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Cuban Color in Tourism and La Lucha

An Ethnography of Racial Meanings

L. Kaifa Roland

Publication Date - 01 September 2010

ISBN: 9780199739660

144 pages
Paperback
5-1/2 x 8-1/4 inches

In Stock

A brief, engaging ethnography on race and tourism in modern socialist Cuba that engages concepts of belonging and identity

Description

Cuban Color in Tourism and La Lucha: An Ethnography of Racial Meanings offers a provocative look at what it means to belong in modern socialist Cuba. Drawn from her extensive travels throughout Cuba over the past decade, author L. Kaifa Roland pulls back the curtain on a country that has remained mysterious to Americans since the mid-twentieth century. Through vivid vignettes and firsthand details, Roland exposes the lasting effects of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the subsequent rise of state-sponsored segregated tourism in Cuba. She demonstrates how the creation of separate spheres for locals and tourists has had two effects. First, tourism reestablished the racial apartheid that plagued pre-revolutionary Cuba. Second, it reinforced how the state's desire to maintain a socialist ideology in face of its increasing reliance on capitalist tools is at odds with the day-to-day struggles--or La Lucha--of the Cuban people. Roland uses conversations and anecdotes gleaned from a year of living among locals as a way of delving into these struggles and understanding what constitutes life in Cuba today. In exploring the intersections of race, class, and gender, she gives readers a better understanding of the common issues of status and belonging for tourists and their hosts in Cuba.

Cuban Color in Tourism and La Lucha is one of several volumes in the Issues of Globalization: Case Studies in Contemporary Anthropology series, which examines the experiences of individual communities in our contemporary world. Each volume offers a brief and engaging exploration of a particular issue arising from globalization and its cultural, political, and economic effects on certain peoples or groups. Ideal for introductory anthropology courses--and as supplements for a variety of upper-level courses--these texts seamlessly combine portraits of an interconnected and globalized world with narratives that emphasize the agency of their subjects.

About the Author(s)

L. Kaifa Roland is Assistant Professor in Anthropology at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Her research is in the area of cultural anthropology with specific interests in tourism, national identity, racial and gender constructions, popular cultural practices, and critiques of capitalism. She has conducted extensive field research in Cuba, with a regional focus on the Caribbean and the broader African Diaspora.

Table of Contents

    Preface
    Chapter 1: Race, Tourism, and Belonging in Cuba
    Welcome to Cuba
    The Meaning(s) of "Race"
    Tourism and the Caribbean
    Socialism and Cuba's Revolutionary Ideal
    Post-socialist Globalization
    Methodology
    Chapter 2: "Blackness" and Race Matters in Cuba
    Raciality in Cuba
    Race and the Revolution
    From Black(ness) to White(ned)
    Gendered Race/Raced Gender
    Conclusion
    Chapter 3: Surviving through La Lucha
    La Lucha
    Ineteros (Hustlers)
    Marrying the Other
    Conclusion
    Chapter 4: Tourism and Belonging
    Who Tours Cuba?
    Privilege and Place
    Power and Belonging
    The Yuma/Jinetero Dynamic
    Conclusion
    Chapter 5: Of Shorts and Segregated Socialism
    Separate and Unequal
    Transition or Transformation
    Conclusion
    Epilogue: Where Are They Now?
    From Jineteros to Perros Callejeros
    Yumas Out, Pepes In
    Raul Castro and Change
    Student Resource Guide
    Glossary of Key Terms
    Glossary of Spanish/Cuban Terms
    Bibliography
    Index

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