Event Calendar Listing



Monday, Nov. 6
8 p.m.

Mead Chapel, located on Hepburn Road off College Street (Route 125)

MIDDLEBURY, Vt. - Dedé Mirabal Reyes and Minou Tavárez Mirabal will give a lecture titled “Violence against Women and the Example of the Mirabal Sisters” on Monday, Nov. 6, at 8 p.m. in Middlebury College’s Mead Chapel. The event is part of the College’s “Sixteen Days of Activism against Gender Violence” Campaign from Nov. 25-Dec. 10. Middlebury College Writer-in-Residence Julia Alvarez will introduce the speakers. The lecture is free and open to the public and will be given in Spanish, with consecutive translation to English.

Dedé and Minou are descendants of the Mirabal family, whose history of resistance to Rafael Trujillo’s dictatorship in the Dominican Republic during the 1960s has been immortalized in Alvarez’s novel “In the Time of the Butterflies.” On Nov. 25, 1960, Trujillo’s henchmen killed sisters Patria, Minerva and Maria Teresa Mirabal for their involvement in efforts to overthrow his government. The United Nations now marks the anniversary of their assassination as the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. Dedé is the last surviving sister of the “Butterflies,” and Minou is her niece and the daughter of the late Minerva Mirabal.

For over four decades, Dedé Mirabal has kept alive the memory of her three sisters. She established the “Museo Hermanas Mirabal” in Conuco, Dominican Republic, to educate people about the horrors of dictatorship and the preciousness of freedom. Minou Tavárez Mirabal received a degree in Hispanic-American Literature and Linguistics from the University of Havana. She is currently serving her second term as a member of the Dominican Chamber of Deputies.

The Middlebury College Women’s and Gender Studies Program and Chellis House, the Women’s Resource Center, are participating in the global campaign “The 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence,” and the Mirabal lecture will be a preview for the events that will follow later in the month, which include a panel discussion on World AIDS Day.

This event is sponsored by several Middlebury College organizations, including the Women’s and Gender Studies Program and Chellis House, the Rohatyn Center for International Affairs, the Alliance for Civic Engagement, the Office of the Vice President of Academic Affairs, Brainerd Commons, and the History and Spanish departments. For further information, please contact Karin Hanta at (802) 443-5937 or at khanta@middlebury.edu