The big man wore three braids under a flat-brimmed, dome-crowned hat. He asked for my father and Dad joined him on the front
David Halberstam: The Making of a Critic
When David Halberstam arrived in Saigon in early September, 1962, his new dateline remained distant and obscure to his readers and even his editors. It would be several months before he would move back onto the front page with the regularity he had
Growing Up: Solidarity’s Turbulent Times
May 15-20, 1989: A week of highs and lows for Lech Walesa. In Strasbourg, France, the Council of Europe honors him with a human-rights award. In ceremonies there, he is accorded the protocol usually reserved for heads of state. Before Mass at
Rebellion Among The Rebels
When several angry Nicaraguan contra field commanders last year challenged Enrique Bermudez, the rebel army’s “Supreme Commander,” their first tactical move reflected the dynamics of power within the anti-Sandinista movement: they called the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa to request a meeting with the