CULTURE-EL SALVADOR: Museum of Words

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Juan Jose Dalton

SAN SALVADOR, Oct 31 1995 (IPS) - The revolutionary rhetoric of yesteryear lives on in El Salvador where visitors to the ‘Museo de la Palabra’ (‘Museum of the Word’) can hear recordings of broadcasts from the 12-year-long civil war which ended in 1992.

Also on show are the diaries of guerrilla leaders and fighters, and their testimonies, either in writing or taped.

Director of this unique museum is Carlos Henriquez, a Venezuelan by birth but Salvadoran “at heart”. During the war, he headed the rebel radio station ‘Venceremos’ (We Shall Overcome) that aired from guerrilla-controlled territory in the eastern department of Morazan.

“The seed for the museum was planted in late 1980’s, when we set up the radio station, Henriquez said. “We always felt we were doing something of national and international significance, and that it was necessary to save everything for the historic memory of our people.”

Recordings of ‘Venceremos’ broadcasts were “stored in secret hideouts or underground shelters,” and more than 4,000 survived.

‘Santiago’, Henriquez’ nom de guerre, also saved testimony by guerrilla leaders and fighters, diaries, maps and other objects.

“After the December 1981 El Mozote massacre in Morazan, when troops killed hundreds of defenceless peasant farmers, we saved many objects which we will put on public exhibition, so those things never happen again.”

A 1993 report by the Truth Commission, that revealed the human rights abuses that took place during the armed conflict, stated that “more than 500 victims who died at El Mozote and the other villages have been identified, but the identities of many more victims have not been established.”

Henriquez lives in the museum, “his motive in life” today. He is surrounded by works of art from the Salvadoran countryside where relics of the pre-Colombian Nahuatl culture can still be found, as well as by computers and other modern equipment where “everything that falls into our hands” is filed.

Georgina Hernandez, the museum’s technician and computer expert, said “we are creating a catalogue of everything – documents, photos, recordings, videos and objects such as arms and pre-Columbian figures.

“We are also restoring historic documents, letters and photos by computer.” (MORE)

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