Iris Morales

Iris Morales (born 1948) is a New York-based Latina activist. She is best known for her work with the Young Lords, a Puerto Rican community activist group in the United States.[1][2]

Early life and education

Iris Morales was born in New York in 1948 to Puerto Rican migrant parents.[3][4] Her father worked as a hotel elevator operator, and her mother worked as a sewing machine operator.[5] She went to Julia Richman High School, where she attended meetings of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the NAACP.[6]

As a teenager, she became a tenant rights organizer in her East Harlem neighborhood and protested the Vietnam War. She studied political science at City College, where she joined the Black student organization.[7][8][9] She also co-founded Puerto Ricans Involved in Student Action (PRISA), the school's first Puerto Rican student organization.[10]

The Young Lords
The Young Lords logo.

The Chicago-based Young Lords, a leftist group of Puerto Rican youth activists inspired by the Black Panthers, established a branch in New York in 1969. Morales joined the group that year, after meeting Young Lords founder José Cha Cha Jiménez at a conference in Denver.[8]

Her work as a leader in the Young Lords spanned five years in the 1960s and 1970s. She served as deputy minister of education and co-founder of its Women's Caucus.[11] She also served as minister of information for a period.[12]

Morales worked on political education and literacy efforts, as well as attempting to change the machista culture of the organization.[8] She advocated for women's inclusion in leadership and helped co-found the Women's Union and its corresponding publication, La Luchadora. Her work on women's representation in the Young Lords paved the way for the organization's pioneering lesbian and gay caucus.[1][13]

In addition to her fight for the feminist cause within the Young Lords, she also used her position in the organization to advocate for abortion access and against forced sterilizations.[13][14] Among the causes that the organization undertook during this period included establishing a free breakfast program for New York's youth, creating a lead poisoning prevention program, founding a daycare so Latina women could seek employment, and advocating for decolonization of Puerto Rico.[8]

Morales resigned from the Young Lords, which was struggling with infighting and targeted by the FBI's COINTELPRO program, in 1975.[15] The party effectively disbanded the following year.[10]

Further education and career

After the dissolution of the Young Lords, Morales continued her Latina feminist activism and pursued a law degree from New York University School of Law.[11] At NYU, she became the first Puerto Rican to receive the highly competitive Root-Tilden-Kern Scholarship, a full-tuition public service scholarship.[8]

As a lawyer, she worked as an attorney and director of education at the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund.[16][7] She was also a co-founder and the executive director of the New Educational Opportunities Network, a media nonprofit serving young people of color.[12] She later worked with Manhattan Neighborhood Network's community media center in Spanish Harlem[10][17] and served as director of the Union Square Awards, a city government project recognizing grassroots activists.[12]

Morales returned to school again and earned an MFA in Integrated Media Arts from Hunter College.[11] She subsequently founded Latino Education Network Services, a documentary filmmaking nonprofit.[12]

In 2020, she was honored as a Latina Trailblazer by LatinoJustice PRLDEF.[18]

The cover of Through the Eyes of Rebel Women.

Writing and documentary film

With the founding of Latino Education Network Services, Morales created her first film, the 1996 documentary ¡Palante Siempre Palante! The Young Lords.[1] The documentary aired as part of the PBS series POV.[19]

Morales has contributed to recent scholarship on the history of the Young Lords, writing forwards for The Young Lords: A Reader in 2010 and Palante: Young Lords Party in 2011.[8][20][15]

In 2012, Morales founded her own small publishing house, Red Sugarcane Press.[11] In 2016, the press published her history of women in the Young Lords, Through the Eyes of Rebel Women: The Young Lords 1969-1976.[1][21]

Red Sugarcane subsequently published the anthology Latinas: Struggles and Protests in 21st Century USA, edited by Morales, in 2018.[22] She also edited the 2019 bilingual anthology Voices from Puerto Rico: Post-Hurricane Maria, in which Puerto Rican activists discuss the aftermath of Hurricane Maria.[23][24]

See also

References
  1. Isaad, Virginia (2018-07-27). "Latina Reads: 12 Puerto Rican Writers Whose Books You Need To Add To Your Reading List". Fierce. Retrieved 2020-09-27.
  2. Latinas in the United States : a historical encyclopedia. Ruíz, Vicki., Sánchez Korrol, Virginia. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 2006. ISBN 0-253-11169-2. OCLC 74671044.CS1 maint: others (link)
  3. "Iris Morales". Oxford Reference. Retrieved 2020-09-27.
  4. Hobson, Janell. "Women Creating Change: 1950-Present". University at Albany, State University of New York. Retrieved 2020-09-27.
  5. Leonard, David J.; Lugo-Lugo, Carmen R., eds. (2010). Latino history and culture : an encyclopedia. Armonk, New York. ISBN 978-1-78402-829-9. OCLC 891677645.
  6. Thomas, Lorrin R.; Lauria-Santiago, Aldo A. (29 September 2017). Rethinking the Struggle for Puerto Rican Rights (1st ed.). Milton. ISBN 978-1-351-67872-8. OCLC 1097153817.
  7. Gonzalez, David (1996-10-16). "Young Lords: Vital in 60's, A Model Now". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-09-28.
  8. Estevez, Marjua (2018-10-11). "The Revolutionary Latinx Who Brought Feminism to a 60s Leftist Group". Vice. Retrieved 2020-09-27.
  9. Thomas, Lorrin (2010). Puerto Rican citizen : history and political identity in twentieth-century New York City. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-79610-9. OCLC 655231527.
  10. "Through the Eyes of Rebel Women with Iris Morales". Five College Consortium. 2017-03-22. Retrieved 2020-09-27.
  11. "Iris Morales". Red Sugarcane Press. Retrieved 2020-09-27.
  12. Cruz, Jermaine (1999-03-05). "Iris Morales, former minister of information for the Young Lords Party, will speak and show film at Cornell, March 13". Cornell Chronicle. Retrieved 2020-09-27.
  13. Nadal, Lenina (2017-04-17). "Lifting Up the Struggles of the Mujerxs of the Young Lords Party: Reflections on Iris Morales' Book". Mijente. Retrieved 2020-09-27.
  14. Martinez, Jael (2019-08-06). "50 Years Later, the Young Lords' Legacy Remains in East Harlem". Remezcla. Retrieved 2020-09-28.
  15. Parra, Daniel (2020-06-24). "Former Young Lords Reflect on Protests, Racism and Police Violence". City Limits. Retrieved 2020-09-28.
  16. "The Puerto Rican Civil Rights Movement". Democracy Now!. 1996-10-18. Retrieved 2020-09-27.
  17. "Iris Morales: Through the Eyes of Rebel Women: The Young Lords: 1969-1976". Carolina Women's Center. 2017-01-31. Retrieved 2020-09-28.
  18. "2020 Latina Trailblazers Honoree: Iris Morales". Latinojustice PRLDEF on YouTube. 2020-09-11.
  19. "Film Screening, Q&A with Educator & Latina Activist Iris Morales | Obermann Center for Advanced Studies". University of Iowa. 2019-12-04. Retrieved 2020-09-27.
  20. "The Young Lords". NYU Press. 2010. Retrieved 2020-09-28.
  21. Morales, Iris (2016). Through the Eyes of Rebel Women: The Young Lords 1969-1976 (First ed.). New York. ISBN 978-0-9968276-1-4. OCLC 963865160.
  22. "LATINAS: Protests & Struggles". Red Sugarcane Press. Retrieved 2020-09-28.
  23. "50th Anniversary of the Young Lords: Iris Morales With Vanessa Valdes". The City University of New York. 2019-10-23. Retrieved 2020-09-27.
  24. Morales, Iris, ed. (2019). Voices from Puerto Rico : post-Hurricane María / Voces desde Puerto Rico : pos-huracán María (First ed.). New York. ISBN 978-0-9968276-6-9. OCLC 1103335560.
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