Travel to Central America

Nicaragua In Focus: a Guide to the People, Politics and Culture (In Focus Guides)

Format: Paperback
Author: Hazel Plunkett
ReleaseDate: December, 2001
Publisher: Interlink Publishing Group
Rating:

Great Concise History
I spent a month in Nica back in Jan 06. This book is a great quick review of the important historical issues and trends that have affected Nicaraguans. I'm looking forward to returning and would recommend this book to anyone going who is interested in understanding where the people have been and where they are going.

Out of Focus Nicaragua


In specific, Hazel Plunkett's descriptions of the violent Marxist revolution in the 1960's and 70's tell more about her personal politics than they do help explain the circumstances surrounding the fall of the Somoza dictatorship and the wars which followed. "In Focus Nicaragua", while a decent enough tool for those searching for a light primer on Nicaraguan history and culture, nevertheless contains glaring revisions of well-known historical events that helped shape important parts of Nicaragua's past. The reader is left wondering what lesser-known details of Nicaraguan culture and history Ms. Plunkett has decided to skew to fit her worldview. This calls into question the usefulness of the entire book.

Multiple, negatively inferred references to the "right-wing" Nicaraguan press, "right-wing" American administrations and senators, etc. abound. Nowhere in this book are the words Marxist or Communist written. This is like sitting down to write a book on English pubs and conveniently leaving out the fact that they're full of drunks.

Ms. Plunkett fails to inform us that both Cuba and the Soviet Union funded the leftist FSLN, providing billions in aid to help fight both the Somozas as well as the Contras. They cynically viewed the revolution in Nicaragua as a nothing more than a prime opportunity to threaten/embarrass the United States, rather than as a chance to support some lofty egalitarian workers revolution. It's not clear Ms. Plunkett understands this. Rather, she chooses to accuse the United States of having behaved cynically with its use of the trade embargo to pressure the FSLN and Helms Burton to reform the unjust "land-reforms". While one can certainly argue that the United States took a very active role in opposing the Sandinistas, without some proper historical background as to why they were behaving this way, the story lacks perspective. One is left with the feeling that Ms Plunkett has an agenda.

This book is full of these and logically, other, inexcusable omissions that neither serves history, nor "In Focus Nicaragua" well.
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Adept Guide
There is little backward on the angles or truths in this book, as any traveller of this rich country ought to know its history, their own history, and if he is an American, the history of America's political impact on Nicaragua.

Related products:
click image or link for details on these Central America travel books.

	Nicaragua Map (Travel Reference Map)
	Moon Handbooks Nicaragua (Moon Handbooks : Nicaragua)
	Footprint Nicaragua (Nicaragua Guidebook) (Nicaragua Travel Guide)