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Topics | Themes | Questions | Bibliography

The Closest of Enemies?

No other Latin American country, except Mexico, looms so large in the consciousness of the United States. It makes sense. A close trading relationship has tied Cuba and the United States together since the early 1800s. During most of that century, Cuba (along with Puerto Rico) remained a Spanish colony, but U.S. capital already flowed into Cuban sugar plantations, and Cuban habanera music already enlivened U.S. popular culture. Cubans, in turn, substituted baseball for bullfighting even before breaking with Spain. The Cuban-U.S. political relationship has remained intense since the U.S. involvement in Cuba's war for independence (1898). Since the revolution of 1959, the subsequent rupture of diplomatic relations, and the imposition of a U.S. embargo, the governments of the United States and Cuba have been "the closest of enemies." Because of outstanding U.S. claims for property expropriated by Cuban revolutionaries in the early 1960s, the U.S. government continued to keep Cuba generally off-limits to U.S. citizens after the end of the Cold War, when travel to other Communist countries became routine. The island became increasingly isolated commercially and diplomatically in the 1990s with the collapse of Communism in Russia and Eastern Europe. In the first decade of the twenty-first century, much seemed to hang on the longevity of Fidel Castro, who had led Cuba's revolution since its inception.

From the outside, Cuba figures in the U.S. imagination above all as an ideological sign. The Cuban revolution starkly divides supporters and opponents. Within Cuba, on the other hand, ideology is not the center of national life. More mundane matters, like east-west regional differences, come into view. Western Cuba, the location of Havana, has also been the main producer of Cuba's great crop, sugar. Mountainous eastern Cuba is the poor relation in this family group. As often happens with less-developed regions (Appalachia, the Brazilian Northeast, or the Argentine Northwest, for example), eastern Cuba represents the main repository of folk culture, centered in the city of Santiago, where the Spanish made their first capital on the island.


Topics:
African Background
Cuban Revolution
The Music and the Conquered World
National Identities in the Caribbean
Slavery and Abolition
Neo-African Religions
Sugar


Themes:
Religion (Key Theme)


Questions for Analysis and Further Reflection:

  1. Indigenous populations of the Caribbean were quickly decimated after the arrival of Spaniards. What led to this destruction of human lives, what consequences did it bring for the region, and how did the encounter of Spaniards with Indians differ in Mesoamerica and South America?


  2. Though Cuba was one of the last colonies to become independent from Spain, the argument can be made that a sense of "national identity" or "Cubaness" developed throughout the 1800s, before the end of colonial rule. What are some illustrations of this development, and how did race enter in?


  3. Our parents' attitudes often color our own "world view." How do your family members, especially those of older generations, think about Cuba, and how has that affected your own understanding of U.S.-Cuban relations?

Country Bibliography: (Titles with ** are good starting places.)

** Bethell, Leslie, ed. Cuba: A Short History. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993.

A collection drawn from the large-scale Cambridge History of Latin America. The four essays begin with Cuba in the mid-eighteenth century, shift to movements for independence and the years of U.S. influence in the early twentieth century, and then focus on Cuba since 1930. Each has an accompanying bibliographical essay.

** Knight, Franklin W. The Caribbean: The Genesis of a Fragmented Nationalism, 2nd ed.
           New York: Oxford University Press, 1990.

Knight's regional history aims to put the national experience of each country within the larger historical context of the Caribbean. The survey begins with a comparative look at the pre-Hispanic Caribbean, shifts to colonization, slavery and plantation society, and then on to imperial fragmentation. In the second half of the book, Knight focuses on individual national cases. Maps, tables, a timeline, and a bibliographical essay on suggested readings are included.

Palmer, Colin A., and Franklin W. Knight, eds. The Modern Caribbean. Chapel Hill: The
           University of North Carolina Press, 1989.

This collection of essays on the region of the Caribbean is intended for the general public and undergraduate students. Of use to the student looking for brief introductions to the region as a whole, and Cuba in particular, are Palmer's and Knight's regional overview and Knight's essay on Cuba from independence to the mid 1980s. A detailed bibliography is included.

** Pérez, Jr., Louis A. Cuba: Between Reform and Revolution, 2nd ed. Latin American
           Histories. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995.

A thorough and authoritative general history of Cuba. Readers will find many tables and maps throughout the text, along with a political chronology at the end. An extensive guide to literature—organized by themes and types of writing—on Cuba is also included.

** Staten, Clifford L. The History of Cuba. Greenwood Histories of the Modern Nations.
           Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2003.

An accessible introduction for students and nonspecialists. A timeline, list of historical figures, and a brief bibliographic essay accompany the narrative.

Suchlicki, Jaime. Cuba: From Columbus to Castro and Beyond, 5th ed. rev. Washington,
           D.C.: Brassey's, 2002.

A readable overview that concentrates on the twentieth century. Included are a handful of maps and an annotated bibliography of suggested readings.


Maps:
Map of Cuba