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Abstract
Antonia Sáez Torres (10 May 1889-20 July 19641 was born and raised in Humacao, Puerto Rico. Her memoirs, Caminos del recuerdo, were published in 1967. However, there has not been much published analysis of them. This article examines the conditions and changes in the educational system of Puerto Rico during the early twentieth century under the US occupation and provides a glimpse into the efforts of predominantly Afro-descended artisans, professionals, and day-laborers in Puerto Rico striving towards social and cultural uplift.
Antonia Sáez Torres left Puerto Rico in 1964 for a trip around the world to celebrate her retirement. Before leaving however, she left the manuscript of her memoirs with her friend and prominent intellectual, Concha Meléndez, who she asked to write a short prologue. Sáez died in Tokyo during this trip. Her memoirs, Caminos del recuerdo, though published in 1967, have never been used as research material in publications. The memoirs contain historical material that gives us an understanding of Sáez's commitment to education, family, and Puerto Rican cultural traditions. In particular, it also enables an examination of the conditions and changes in the educational system of Puerto Rico during the early twentieth century under the US occupation. More importantly, these memoirs provide a glimpse into the meaning and efforts of predominantly Afro-descended artisans, professionals, and day-labourers in Puerto Rico who were striving towards social and cultural uplift.
Sáez, a light-skinned mulatto woman, does not speak directly about racial uplift in her memoirs. However, her recollections offer historians an opportunity to examine the meanings of what is unspoken and the implications of her social commitments and actual pedagogical practice. What did the memoirs say - beyond her verbal or written words? Here was a schoolteacher of African descent who went beyond the public schoolroom and spent her personal time, without compensation, giving lessons within an artisan, overwhelmingly black and mulatto institutional space, which she herself helped to establish and maintain. What did it mean that Sáez did this in order to benefit and nurture the children of the social-racial sectors who were forced to leave public school due to the predominant structural racism and class exploitation under US colonialism in Puerto Rico? What was the meaning behind her attempt to socially assist...