Re:Generation – Archivos del Caribe

“We want to question, recollect, analyze, and archive histories and experiences across the Antillean Caribbean region with the mission of creating, conserving, and spotlighting counter narratives.”
–Leticia Berdecia, Archivos del Caribe


Archivos del Caribe, a community-based and community-led archive and literary collective, spotlights the public history of Cayey, Puerto Rico. Dually curating in digital and physical spaces, the Archivos del Caribe team works with partners across the Caribbean to connect Cayey to broader Antillean and diasporic communities, providing a greater dimensionality to the complex past and present of this vulnerable region for future generations. Their website, archivosdelcaribe.org, features the Nuestro Archivo archive, along with ongoing architectural and literary projects.

The Archivos del Caribe team focused their Re:Generation project on expanding the Nuestro Archivo digital archive through time-intensive participatory methods—oral history interviews, archival digitization of family records, and architectural surveys of Cayey’s historic core while presenting the city’s history and culture to its own residents as a heritage worthy of museum walls and deserving celebration in the most welcoming of community spaces.

Team members include: Leticia Berdecia, Nicole Collazo Santana, Natalia Gulick de Torres, Roberto Guzmán-Hernández, Emilie Raboteur, Jared Rafaelo, Luis Rivera Jiménez, Paula E. Roque Rivera, Roudhia Sellin, Ana Teresa Solá Rivière, and Gabriel Torres Ojeda.
Local Partner Organization: Casa Histórica de la Música en Cayey 
Social Media: @archivosdelcaribe (Instagram)

Credits

Archivos del Caribe is a project of Monument Lab's Re:Generation, supported by the Mellon Foundation. For a full list of credits, see Re:Generation.

Images:
1: Team Photo (Naomieh Jovin/Monument Lab)
2: Colección La Casa, 2020 (Archivos del Caribe)
3-4: (Archivos del Caribe)