MERIDA: FIRST PLACE IN CULTURE.

• Author: Mendez, Maria Teresa Mezquita
• Position: Yucatan, Mexico - Brief Article

The city of Merida, capital of Yucatan, Mexico, has been designated the first-ever American Capital of Culture, for the year 2000.

The idea of yearly designating a city as American Capital of Culture arose just three years ago. The inspiration was the "Cultural Capital of Europe" initiative, promoted by the European Union. Recalls Xavier Tudela, president of the nongovernmental organization that is sponsoring the new program, "When a group of us citizens decided to launch the initiative of the American Capital of Culture, we were fully aware that such a proposal would need institutional support from the representatives of the countries of the Americas."

Tudela's group presented the project to the Organization of American States (OAS), and in December 1998 Secretary General Cesar Gaviria and Tudela signed a "pledge of cooperation" through which the OAS would support the establishment and development of the American Capital of Culture initiative: to give a leading role to the cities of the Americas as well as to complement the processes of economic alliance now in progress in the American continent.

The purpose of the initiative is to foster advancement of knowledge, facilitate dissemination of the culture and history of the people of the Americas, and encourage conservation and protection of cultural heritage. The program will also promote cultural exchanges, literary and artistic creation, and encourage new forms of cooperation between states both within the American continent and elsewhere.

To be eligible for this annual designation, a city must have more than one hundred thousand inhabitants, belong to one of the thirty-five countries in the American continent, and formally submit its candidacy.

Merida is a well chosen cultural capital. A tranquil city of some 700,000 people, it is located on the great Yucatecan plain in southeastern Mexico. Typically mestizo, it is at the heart of Maya culture, sited over the remains of the ancient city of T'Ho, one of the most important political and religious centers of the Maya. The city is still graced by the colonial buildings dating to its establishment. Founded in 1542 by a native of Salamanca, Francisco de Montejo, it is said that the ruins of what had clearly been an architecturally splendid Maya site were comparable to the Roman vestiges of Spanish Merida, named in memory of Emerita Augusta.

At present, by reason of its recent designation, Merida is wearing a new face: The historic center of...