1. La Negra Carlota, Cuban Slave Rebellion leader (?- 1844)
Carlota Lucumi was one of the leaders of the famous slave rebellion at the Triunvirato plantation in Mantanzas, Cuba. Kidnapped at the age of ten in Benin, West Africa, Lucumi was taken to the Matanzas province of Cuba where she lived and worked as a slave on the Triumvirato sugar plantation.
In 1843 Lucumi and another enslaved woman, Firmina, began to plot a rebellion among the slaves. Fermina was severely beaten and then imprisoned for distributing pamphlets, but Lucumi continued to organize the uprising. On November 3, 1843, along with other tribal leaders Filip, Narcisco, Manuel Ganga, and Eduardo, Lucumi led the raid. Wielding a machete, she first freed a dozen house slaves, killed the overseer’s daughter, Maria de Regla, and then forced Julian Luis Alfonso, the owner of the Triumvirato plantation, to flee.
Lucumi and her followers then went to the Acane plantation to do the same. In their brief two-day rebellion, they destroyed five sugar plantations, as well as a number of coffee and cattle estates. The day the last plantation was destroyed, Lucumi was captured, her body tied to horses and dragged until she died. Her followers found her body on the morning of November 6, 1843, and vowed to continue to fight for their freedom, but heavily-armed Spanish forces overpowered the machete-wielding slaves and the revolt ended.
The following year, 1844, became known as the “Year of the Lashes” in Cuba as slaveholders brutalised virtually all enslaved people on the island to punish both those who participated in the uprising and intimidate those who did not. Lucumi’s tale of bravery during the revolt, however, spread throughout Cuba. Her actions inspired subsequent rebellions throughout the Caribbean and there is now a monument to the legacy of Carlota Lucumi at the Triumvirato sugar mill. p.s. we're notconvinced she had her tits our while hacking her oppressors but its the only picture we could find!
2. Mariana Grajales Cuello, Cuban independance leader (1808 - 1893)
Born in Santiago de Cuba, Mariana Grajales Cuello played a crucial role in her country’s struggle for independence against Spain. A mixed-race daughter of Dominican land-owning parents, Mariana was educated and, while mothering nine children, she and her husband trained them in the art of self-defence and two of her sons, Jose and Antonio, became generals in Cuba’s Liberation Army.
Two days after the start of war of independence against Spain in 1868, Mariana established a hospital for wounded soldiers, and travelled with rebel troops, providing support. Despite the loss of her husband and some of her sons in battle she continued working for Cuba’s freedom against Spain. By 1878, she had lost all her family property and with death warrants issued on her surviving sons, Mariana went into exile in Jamaica, where she continued her work toward Cuban independence by forming patriotic associations among exiled Cubans.
Mariana Grajales Cuello never returned to her homeland. She died in Kingston, Jamaica at the age of 85, but has been seen as a model for Cubans ever since, risking everything for the sake of the country. In 1957, Grajales was given the title “Mother of Cuba” by Havana mayor Justo Luis Pozo del Puerto, in acknowledgement and appreciation for her patriotism and work toward liberating her country.
3. Maria Firmina dos Reis, Brazilian Abolitionist (October 11, 1825 – November 11, 1917)
Born in São Luís, Maranhão in Brazil, Maria Firmina dos Reis is an abolitionist, author and poet. It is not certain whether she was the daughter of a white Portuguese mother and a Black African enslaved father, or of a free black woman and a black enslaved man, or of a black enslaved woman and a white man. Whichever it was, her parents would have been unable to marry and shunned by society, and Maria would have begun life with what her community perceived as three handicaps; she was mixed-race, illegitimate and a woman.
Denied an education, Maria self-studied and by the age of 22 she was a primary school teacher wrote poetry and short stories. Brazil was the last country in the Western world to abolish slavery, and did not do so until 1888 (Britain ended the practise in 1834) and yet, astonishingly, in 1859 she wrote Ursula, thought to be one of the first novels written by a Brazilian woman. Published under the pen-name Una Maranhense - the book is also believed to be first abolitionist work from Brazil, portraying black slaves as having morals, emotions and opinions similar to those of the white ruling classes.
Maria went on to write another love story, E Gupeva, a book of political poetry called Cantos à beira-mar (1871; Songs at the Coast) and a powerful short story called A Escrava (1887; The Slave Woman). She kept a diary for fifty years and wrote a song to celebrate the end of slavery in Brazil
Shortly before she stopped teaching, in 1881, Maria founded a school for disadvantaged boys and girls, but mixed education was deemed shocking and the school suffered from repeated protests. It closed down two years later. Maria is thought to have adopted ten children, her filhos do coração (“sons and daughters of the heart”). Although she is now a celebrated figure in Brazil, she died blind and in poverty in 1917, at the age of 92.
4. Mamá Tingó, Dominican human rights activist (1921 –1974)
Born Florinda Muñoz Soria, Mamá Tingó farmed her plot of land in the Hato Viejo region of the Dominican Republic until, under the government of President Joaquín Balaguer, farmers were told that the land had been purchased by a rich businessman, Pablo Díaz Hernández, and needed to leave. At the time of the land grab, Hato Viejo was occupied by 350 families that lived and worked on the land. Mamá Tingó went to several government officials protesting the decision and the violence that was being used to remove people from the land. Mamá Tingó and her husband even sought to buy the land but were unable to.
It was as a last resort that Mamá Tingó decided to organize the families and people that lived on the land to form a united front against Díaz Hernández and his thugs who used tanks, bulldozers, and fires to get them off. After several violent clashes, the courts finally agreed to hear the case.
On returning to her plot of land after the court hearing, which did not end in her favour, Mamá Tingó was shot twice. Mamá Tingó fought back with her machete but died from the gunshot wounds. After Mamá Tingó ‘s death, many of the farmers continued to fight for their rights. Mamá Tingó was survived by her children and husband.
5. Dominga Cruz Becerril, Puerto Rican Patriot and Activist (1909-circa 1970s)
Born in Ponce, Puerto Rico, Dominga Cruz Becerril is known as the “One Who Picked up the Flag” for her heroic act of “rescuing” the Puerto Rican flag that was left on the ground during the Ponce Massacre of 1937. When she testified she said she picked up the flag, in the midst of danger,“because Maestro [Dr. Pedro Albizu Campos] taught me that the flag of the homeland should never fall on the ground.”
She became a lectora at a tobacco factory, where she was inspired by Latin American freedom movements to join the Nationalist Party in the 1930s. Cruz Becerril rebuilt the women’s sector of the movement into trained fighters. Due to government persecution, she lived the majority of her remaining years in Cuba.
6. María Elena Moyano Delgado, Peruvian Feminist (November 29, 1958 – February 15, 1992)
María Elena Moyano is a Peruvian feminist, community organizer and activist of Afro-Peruvian descent. Born in the (Barranco district of) Lima, Peru, her activism began in her teens and only grew stronger with age. At the age of 25, she was elected president of the Federación Popular de Mujeres de Villa El Salvador (Fepomuves), a federation of women from Villa El Salvador. Under Moyano’s leadership, the organization grew to include public kitchens, health committees, the Vaso de Leche program (which supplied children with milk), income-generating projects, and committees for basic education.
Moyano left her position in Fepomuves in 1990 and shortly thereafter was elected deputy mayor of the municipality of Villa El Salvador. As an outspoken leader, she faced pushback and even death threats. Unfortunately, she was assassinated on February 15, 1992, which resulted in a public outcry.
7. Solange Pierre, Dominican Human Rights Acitivist (1963 – 2011)
Born in Villa Altagracia, San Cristóbal, Dominican Republic to parents of Haitian origin, Solange was one of twelve children, and raised in a migrant worker camp. She became an activist at the age of 14, when she was arrested for being the spokesperson of a group of Haitian sugar-cane cutters in her migrant labor village who were protesting for better wages and living conditions.
However, she caught the nation’s attention and after university, began working as director of the non-governmental organization Movement for Dominican Women of Haitian Descent (MUDHA), which aims to end antihaitianismo or bias against individuals from Haiti or people of Haitian descent in the Dominican Republic.
In 2005, Pierre petitioned the Inter-American Court of Human Rights on the case of two ethnic Haitian children who were denied Dominican birth certificates. Called Yean and Bosico v. Dominican Republic, the case "upheld human rights laws prohibiting racial discrimination in access to nationality and citizenship." The court also ordered the Dominican government to provide the birth certificates. Pierre won the 2006 Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award handed down by former US Senator Ted Kennedy.
Pierre also won Amnesty International's 2003 Human Rights Ginetta Sagan Fund Award,[8] and she and MUDHA were nominated for the UNESCO Prize for Human Rights Education in 2002. In 2008, she was awarded the Giuseppe Motta Medal for protection of human.[11] She was also honored by the United States Department of State with a 2010 International Women of Courage Award.
8. Marielle Franco, Brazilian politician and LGBT activist (1979-2018)
The 2018 murder of Marielle Franco, a young black city councillor and human rights campaigner, deeply traumatized Rio de Janeiro a city where, of the thousands that die every year at the hands of police, 75% are black. Marielle Franco defended those who had no voice, she gave voice to the hopes of favela dwellers, black people, women and the LGBT community. And yet she two became another victim of Brazil's disproportionate violence against women and people of colour. Two years after her murder, the perpetrators still have not been brought to justice. All that is left of her is her legacy and inspiration.
Franco was raised in Maré, a slum in northern Rio de Janeiro, where she also resided for most of her life. She gave birth to her first and only child when she was 20 years old and raised her daughter without the father's help and worked as a pre-school teacher making minimum wage. In 2000, she began her pre-university studies.[8] Following the death of a friend from a stray bullet in 2000, Franco began working in human rights activism. In 2002, she entered the Pontifical Catholic University on a scholarship and continued working and raising her daughter as she earned a degree.[She went on to earn a master's in public administration from the She wrote her master's thesis on the law enforcement program to retake control of the city's favelas from gangs.
Before running for city council, Franco worked for state representative Marcelo Freixo as a consultant and helped coordinate the Committee for the Defense of Human Rights and Citizenship on the Legislative Assembly of Rio de Janeiro (ALERJ). In her bid for a seat on the Rio de Janeiro city council in 2016, Franco received 46,500 votes, the fifth most votes out of more than 1,500 candidates and was one of 51 people elected. As a city council member, Franco fought against gender violence and for reproductive rights and the rights of favela residents. She chaired the Women's Defense Commission and formed part of a four-person committee that monitored the federal intervention in Rio de Janeiro. Working with the Rio de Janeiro Lesbian Front, Franco presented a bill to create a day of lesbian visibility in Rio de Janeiro in August 2017, but the bill was defeated by a vote of 19-17.
9. Benedita Souza da Silva Sampai, Brazilian politician (b. 1942)
Benedita was the first female and Afro-Brazilian governor of the State of Rio de Janeiro and, later, Minister of the said Secretary of State as well in the Government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Trained as a social worker, “Bene,” as she is entered politics in 1983 as a member of the Rio de Janeiro city government. Once in office she championed the cause of Afro-Brazilian women and Brazilian black history, helping establish the National Awareness day of Black Consciousness, celebrating Zumbi dos Palmares, the Afro-Brazilian hero.
As Rio de Janeiro State Secretary for Social Services, she has lobbied against human trafficking, poverty, and for better access to education and health care. She was elected to the Brazilian congress in 1991 and senate in 1995. In 1998, she was deputy governor for the state of Rio de Janeiro. In 2004, she became Federal Secretary for Social Services and later occupying a similar position in the State government of Rio de Janeiro.
10. Marta Salgado, Chilean activist (b. 1947)
As an activist for cultural preservation and civil rights protections for the African diaspora in Chile, Marta he has founded several non-governmental organizations to promote minority rights. Trained as a teacher and public administrator, Salgado began her career as a teacher in the in state universities of the Arica-Parinacota region and spent forty-one years as a professor at UTA.She was a co-founder, of the Universidad de Tarapacá' workers' union and founded Oro Negro (Black Gold), the first advocate for the inclusion of populations of African descent in public policies, which include both anti-discrimination and official recognition as an ethnic group with the legal protections that entails. She argued that Governments recognize the "Slave Route" as an educational and tourist-worthy part of the cultural heritage, but not the people themselves. Salgado pressed for the government to take a census of the Afro-Chilean population, as well as to sponsor programs to sensitize Chileans to their right to have their ethnic identity protected.
