Author: m.rupolo

Outline

Intro:

-Argument- Through West Side Story we can see how New York was economically, racially, and educationally effected by U.S. imperialism over Puerto Rico in the 1950s-1960s.

Summary:

-Summarize West Side Story and where my argument can be seen through its events. (Using the West Side Story Review: WEST SIDE STORY by Bosley Crowther)

Body#1:

-Explain what Puerto Rico is to the U.S. and how it came to belong to the U.S. (Using Puerto Rico is to the U.S. using Puerto Rico’s Status: Island Declared an Autonomous Territory, Not a Commonwealth by James McManus)

-Explain why there was a mass migration of Puerto Ricans into New York and the “Dependency Theory”. (Using chapter 1 in U.S. TAX IMPERIALISM IN PUERTO RICO by Diane Lourdes Dick)

Body#2:

-Discuss the racism toward the Puerto Ricans, “The Puerto Rican Problem”. (Using Puerto Rican Migration: Citizens should be Better Prepared; It is Felt, Before leaving Homes by Leslie Highley)

-Also talk about how New York tried to fix this problem. (Using NEW YORKERS URGE AID TO PUERTO RICO: Propose U.S. Help for a Sound Economy — City, Island Agree on Steps Easing Migration by Peter Kihss)

Body#3:

-Talk how West Side Story is affected by the migration of Puerto Ricans and “The Puerto Rican Problem”. (Using a scene from the film in which the Sharks sing the song “America” and West Side Story and The Music Man: Whiteness, Immigration, and Race in the US during the late 1950s by Carol J Oja)

Conclusion:

-Wrap up how through U.S imperialism, New York was economically, racially, and educationally effected by U.S. imperialism over Puerto Rico.

Sources to be used:

New York Times Articles:

– Puerto Rico’s Status: Island Declared an Autonomous Territory, Not a Commonwealth by James McManus

–Puerto Rican Migration: Citizens should be Better Prepared; It is Felt, Before leaving Homes by Leslie Highley

– NEW YORKERS URGE AID TO PUERTO RICO: Propose U.S. Help for a Sound Economy — City, Island Agree on Steps Easing Migration by Peter Kihss

West Side story Review:

– WEST SIDE STORY by Bosley Crowther

Scholarly Articles:

–West Side Story and The Music Man: Whiteness, Immigration, and Race in the US during the late 1950s by Carol J Oja

– U.S. TAX IMPERIALISM IN PUERTO RICO by Diane Lourdes Dick

 

• -Briggs, Laura. Reproducing Empire: Race, Sex, Science and U.S. Imperialism in Puerto Rico                                                                                                                                 This is found through the Newman Library Database: http://site.ebrary.com/lib/alltitles/docDetail.action?docID=10048757
• -Carol Oja, “West Side Story and The Music Man: Whiteness, Immigration, and Race in the US during the late 1950s.” Studies in Musical Theater 3,1 (2009)              This is found through the New Library Database in a PDF
• Dick, Diane Lourdes. U.S. TAX IMPERIALISM IN PUERTO RICO. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.                                                                                                                                            This is found through the Newman Library Database in a PDF

Option 1: West Side Story

West Side Story shows us two things talked about by Briggs in Reproducing Empire. These two things are Colonialism and Imperialism. You can see in Reproducing Empire that the United States is an Imperialist country who wanted to gain different lands such as Cuba, the Philippians, and most importantly Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico is the most important of the three because its people “appreciated the United States and the gifts it had to offer to its less fortunate neighbors.” Meaning that Puerto Ricans actually wanted the help of America as opposed to Cuba and the Philippians who were “rudely wagging guerrilla war against the U.S.” In addition to that Reproducing Empire spoke on why there was an influx of  Puerto Rican in America after 1965. This was because the U.S. lifted restrictions on their immigration laws in an attempt to incorporate new nationalities into modern racial categories.

Reproducing Empire relates to West Side Story because it tells us the backstory behind the why their were groups of Puerto Rico in New York City during the mid nineteen fifties. Which of course had to do with the help America was giving to Puerto Rico and the fact that America was lifting its restrictions on their immigration laws. One thing i find interesting is you can view the Sharks of West side story as an imperialist group in some way. The Sharks came into America for new better lives but are taking the Jets territory. This can be related to exactly what the American are doing to their neighbors the Puerto Ricans. Lastly an interesting Scene from West Side Story is the America song scene. In this scene the Puerto Rican girls are saying they’re happy to be in America while the guys say that its only nice in America if you’re white. This is interesting because the Americans help the Puerto Ricans while in Puerto Rico and get them to America but once their it appears they are left on their own.

The film White Zombie set in Haiti during its occupation has much in common with the reading The Magic Island by W.B. Seabrook. Both the film and the readings illustrate various superstitions and beliefs of Haiti people during this time. White Zombie shows dead people of Haiti being resurrected by a wicked white man. This man goes on to turn a women into a zombie so that another white land owner ca have her has his wife. W.B. Seabrook’s The Magic Island discusses many  superstitions of the people of Haiti. These superstitions include Fire-hags, Vampires, Werewolves, and Zombies. The narrator goes on to say “It seems to me that these Werewolves and Vampires are first cousins to those we have at home, but I have never, except in Haiti, heard anything like zombies.

The Magic Island reading goes on to tell us that the poorest peasants are the ones targeted to become these zombies. It also tells us that these zombies become the person who makes them slaves/servants who are forced to work on farms doing “dull heavy tasks”. This can be seen a call back to slavery in Haiti. These white necromancers ( the people who create the zombies) can be seen as white slave and land owners who and the zombies can be seen as the Haitian slaves that worked the fields.

This relates to a scene in the film White Zombie when the white man who creates the zombies, Von Gelder and Charles Beaumont go to the grave of Madeline to turn her into a zombie. In this scene Von Gelder forces his zombie slaves to do his bidding by carry her coffin. This relates to The Magic Island because it shows that these zombies were meant to represent slaves of Haiti, doing the “dull heavy tasks” such as carrying the coffin. Von Gelder perfectly represents the white slave owner because he is in full control over these zombies/ slaves and they do whatever he wishes.

Brown’s Article Reapers Garden talked about many things, such as the harsh treatment of living slaves and the harsh treatment of the bodies of slaves. The Article talked about ways in which Europeans could enforce their power onto the slaves. The main way these Europeans decided to enforce their dominion over these slaves is by “making a spectacle of their corpses.” These terror tactics were used to scare slaves into obedience. The reason why these tactics were thought to be effective was these tactics were to attack Africans spiritual beliefs. The bodies of these dead Africans were symbolic, they symbolized what was to come after life and made slaves think what the meaning of it all was. Of course these tactics had some backlash, essentially becoming a requirement in the society slaves had become apart of. In addition to that Slaves of this time were starting to end their lives in order to end the harsh labor, social isolation, and did it in an attempt to return to their “ancestral lands”.Recently I took a trip to the African Burial Grounds in lower Manhattan. Once there i discovered that in 1697 British law banned Africans from having burials in the New York public cemetery. For this reason the African Burial Grounds are “north of the city limits near a ravine.” The reason why this burial ground is significant to the Brown article is, it shows the relation African had with their dead. It shows that they believed in the afterlife, in their culture, and putting their dead to rest in some way.

“This act, giving “legislative countenance to the social ascent of mulattoes,” as Winthrop Jordan pointed out some time ago, was singular among the British colonies in America. But it also made clear the racial basis of claims to national belonging: English rights and liberties belonged to English, or British, subjects, “born of British parents” or sufficiently removed from miscegenated roots to be seen as white and Christian; to be “called English” meant to be “free from all taint of the Negroe race.”(page 148)

This quote is talking about a law passed in 1733 that stated that no one should be labeled a mulatto after the “Third Generation”and if they were brought up to be Christian. This means that A mulatto which is person born of white and black ancestry, shall not be called a mulatto after the third generation of black blood being in their veins, this essentially allowed them to be called white as long as they were brought up Christian. The quote illustrates to us what this meant for the ex-mulattoes. The quote states that English rights were given to English people, people born to British parents, or people “sufficiently removed from miscegenated roots. This means that these people who were mulattoes after the third generation and grew up as Christians were now allowed the rights of Englishmen meaning they were considered equal. The quote also goes on to tell us what makes someone “English”. It states ” …to be “called English” meant to be “free from all taint of the Negroe race.” This of course means that in order to be English you must not contain black blood inside you.

Two questions i have about this reading are:

1. If you are only considered “English” is you are free from all taint of the Negroe race.” then why are they allowing Mulattoes become Englishmen and are allowing them equal rights?
2. This quote also states that English rights also belonged to people who sufficiently removed from miscegenated roots to be seen as white and Christian. Does this mean that if you look black even after the third generation you are not given those rights?

“Within hours torches were set to the flammable dried sugar cane trash at Blue Hole, Leogan, Leyden, Palmyra, Windsor, Hazelymph, Belvedere, and Content. Later that night observers at Montego Bay reported a pattern of flaming stretching across the dark horizon like a red arc. The slaves of Jamaica’s western parishes were in revolt.”(Page 13)

The Meaning of Freedom speaks on the freedom of Jamaica, these include how and why it was acquired. This quote is one of the opening quotes of this piece but i choose it because it perfectly illustrates whats to come throughout the entirety of the reading. The quote tells the reader that people are setting sugar cane (the most valuable asset in Jamaica at that time) on fire all across Jamaica. The quote goes on to tell us that it is the slaves of Jamaica that are the ones setting fire to the sugar cane. The reason for doing this is because they are revolting against the white slave owners and free blacks of Jamaica. The destruction of the sugar cane plantations is a great way to hurt the white populous of Jamaica because it is essentially the reason for them being there, this is because the harvesting of sugar cane is among one of the greatest ways to make great wealth at this time.

This quote is important to the entirety of the reading because this revolt leads to many events. One of such important events happened a little more then a year and a half after the revolt. This event was the British Parliament abolishing slavery throughout the Western Indian colonies which took place on August 20th 1833. The authors of this abolition said that this revolt that took place is a major factor that contributed to their actions in abolishing slavery in the Western Indian colonies.

1. Though it is roughly answered in the reading,  why did this revolt set the British Parliament over the edge to abolish slavery in the Western Indian colonies?
2. Why did the Jamaican slaves wish to remove both the whites and the free black Jamaicans?

“I know of such cases; and it is worthy of remark that such slaves invariably suffer greater hardships, and have more to contend with, than others. They are, in the first place, a constant offence to their mistress. She is ever disposed to find fault with them; they can seldom do anything to please her; she is never better pleased than when she sees them under the lash, especially when she suspects her husband of showing to his mulatto children favors which he withholds from his black slaves. The master is frequently compelled to sell this class of his slaves, out of deference to the feelings of his white wife; and, cruel as the deed may strike any one to be, for a man to sell his own children to human flesh-mongers, it is often the dictate of humanity for him to do so; for, unless he does this, he must not only whip them himself, but must stand by and see one white son tie up his brother, of but few shades darker complexion than himself, and ply the gory lash to his naked back; and if he lisp one word of disapproval, it is set down to his parental partiality, and only makes a bad matter worse, both for himself and the slave whom he would protect and defend.”

This quote from Frederick Douglass’s Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave is extremely interesting to me because it shows that even is a slave is born of a white man he is not treated any better. In fact this quote goes as far as to say that a slave born of a white man or of the master of the plantation is actually treated worse due to the jealously of the “mistress”. I find this extremely interesting especially if you compare it to the French colony of Saint Domingue. In this French colony slaves born to a white parent were considered freer and on this colony there was a ranking of freedom depending on how much blackness was in their skin.  Another aspect of this quote that is of interest is that the master wouldn’t want to sell his slave son because it would be inhumane to do so. But if the master decided that he wouldn’t sell his own son then he must watch one of his other whiter sons (the slave’s brothers) do things such as whip the slave.

“And his Majesty doth further hereby declare, that if any person recalled, or otherwise without Licence, to sell by retail (as aforesaid) any of the Liquors aforesaid, upon the Statue made in the fifteenth year of his Majesties Reign (which gives the forfeiture of five pounds for every month wherein he, she or they offend therein) but shall (in case they persevere to Offend) receive the severest punishments that may by Law be inflicted.”

This is as the title states a royal proclamation for the suppression of coffee houses, demanding the halt of any selling of Coffee, Chocolet, Sherbett, or Tea. This proclamation was to effect the Kingdom of England, the Dominion of Wales, and the Town of Berwick on Tweed. This proclamation speaks about the Coffee-Houses of these areas staying they “have produced very evil and dangerous effects;”. Because they believed these “Liquors” produced very evil and dangerous effects the selling of them was to result in a severe punishment. An interesting thing to think about is why else the King might have wanted to halt the selling of these items. Maybe it was not only because they were evil and dangerous but because he possibly stood to turn a profit being incharge of all the  Coffee, Chocolet, Sherbett, and Tea he wanted. Another interesting thing to note about this proclamation is the King thought the coffee and such would result in evil and dangerous effects but his ministers pressured him into its withdrawal before the proclamation even was to take into effect.