I found the texts and films to be very interesting as it was able to provide different perspectives on the relationship between the United States and Latin America. In the first text, Sandino provides a more traditional perspective and shows less of a concern with the parochial battles between liberals and conservatives than about the larger influence of the United States on Nicaragua. He believes in the unity of Latin America as the means of fighting against imperialism, similar to Simon Bolivar’s dream, as we read about before.

The film titled “Silent War” on the other hand, was a more generous view of the relationship between the United States and Latin America. It focuses on the aid and investment that the United States provided as effective means of promoting economic progress and modernization. However, I feel like the consequences of such intended ways of ‘helping’ are dismissed, neglecting the negative social effects these changes have caused in Latin American countries when trying to improve infrastructure.

In the film “Journey to Banana Land,” the positive impacts of UFCO in Guatemala are portrayed. It is seen as a powerful source for interrogating a series of other assumptions about class, gender and ethnicity. The video almost sounds like a commercial, where the culture of Guatemala (from the city to the highlands) are shown in very positive way, comparing it numerous times to the United States.

Additionally, Dorfman and Mattelart deliver a critique of the US imperialism in the 1960s. They believe one must understand a set of assumptions about the modern and primitive world in order to understand American imperial practices. They say cartoons were created to serve as instruments of imperialism and provides multiple examples of such concept. This is a very interesting perspective as disney world and cartoons are usually not seen as a means of controlling other countries’ ways of thinking as shown in the Donald example.