CUNY Dominican Studies Institute Library

News from our trip to the Dominican Republic - Part 2

Welcome back! This is the second posting about our trip to DR. As you may remember, the CUNY Dominican Studies Institute' s Head Librarian, Sarah Aponte and the Director of Communications and Marketing, Altagracia Diloné Levat, recently attended meetings in Santiago (Cibao region) and Santo Domingo, the capital of the country.

Some important donations of books and audiovisuals: 

We met with Dr. Paula Gómez Jorge, Director of Museo Bellapart, one of the first private art collections in the Dominican Republic open to the public (http://www.museobellapart.com). We were impressed by the permanent exhibit at the museum which included, among other artists, Dominican painter Celeste Woss y Gil, who studied at the Art Student League in the early 1920s. Worth mentioning is the Jaime Colson's collection of his most important works. 

We were very fortunate to get art catalogues for our library of Jaime Colson and Eligio Pichardo.

   Another great resource that we found during our trip was the newly built library at FUNGLODE (Fundación Global Democracia y Democracia). The library was named after the renowned Dominican writer and political scientist Juan Bosch: https://bibliotecajuanbosch.org/

We were welcomed by María Elizabeth Rodríguez, Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs of Instituto Global de Altos Estudios en Ciencias Sociales, who gave us a tour of the facilities and donated the latest publications from FUNGLODE. We would like to acknowledge Librarian Mirthia Solano for her laborious cataloging of all the library collection to make them available to the public.

We were pleased to share this resource with Eduardo Díaz, Director of the Latino Center at the Smithsonian Institution, who accompanied us during this quick visit.

  

Currently Biblioteca Nacional Pedro Henríquez Ureña is undergoing a major renovation. Director Dr.  Diómedes Núñez Polanco welcomed us at the temporary administrative offices. We had a productive meeting with Dr. Núñez Polanco, Lic. José Acosta (Assistant Director), and Librarian Yumarys Polanco (Head of Collection Development). At the meeting we discussed collaborative projects among our institutions and received several donations of the Biblioteca Nacional's latest publications. 

 

One of the special highlights was visiting the Fundación Culturas  Americanas, where we met with Víctor E. Saladi (President), Nemanja Brankovic (Director), and Juan Rodríguez (Cultural Director). Among some of the projects undertaken by this Foundation are: "Imágenes de la Frontera: Fotografías," a traveling photo exhibit featuring images from the Haitian-Dominican border and "República Dominicana lo tiene todo. Fotografías," a collection of images displaying natural resources, historic monuments, and important historic sites. We are very grateful for their courtesy and support during our stay.

 

 

Exciting news about our trip to the Dominican Republic- Part I

The CUNY Dominican Studies Institute' s Head Librarian, Sarah Aponte and the Director of Communications and Marketing, Altagracia Diloné Levat, recently attended meetings in Santiago (Cibao region) and Santo Domingo, the capital of the country. This is the first part of our blog entries on this  memorable and productive trip.

Our Dominican Library received important donations of books and audiovisuals that will certainly enrich our growing collection.

In Santiago de los Caballeros, we visited Centro León (http://www.centroleon.org.do/), a great cultural resource in the Caribbean region, with an excellent library. Every year, Centro León and INEC (Instituto de Estudios Caribeños) organize the Congreso Internacional Música Identidad y Cultura en el Caribe and they publish the conference proceedings. We were very fortunate to get the following materials for our library and to meet so wonderful people:

 

Book: El merengue en la cultura dominicana y del Caribe. Ed. Darío Tejeda and Rafael Emilio Yunén. Santiago de los Caballeros: Centro León; Santo Domingo: Instituto de Estudios Caribeños, 2006.

DVD: El merengue símbolo de identidad dominicana.Ed. Darío Tejeda and Manuel Mejía. 2006.

  

Book: El son y la salsa en la identidad del Caribe. Ed. Darío Tejeda and Rafael Emilio Yunén. Santiago de los Caballeros: Centro León; Santo Domingo: Instituto de Estudios Caribeños, 2007.

DVD: II Congreso Internacional: El son y la salsa en la identidad del Caribe.DVD 1: Concert. DVD 2: Conference. 2007.

After our visit to Santiago, we traveled to Santo Domingo where met with incredible organizations and individuals. It was very rewarding to feel the respect and interest they all expressed for our library and how much they wanted to share their publications with us. Below are some of the donors we would like to highlight:

"The Taxi Driver" - As soon as we got into Reynaldo González's cab,  we noticed a book right next to him. As our conversation flowed we expressed curiosity about the book and at the end, we convinced Reynaldo to donate it to our Dominican Library.

Los panfleteros de Santiago: torturas y desaparición. By Ramón Antonio, Negro, Veras. Santo Domingo: Archivo General de la Nación, 2009

 

Roldán Mármol - Twice we had the pleasure of meeting with Roldán, one of the leading promoters, interpreters, and cultural activists of African heritage in the Dominican Republic. One of his most recent musical recordings is Sí Gagá, a unique compilation of different Gagá groups and musicians. He also donated some of the following recordings:

Librería La Trinitaria - The CUNY Dominican Studies Institute Library has been fortunate to receive donations from book vendors and bookstores throughout the United States and abroad. During our visit to Librería Trinitaria, Doña Virtudes Uribe welcomed us with her usual warm and donated several books to our library. She also encouraged a Dominican author, Guaroa Ubiñas Renville to donate two of his books. We are very grateful for her generous support!!

"A Professor from la UASD" - While we were having lunch at a vegetarian restaurant, we joined José C. García, who turned out to be a lawyer and professor at the Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo. The following day, Prof. García was kind enough to visit us at the Hotel and bring with him two of his books published by Editora Universitaria UASD. He also donated a copy of the new Dominican Constitution approved in 2010. 

These are Prof. García's books: Trujillo y la universidad (2002) and Concordato entre la República Dominicana y la Santa Sede. Por los siglos de los siglos... (2010).

Stay tuned for Part II... ¡Hasta pronto!