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A Voice For the Voiceless

The Advocacy Project helps marginalized communities to tell their story, claim their rights and produce social change. We recruit graduate students to volunteer as Peace Fellows with partners.

The Impact of Service "Speaking with locals and living in a country is the best way to learn about the real lives of citizens, not just the stories in the mainstream media. I will be more critical of what I read as a result of this experience. I also feel even more grateful for my education, and I feel a stronger responsibility to assist others who do not have resources or access to opportunities in their communities." Maria Skouras (New York University) volunteered in 2011 as a Peace Fellow for eHomemakers in Malaysia. For more 2011 feedback click here.

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Partner Campaigns > Advocacy Quilting > Rio Negro Memoria... > The Memorial Quilt > The Weavers > Erlinda Alvarado

Erlinda Alvarado

Erlinda was seven years-old when her father died in the village of Xococ on February 13, 1982. Francisco Alvarado Chen was 45 at the time, a farmer and well liked member of the community of Río Negro. He left seven children behind. One month later, on March 13, 1982, Erlinda was at her grandmother’s house while her mother went to Pueblo Viejo to purchase corn and sugar. When the soldiers arrived and called her grandmother, Valeriana Sic, to a meeting, Erlinda was left in the school with her siblings and a group of other children. Valeriana understood the danger of the situation, and died alone at Pak’oxom that day.

Erlinda and the other children were taken into the mountains when the violence began. She remembers very little of her time there. That same day her mother found her hidden with the other children and they spent more than a year living without shelter, food or clothing. “We became orphans.” When the family arrived in Pacux in 1984, the children could not attend school for lack of funds to buy basic books and pencils.

Today, Erlinda can write her name and a few words thanks to a literacy program funded by the government, but her life is far from easy. With three children and her mother to feed, Erlinda and her husband do what they can. Erlinda weaves on commission and made one panel for The Memorial Quilt Project to commemorate her father, Don Francisco. The image is unlike any of the others included in the Memorial Textile: a landscape image of Río Negro that Erlinda based on memories of her last visit to the village.

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