Se vende. Home-making and betrayal of the future in Eastern Cuba

Espiritismo and Urban Planning in Cuba: Envisioning Regeneration in Havana and Oriente after 1898

Evidence of instrumental seismic data can be found in Cuba as early as the beginning of the twentieth century. The first Cuban seismological station was installed in 1907 by the Jesuits of Belen Observatory in Luyano, Ciudad Havana and worked until the 1920's. The station was equipped with two Bosch-Omori-type seismometers recording on smoked paper (Cotilla, 1998). Some moderate earthquakes were recorded during that period but unfortunately the seismograms from those instruments were lost. The second station, Soroa (SOR), the first of the current seismograph network (Figure 1), began operation in 1964. It was located in west Cuba to monitor the seismic activity of the Pinar Fault (Figure 2), responsible for the 1880 San Cristobal earthquake (Table 1). One year later, in 1965, station Rio Carpintero (RCC) began operation in eastern Cuba (Figure 1), the most seismically active part of the country. View this table: TABLE 1 Historic Cuban Earthquakes Macroseismic determination is represented by parentheses. Only earthquakes Ms > 6 (Santiago de Cuba) and Ms > 5 (rest of the country) are shown. Figure 1. New Cuban Seismograph Network. Activity in eastern Cuba is generated mostly by a major transform fault, the Oriente Fault Zone (OFZ) (Figure 2). To monitor the OFZ activity and improve the coverage of the area, three more stations were installed in eastern Cuba in 1979—Pinares (PIN), Las Mercedes (LMG), and Maisi (MAS)—and three years later Cascorro (CCC) was added (Figure 1). Most of the stations were equipped with SKM-3 short-period three-component electromagnetic seismometers (of Russian manufacture) recording on photographic paper. The seismograph network consisted of eighteen stations in 1989, including a local telemetered network of eight stations in the area surrounding Santiago de Cuba. The locations of these stations can be found in Cotilla (1998). The local telemetered network was equipped with one vertical-component short-period seismometer with visual recording. …

A new, diminutive, and cryptic species of the genus Tarentola (T. crombiei sp. n.) is described from the arid south coast of Granma, Santiago de Cuba, and Guantánamo provinces in eastern Cuba. Specimens of this species have been in collections for nearly 100 years but its close resemblance to sympatric Tarentola americana delayed its detection. It differs from that species in body size, scalation, clutch size, and molecular phylogeny.

This contribution has for an antecedent a comparative socioanthroponymic study of the year 1960, as well as works on the Mexican, French, and Cuban prenomination of the twentieth century. It is both quantitative and qualitative, and analyzes a corpus of birth certificates from the 1970 civil registry, at Tlalnepantla de Baz and Santiago de Cuba. It is based on classical texts in French onomastics, pragmasemantic theories of proper name and anthroponym, and socioanthroponymy. Each name is compared with the date of birth of the bearer, the list of Catholic saints, and the names of his/her ascendants. Attribution models are also compared in both cities. Main trends: a) permanence of the traditional model in Tlalnepantla, and b) significant presence of neologisms in Santiago de Cuba. This is the result of socioanthroponymic factors operating in 1970, especially the impact of social movements and the Cuban revolution. The richness of denominational practices, convergent and divergent, highlights the importance of studying the Cuban and Mexican variants of Spanish from a socionomastic perspective.

Reviewed by: Black British Migrants in Cuba: Race, Labor, and Empire in the Twentieth-Century Caribbean, 1898–1948 by Jorge L. Giovannetti-Torres Marc McLeod (bio) Jorge L. Giovannetti-Torres. 2018. Black British Migrants in Cuba: Race, Labor, and Empire in the Twentieth-Century Caribbean, 1898–1948. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 305 pp. ISBN: 9781108437585. During the first half of the twentieth century, more than 140,000 British Caribbean workers migrated to Cuba. The history of their experiences, once largely neglected by scholars, has received increasing attention in the last couple of decades, including recent books by Robert Whitney and Graciela Chailloux Laffita, and Phillip Howard. Black British Migrants in Cuba, based on a dissertation completed by Jorge L. Giovannetti-Torres at the University of North London in 2001, is a most welcome addition to the topic. Written in clear, cogent prose, characterized by thoughtful analysis, and informed by extensive research in archives and libraries in numerous locations, it is the most comprehensive study of the subject yet. Following an introduction which adroitly situates the work within multiple scholarly frameworks, the book is organized into ten chapters along general chronological lines, with each chapter developing one or more main themes. Chapter One reaches back into the nineteenth century to examine the roots of racial fear in Cuba and histories of intra-Caribbean migration in the century after slave emancipation in the British Caribbean. Chapter Two details the patterns of labor recruitment and migration to Cuba in the early twentieth century, paying particular attention to the practices of the Cuban American Sugar Company and the United Fruit Company on their plantations in eastern Cuba. Chapter Three explores how increased migration during the 1910s contributed to rising levels of racial anxiety among Cuban elites and government authorities, culminating in the massacre of at least fourteen British Caribbean migrants by Cuban troops in the sugar mill town of Jobabo during political unrest in 1917. Chapters Four and Five consider diplomatic relations between the British and Cuban governments during the eight years after the Jobabo massacre. They illustrate the agency of British Caribbean migrants, who persistently penned letters to government officials and newspapers to demand protection of their rights, but also the reluctance of British officials to represent black workers and the overall limitations of diplomatic representation. The second half of the book surveys the three decades after World [End Page 173] War I, during which recurring crises in the island’s sugar economy posed ever greater challenges to migrants who remained in Cuba, including those hoping to return to their home islands. Chapter Six demonstrates how rising unemployment, anti-migrant nationalism, and anti-black discrimination coalesced with the onset of the Great Depression between 1925 and 1931. Giovannetti-Torres uses the experiences of eastern Caribbean migrants on the Chaparra and Delicias plantations to highlight the power and control over migrant labor wielded by large corporations like the Cuban American Sugar Company. Chapter Seven examines changes in British colonial consular policy from 1925 to 1933 while emphasizing the different experiences between Leeward and Windward Islanders versus Jamaicans, who were represented by a Secretary for Immigration based in Santiago de Cuba that administered a repatriation program to Jamaica during this time. Chapter Eight assesses the impact of Cuban labor nationalization efforts during the 1930s (particularly a 1933 law requiring that fifty percent of employees in most places of work be Cuban nationals) on British Caribbean migrants, which led many to return to their home islands. Chapter Nine looks at the experiences of migrants who remained in Cuba after the 1930s, when British officials feared that further repatriation would exacerbate unemployment and fuel additional labor unrest in British colonies, and thus encouraged migrants to assimilate and remain in Cuba. Chapter Ten reconsiders the main themes of the first chapter while stressing that British Caribbean migrants—in their multiple interactions with Cuban and British (not to mention U.S.) officials and employers—confronted a common ideology of white supremacy. The research that undergirds Black British Migrants in Cuba is impressive. Giovannetti-Torres has mined archives across the Atlantic world, including national, provincial, and municipal archives throughout Cuba as well as collections in Dominica, Jamaica, St. Lucia...

Starting in the early part of the nineteenth century, American administrations expressed a desire to own Cuba. A rationale for adding Cuba to the territory of the United States could be built on Cuba's sugar and tobacco industries, as well as Cuba's mineral deposits. But economics was not the primary motivation. American presidents knew that in the event of war, any nation occupying Cuba would have an advantage over the US military strategies; this fear, coupled with the economic benefit, explains a century of policy decisions. As Frank R. VillafaNa shows, Cubans were not sitting idle, waiting for outsiders to liberate them from Spanish oppression. A major part of this research is devoted to studying Cuban efforts to liberate their island from prolonged Spanish domination. Cuba had been struggling for independence from Spain since the 1830s, followed by the Ten Year War. During the 1895-1898 War of Independence, Cuba came close to defeating Spain, but a merciless Spanish military effort converted Cuba into a series of concentration camps. Spain surrendered after its naval defeats by the US at Manila Bay and Santiago de Cuba, following a failed ground campaign in eastern Cuba. After the US occupied Cuba militarily, American political leaders realized only a small minority of Cubans supported annexation, and the Platt Amendment was developed as a substitute. Today, most Cubans agree that independence, even constrained by the United States, was better than enslavement by the Castro brothers. However, as VillafaNa emphasizes, Cubans living in Cuba as well as abroad still seek a land free and independent of foreign threat and domestic tyrants.

Con el desarrollo de la producción cafetalera tras la llega­da de los inmigrantes franceses al oriente cubano, a fines del siglo XVIII y principios del XIX, no solo la economía del país se vio beneficiada, sino que también hubo un impacto en lo social y cultural. A pesar de ser un hecho analizado en importantes investigaciones, el modo de vida de esas familias en las haciendas cafetaleras situadas en las zonas montañosas de Santiago de Cuba, no ha sido lo su­ficientemente estudiado. El presente artículo es el resultado de la investigación Aportes culturales de la presencia francesa en el partido Ramón de las Yaguas y muestra un acercamiento al pa­norama cultural desarrollado en este partido a través del modo de vida de las familias francesas allí establecidas. Se tocan aspectos de los comportamientos y las costumbres de los hacendados franceses, así como el progreso en los negocios del café y su reflejo en el estilo de vida, los es­tablecimientos, la moda, la alimentación y las bebidas. Se desarrolla una lectura histórico-cultural, con especial énfasis en las familias más importantes del partido. Los datos aportados básicamente se reflejan en fuentes prima­rias como testamentos, documentos adscritos y protocolosnotariales del fondo del Archivo Histórico Provincial de Santiago de Cuba, lo que complementado con el trabajo de campo contribuye a un acercamiento al ideal cultural e identitario de la presencia francesa en ese partido.

A study of 12 pre-Hispanic metal objects found in Cuba has been made using scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive X-ray microanalysis. Certain of these objects may represent evidence of pre-Columbian trade between cultures in eastern Cuba and the Central American region; others bear testimony to early Spanish-American contacts. The objects were found near the sea in the provinces of Holguan, Guantanamo and Santiago de Cuba. The objects found at the southern sites were found to be native gold, brass and a gold-silver-copper alloy (guanan or tumbaga). The brass objects, worked and shaped in traditional Indian forms, are evidence of early Spanish-American contacts. A plate with an unusual nickel enriched surface was also found among the objects from the southern coast. The more elaborate objects found at the site near Holguan are tumbagas (guanan) which are stylistically similar to Central American examples. They are evidence of trade between Cuba and Mesoamerica before or shortly after the arrival of the Spaniards.

The triumph of the Cuban Revolution in January 1959 was one of the most popular political events of the twentieth century. A social movement that the majority of the Cuban population initially applauded, and for which many risked their lives, the Cuban Revolution captured the imagination. Romantic in its execution, expressing a call for social justice, it also had vast international support. Yet 60 years later, around 25% of its population had left Cuba as a result of their process of political disaffection, disappointment, and sense of betrayal. Among those who sought refuge in other lands, many had once been ardent supporters of the revolution. Five distinct waves of refugees are identified over the course of 60 years.

The triumph of the Cuban revolution in January 1959 was one of the most popular political events of the twentieth century. A social movement that the majority of the Cuban population initially applauded, and for which many risked their lives, the Cuban revolution captured the imagination. Romantic in its execution, expressing a call for social justice, it also had vast international support. Yet by the end of the century, 40 years later, around 15 percent of its population had left Cuba as a result of their process of political disaffection, disappointment, and sense of betrayal. Among those who sought refuge in other lands, many had once been ardent supporters of the revolution.

Visual elicitation methods, such as diagramming, are growing in their use with vulnerable populations, trauma-informed research, and social work studies where the use of traditional oral interviews alone may be lacking in their ability to increase access to different areas of human consciousness. The adoption and designing of innovative diagramming and visual methods have the potential to push the boundaries of data collection in understanding the experiences of forced migrants. However, scholars have seldom adopted this method in forced migration research. In this article, the authors explore three diagramming methods-timelines, convoy circles, and ecomaps-to highlight the possibilities of their use for social work research with forced migrants. The benefits of utilising these methods in support of the unique characteristics and challenges of forced migrants are also discussed. The article concludes by identifying several limitations while advocating for the adoption and documentation of the use of diagramming in studies with forced migrants.

(1999). Speech by Fidel Castro on the 40th Anniversary of the Cuban Revolution, January 1, 1999, Cespedes Park, Santiago de Cuba. The Black Scholar: Vol. 29, African Initiatives, pp. 39-42.

Is history still the handmaiden of the Cuban revolution, as Louis A. Pérez argued 30 years ago? In this article we explore how historical narratives, specifically concerning the Moncada Barracks assault of 1953, are incorporated into Cuban political culture. The event—the opening salvo in the armed struggle against Fulgencio Batista—is arguably the most commemorated event in Cuban revolutionary history. A close examination of commemorative practices, especially the contents of three museum exhibits in Santiago de Cuba, show that an aura of religiosity is cultivated around the victims of Batista's backlash against the rebels. The exhibits work to link the Moncada assault with other key events in Cuban history and to reinforce the status of the Moncada generation as the canonical generation of Cuban history.

Cuban cities are characterized by juxtapositions of Spanish colonial and U.S. capitalist heritage with the material and political culture of nearly fifty years of socialism; these cities have been transformed and retransformed by the daily practices of residents in noteworthy ways. This article will suggest that a fundamental philoso phy and practice that shapes Cuban vernacular architecture is the concept of Inventar, whereby new housing spaces and structures are quite literally invented through the improvised acquisition of goods and the expert negotiation of complex political and economic obstacles. This discussion depends research drawn from two separate field projects, undertaken by an architect (Patricio del Real) in Havana, and an anthropologist (Anna Cristina Pertierra) in San tiago de Cuba. Through the integration of our distinct research experiences it became clear that Inventar is simultaneously a technical and a social skill, enabling Cuban citizens to improvise in adverse circumstances. Housing is consciously presented by Cubans as an important space in which such skills of Inventar must be expressed in order to create not only material but also social well-being. The term Inventar is commonly used in Cuban vernacular speech to describe processes of improvising creative solutions to everyday problems. Three short case studies taken from our field research demonstrate the particular sig nificance of the notion of Inventar to housing con struction, showing how Inventar practices have been both stifled and enabled by Cuban state pol icies in the post-Soviet period. The case studies presented show the relationship between techni cal and practical actions on the ground in Cuba and the broader social and political structures that influence such actions. Therefore, engaging in the strategies of Inventar can be seen simulta neously as a set of technical practices, an engage ment in micropolitical actions, and an assertion of the social significance of particular personal qualities and community values. Our intention in examining how residents of Cuban cities develop practices and ideas to adapt their housing within the specific politico economic conditions of the post-Soviet era is to provide an example of how scholars across dis ciplines might study the relationship between material landscapes and cultural and political processes. Such a study is timely, as Kingston W. Heath recently proposed that understand ing this relationship between buildings, land scapes, and cultural processes lies at the center of contemporary vernacular architecture stud ies.1 Anthropologists are particularly well posi tioned to contribute to this discussion; many anthropologists have documented how housing is frequently a site in which political and social changes impact the material form of buildings and building interiors. Some have also proposed that housing forms can be understood as mani festations of social orders or cultural norms.2 It

The issue of forced migration has been a difficult challenge for ASEAN to address. Despite the number of international, regional and national frameworks in place, it is clear that within the international community, emigration is regarded as a right but immigration is seen as a matter of national sovereignty and security. Irregular migrants, especially migrant workers, asylum seekers and refugees, are not only forced to leave their own state but they are vulnerable to the whims of their host state, because they are considered to be secondary to citizens and national interests. The purpose of this article is to examine forced migration in the ASEAN context and how ASEAN member states have perceived and dealt with the issues so far. It also looks critically at how ASEAN as a group has been approaching forced migration and whether the establishment of the ASEAN human rights regime has contributed to changing ASEAN's approach to forced migration. ASEAN has some policies and frameworks in place for the protection of immigrants, including for those who are forced, but are assumed to be voluntary. Although ASEAN has a number of regional frameworks which could be applied to protect the rights of those forced to migrate, it is regrettable that the overall policies and laws on migration are left to the will of national governments which, in many ways, may not comply with international human rights standards. Moreover, while the existence of the ASEAN human rights regime is significant, there are no guarantees that it will lead to the adoption of a common regional approach to forced migration. The fact that ASEAN has been upholding very strong working principles – respect of state sovereignty, non-interference in the international affairs of member states, consultation and consensus – weakens the existing ASEAN human rights system. In addition, although ASEAN is one organisation, it is made up of ten member states, each driven by their prevailing national approach to the issues. A regional approach like the one applied two decades ago, would be difficult to reach now, as the member states do not yet see forced movements and forced migration as a ‘crisis’. While ASEAN does react to issues, it is always reluctant to act before the issue becomes a ‘crisis’. However, even if ASEAN reacts, it might not be in support of the interests of those who are forced to leave their country.