Bracero History Archive
The Bracero History Archive—a collaborative project of George Mason University, the Smithsonian, Brown University, and the University of Texas, El Paso—is an online collection of resources that documents the Bracero program, a guest worker initiative where millions of Mexicans came to work in American agriculture during the mid-20th century.
There is a vast collection of oral histories recorded in Spanish as well as lesson plans and background information written in Spanish and English. (Select Spanish on the home page and then browse to find these resources in Spanish.)
The site also offers a search option in Spanish.
Translations and teaching activities based on Bracero Archive
At ASHP/CML we recently developed teaching materials and activities based on translations we commissioned of several of the oral histories from the Bracero Archive. In the activity students learn about corridos and then, using one of six translated oral histories, write a corrido (in one or more languages!) telling the story of that particular bracero.
(In the next couple of weeks I will (finally) upload the translations to the Bracero Archive; I haven't gotten around to it yet, but our contract with the translator included the right to add the translations to the Archive.)
These activities and materials will be available for free to educators in our forthcoming resource database (launching this fall). If anyone would like me to send them materials before then, please email me (Leah): lnahmias (at) gc.cuny.edu
www.ashp.cuny.edu