Academics
Regla’s Lucumí practitioner communities and its processional tradition have been an intimate and essential part of academic knowledge production. Beginning in the 1920s, Cuban ethnographic researchers such as Fernando Ortiz, began spending significant amounts of time studying community members to understand Cuban African ways of life. This led to Ortiz’s creation of both the concept, language, and institutionalization of “Afro-Cuban religion-culture-folklore.”
The Cabildo de Regla recognizes the importance of its relationship to knowledge production and has invited collaborators who also connect as Lucumí practitioners, community members, and formal knowledge producers (productores de conocimiento) (researchers, academics, archivists, cultural workers) in collaboration. We have created a space here for essays, testimonies, and other information to communicate our academic research into publicly accessible ways.
Juan Dionisio Lozano Gomes
Head of Ile Olorun and former curator at the Museum of Regla (retired in 2024).
Raisa Fornaguera
Former director of the Museum of Regla (retired in 2023).
Museo de Regla
The Museum of Regla serves as the institutional center for the community’s history. As a repository of Regla’s historical artifacts and archival documents, the Museum acts to mediate between the government and the community in the process of reinitiating the cabildo processional tradition. Its active role in collecting documentation, recording oral histories, and helping researchers connect with community members is centered upon amplify Regla’s existing historical narrative.
Research Affiliates
Yaniela Morales Cortina
(La Habana, Cuba)
Anthropology & History, Cuban Institute of Anthropology
Yaniela Morales Cortina, researcher at the Cuban Institute of Anthropology holds a Degree in Education with a focus in Spanish and Literature, a Postgraduate Degree in Preparation of management plans for heritage centers. She also has a Diploma in Anthropology, training in Ethnopsychoanalysis and qualitative methods.
Alexandra P. Gelbard, Ph.D.
(Washington, D.C.)
Sociology, Interdisciplinary Social Sciences
Julio Ismael Martinez Betancourt
(La Habana, Cuba)
Bachelor of Education in the specialty of Biology (University of Pedagogical Sciences Enrique José Varona, 1981), Master in Botany (University of Havana, 2002) and Diploma in Anthropological Overview of Religions of African Ancestry in Cuba (Cuban Institute of Anthropology, 2009). Specialist of the National Botanical Garden (1984-2021).
José Manuel Gonzalez Cruz, Ph.D.
(Puerto Rico)
Dissertation (2018): On the role and legacy of mutual aid organizations in Puerto Rico and Cuba. More information to come soon.
Gabriela Betancourt Fornaguera
(Regla, Cuba & Sevilla, Spain)
Researcher, Center for Psychological and Sociological Research, Department of Socioreligious Studies
