Weaving a larger web: Cuban American writing in the Latin@ narrative

Abstract

This essay explores the underrepresentation of Cuban American literature in Latin@ literary studies, probing into possible explanations for its marginalization in the field. I call attention to scholarship that has tended to portray Cuban American writing as fundamentally different from other Latin@ literatures with respect to politics, ideology, and historical trajectory. I then challenge such critical approaches by foregrounding the expansion and diversity of the Cuban American corpus, which can no longer be viewed as primarily exile-oriented, politically conservative, or racially homogeneous. I highlight the importance of scholarly work across latinidades that includes Cuban American writing in conversations about transnational and diasporic identity, the rewriting of American literary history, and intersections of race, gender, and sexuality. I propose that the study of postmemory and narrative inheritance in Cuban American and other Latin@ literatures offers compelling evidence of the significant interconnections that link these diverse works.