Pick two or more of these themes and discuss them with a partner. Listen carefully to each other, then share the main ideas with the rest of the class.
Cultural Intersections
How has exploring Puerto Rican culture reshaped your understanding of how race, ethnicity, and colonial history intersect in shaping cultural identity? Can you provide specific examples from the course materials (e.g., literature, music, or film)?
Diasporic Perspectives
In what ways did the course challenge or expand your perspective on the Puerto Rican diaspora? How do migration, cultural resilience, and community-building themes manifest in the works you studied?
Creative Resistance
Puerto Rican cultural expressions often serve as forms of resistance. Which artistic or literary work from the course stood out most, and why? How does it speak to issues of identity and liberation?
Contemporary Connections
How do the historical and cultural themes we explored in the course connect to current social, political, or environmental issues affecting Puerto Rico today? What parallels or tensions do you see?
Personal Engagement
Reflect on your own relationship to the topics discussed in the course. Were there any moments that felt particularly resonant or challenging for you? How has your understanding of Puerto Rican culture influenced how you view cultural heritage and identity more broadly?
You should review these topics and sources as you prepare for the exam. The in-person exam will consist of five critical and comparative questions about the class sources. You will choose five from nine questions based on your interest as a learner.
Challenging the “Discovery,” Unveiling the Horrors of Colonization
.Meléndez-Badillo, Jorell. “Borikén’s First Peoples: From Migration to Insurrection.” In Puerto Rico: A National History. Princeton University Press, 2024.
Slave Trade and African Women Rebellion
.Arroyo Pizarro, Yolanda. “Arrowhead.” In Negras, Stories of Puerto Rican Slave Women. Boreales, 2012.
.Dadzie, Stella. “Enslaved Women and Subversion.” In A Kick in the Belly: Women, Slavery and Resistance. Verso, 2020.
What comes to mind when you think of migration across the sea?
How do you think the sea can represent both freedom and danger?
In what ways does water carry both memory and possibility?
Bios
Carina del Valle Schorske is a writer and translator living in Brooklyn. Her first book, “The Other Island,” is forthcoming from Riverhead. Her NYT essay “An Arsenal of Mysteries” portrays Mona Passage and Mona Island as microcosms of the Caribbean’s more extensive history of migration, imperialism, and resistance, highlighting the enduring struggles and resilience of the region’s peoples.
Helen Ceballos is a Dominican performer, visual artist, writer, and cultural promoter that addresses issues of migration to Puerto Rico and the US, Black Atlantic, and Queer Afro-Latinidad. In her piece, Ceballos describes the experience of arriving as an undocumented migrant by sea and the weight of being seen or perceived in transit.
The Mona Passage: Now and Then
The Mona Passage — fast-flowing, shark-infested, one of the roughest stretches of water in the world — remains a troubled crucible of imperial traffic. Every year, migrants from Cuba, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic crowd small boats and try to make the dangerous crossing to Puerto Rico, the local gateway to the American dream. Many drown, uncountable bodies at the bottom of the sea. Hundreds wind up stranded on Mona, abandoned by smugglers looking to cut corners on the journey, then deported by authorities within days. -Carina del Valle Schorske.
What does the Mona Passage symbolize in the context of imperialism and migration?
How does the passage reflect the precariousness of migrants’ lives?
Historical Mariner Expertise and Trade Networks Early settlers of the Caribbean, coming from Central America and the Amazon, were skilled navigators who used the sea to establish multiethnic communities and extensive trade networks. These movements shaped the region’s early societies and demonstrated the purposeful use of maritime routes for cultural and material exchange.
Colonial Exploitation and the Atlantic Slave Trade During the Spanish colonial period, Mona became a critical site for empire-building, serving as a supply station and hub for the slave trade. Enslaved Africans and Indigenous peoples were exploited to produce essential goods like yuca bread and cotton ropes, which fueled colonial campaigns and trade.
Piracy, Haitian Resistance, and Fluid Identities Mona’s isolated location attracted pirates, such as Blackbeard, who trafficked enslaved people through the island. During the Haitian Revolution, rebels used Mona as a refuge, symbolizing its role as a space for oppression and resistance. The island’s contested history reflects its status as a site where imperial forces and displaced individuals negotiated new identities.
Close Reading Exercise
Group 1:
The migrants who left Central America and the Amazon basin to populate our archipelago were great mariners, like the Polynesians, navigating by stars and currents and wind patterns. Over generations of migration, they formed multiethnic polities and maintained vast trade networks: jade from Guatemala, gold and copper alloys from Colombia, jaguar’s teeth from continental jungles. None of these materials arrived by accident.
.How do the achievements of early mariners challenge modern assumptions about migration and navigation?
.What do these networks tell us about the interconnectedness of pre-colonial societies?
Group 2
I could imagine the Spanish ships prowling the Caribbean, snatching people from the Lesser Antilles and the coast of South America to “replenish” their depleted work force. I could imagine the first coffle of stolen Africans that would arrive in Santo Domingo. This passage still teems with human traffic. No one who worked these waters — our captain, the Coast Guard, local fishermen — wanted to talk to me about what they’d seen. Édouard Glissant was right: Even the brightest voyages bring to mind the depths of the sea, “with their punctuation of scarcely corroded balls and chains.”
.How does this excerpt highlight the continuity of exploitation in the Caribbean?
.Why do you think the narrator draws on Édouard Glissant’s idea of the depths of the sea as a repository of history?
Group 3
Soon, Mona became the breadbasket for the whole colonial campaign: gold mines in Puerto Rico, armadas cruising for slaves, salt and pearls from Aruba to Venezuela… Mona was never abandoned for long. Exiled islanders returned to fish, forage and visit sacred sites as their ancestors did for thousands of years. Sailors sick with scurvy came to gather oranges gone to seed. All through the 17th and 18th centuries, pirates frequented the island, making the surrounding waters some of the most perilous in the Atlantic world… Blackbeard, the notorious English buccaneer, used Mona to barrack twice-stolen Africans, reselling them on the black market once they became “acclimated” to hard labor. At the height of the Haitian Revolution, rebels moored ships along Mona’s coast. The island had become both a prison and a sanctuary, a contested terrain where the empire’s exiles hashed out new identities.
In what ways does the island’s history embody the intersection of colonial exploitation and the forging of new, resistant identities?
What does the imagery of exiled islanders returning to sacred sites suggest about the persistence of cultural memory and resilience in the face of imperial disruption?
Enduring Legacy and Connection to the Past
Despite colonial exploitation, Mona’s sacred and practical uses have persisted. Island residents and visitors continued to utilize it for fishing, foraging, and cultural practices, linking the island’s past and present. This continuity underscores the resilience of Indigenous and diasporic traditions in the face of colonial disruption.
What connections can we draw between the past and present narratives of the Mona Passage?
Cerezas por papeles
As a photo-text, Cerezas por papeles/ Cherries for documents is part of a larger piece that Ceballos staged and performed in a San Juan, Puerto Rico gallery. The piece comprises fragments inspired by Ceballos’ life experiences, migrating to Puerto Rico and traveling and living in other countries, including Brazil, Argentina, and the US.
Ceballos proposes that the topic of migration requires that we engage in multiple registers, narratives, and perspectives. In particular, she is interested in how migration affects Dominican and Caribbean women and how the vulnerability of being a migrant is intersected by gender-based oppression, anti-blackness, and constant misreading.
How does Ceballos’ exploration of empowered womanhood intersect with her reflections on the perils and strategies of migration and traveling?
Group Two
Can you explain how Ceballos’ need to perform citizenship and belonging affects her interactions with other members of her community in her piece?
What does the birth certificate for rent suggest about the challenges faced by undocumented immigrants and the lengths they may go to overcome them?
Group Three
Ceballos describes the labor and sacrifices of the women in her family. How do their experiences inform her of the challenges migrant women face in the labor force today?
Group Four
How does the story of the author’s aunt Cathy highlight the difficulty and complexity of legalizing documents as an undocumented immigrant? What are the consequences of being unable to do so?
What topics and sources would you like to see included in the semester-wide exam?
Draft a preliminary question based on one source from the class that impacted you.
Context
The Puerto Rican crisis of the twentieth-first century includes an economic recession, an illegal (non-audited) debt, climate disasters, an extended energy blackout, aid mismanagement and neglect, a massive shutdown of schools, the defunding of public education, the privatization and deterioration of public services, a wave of femicides and queer-phobic crimes, forced migration to the US, internal displacement due to a tourist-US investor led economies, land-grabbing and 126 years of US colonialism that denies Puerto Rico to this day the right of choice to either statehood and full citizenship or independence.
In the last chapter of his book Puerto Rico: A National History, historian Dr. Jorell Meléndez Badillo examines why Puerto Rico arrived at its current juncture and how Puerto Ricans imagine possible futures in the face of austerity, failing infrastructures, and the rubble left behind by colonial neglect.
Beatriz Llenín Figueroa is an independent writer, editor, and translator. She is also an Associate Editor at Editora Educación Emergente (EEE). In her piece “The Maroons are Deathless, We are Deathless,” she argues that driven by an ideology of privatization, government deregulation, and endlessly increasing debt for “development,” neoliberalism is “at once the motor and proposed savior of the current humanitarian and fiscal crisis in Puerto Rico.” However, she says the #RickyRenuncia protests demonstrate that amid this “dire situation, Puerto Ricans ‘on the ground’ and in the commons are illuminating the way toward another, and better, country.”
The institution of slavery was threatened when large groups of Africans escaped to geographically secluded regions to form self-emancipated communities, often referred to as maroon communities. Such communities were established throughout the Americas, particularly in the Caribbean and Brazil. They developed their culture, government, trade, and military defense against their European and American oppressors. In short, they attempted to live as free people beyond the planters’ or colonial officials’ sight and control.
What does the figure of the “maroons” and the descriptive word “deathless” signify in Llenín Figueroa’s piece?
“We honor the submarine corals made from the bodies of our enslaved, our migrants, our poor, our women, our queers, our dispossessed, our freedom-seekers. In and through them, we, Antilleans, islanders, and Caribbean peoples, stand united. The maroons are deathless. We are deathless.”
Compare and explain these arguments by Llenín Figueroa and Meléndez Badillo. Expand your discussion and include examples presented in each reading.
(1) “The hashtag [#MeCagoEnLaIsla meaning “I take a shit on the island” or “fuck the island.”] is intimately connected to the forms of hatred insofar as it reenacts a longstanding ideology of loathing toward our insular geography. Originally deployed by the very empires that, ironically, were built on the blood and resources of the Caribbean archipelagos they revile, [this] ideology has been consistently reproduced by the local elites of complicit, neocolonial criminals. -Llenín Figueroa
“The future without Puerto Ricans [is] a political project that sought to make Puerto Rico a disappearing archipelago. As many Puerto Ricans struggle to survive or make ends meet, a new class of wealthy US foreigners has arrived in the archipelago to take advantage of the government’s tax incentives… For many in Puerto Rico… this is just another form of colonialism (205)”- Meléndez Badillo
(2): “In light of these recent developments in the country, and now trembling with expectation, I can confirm that there is an even more intense, and equally longstanding, love for the island, as opposed to its loathing.” -Llenín Figueroa
“The younger generations are enacting politics and other forms of participatory democracy beyond the ballot box… For many of the people who participate in these projects, decolonization is an urgent matter. Since they cannot continue to wait for elected officials to help them, they rely on themselves to do so. The phrase “sólo el pueblo slava a pueblo” (only the people will save the people) acquires power in this context (211-212).”
Bad Bunny and the politics of everyday life
.Benito Martínez Ocasio, aka Bad Bunny, came to fame during an (ongoing) intense socio-political-ecological collapse in the archipelago of Puerto Rico- a colonial territory since the US invaded in 1898.
.Keeping a balance between his reggaeton/trap/pop persona (a carefree sexual adventurer- now burdened by fame), he has also used and shared his platform to discuss issues regarding political corruption, gender politics in music, queer and trans rights, and visibility, the visitor economy, ecological deterioration, and the displacement of local communities.
. You can find the original lyrics and English translation here.
The repeated phrase “Puerto Rico ‘ta bien cabrón”(Puerto Rico is fucking awesome) discusses the importance of a Black music lineage (bomba, salsa, reggaeton), sports dominance, local knowledge/saberes, Caribbean solidarity (shout out to the Dominican Republic!), activism, political resistance to colonialism (through its images of political leaders and protests), neoliberalism, and corruption. “Cabrón” also means fucked-up, demanding, and challenging.
.The video is interrupted by a “breaking news” story by independent journalist Bianca Graulau about the power system’s vulnerability after the government privatized the company. The report gives context to understand the economic increase in utilities and how the many blackouts are taking lives and affecting the locals daily. The song then “performs” a blackout, a “maldito apagón.”
.Bad Bunny identifies an appropriation problem due to reggaeton’s popularity on a global scale. He says everyone mimics the genre and the Puerto Rican/Latino slang. For him, this cultural issue mirrors the dynamics of colonialism. He warns people, “welcome to el calentón,” you are going to burn, “cuidao con mi corillo,” beware of Puerto Ricans because we don’t stand for shit/fakeness/ political abuse.
.The party scene could be read as a sequence that plays or reproduces tourist’s expectations about the island. At the same time, it is also portraying Puerto Rican queer joy and pleasure as resistance.
.The song ends with a femme voice declaring that she doesn’t want to migrate or be displaced. They (the tourists/the US investors/ the privatizers/the fake appropriators) are the ones who must go because they are taking what belongs to us.
Abraham Rodríguez Jr. is a contemporary Puerto Rican writer. He has been active since the 1990s. Raised in the Bronx, he writes stories that depict the experiences of “Nuyoricans.” Rodriguez portrays the struggle of Puerto Ricans, whether on the island of Puerto Rico or in the US.
In the book and short story The Boy Without a Flag (1992), Abraham Rodriguez Jr. captures the hardship of growing up poor in the South Bronx and what it is like to sacrifice one’s childhood to survive and come to terms with the socio-political realities of (Boricua) life at a young age.
“The Boy Without a Flag”
“The Boy Without a Flag” is narrated by an eleven-year-old Puerto Rican boy who is a voracious reader and writes novels and underground comics in his school. Influenced by his father’s political ideas, a poet critical of US imperialism, he refuses to salute the US flag at his school as an act of political awakening and defiance.
Using the short story as a microcosm, Rodriguez shows Puerto Ricans’ political spectrum in NYC and their different stands regarding US colonial rule. Complacency, ignorance, or avoidance are the most common reactions to the debate about Puerto Rico’s political status. The subject is taboo at school, and nobody wants to address the real-life implications of the discussion.
After his father is called to the principal’s office and refuses to support his son’s political views, the narrator must unpack what happened to him and learn from the complexity of his protest and the reactions of the people around him.
Commenting on the story
Instructions:
Comment on these statements reflecting on the story:
.People in power don’t know how to address the concerns of Puerto Ricans. They are only protecting their interests.
.Puerto Ricans are a part of (the city/the school/the US) without a part to play.
.There is a “proper” and “improper” way and time to protest and produce change.
.Thinking of the historical and political context presented in the reportage, what are the implications of the political silencing at the narrator’s school?
.How does the story reflect life for Puerto Ricans in the US beyond the specifics of its plot?
.How do you interpret the ending? What political and life lessons does the narrator learn?
La Directora de CENTRO: The Center for Puerto Rican Studies Yomaira Figueroa-Vásquez was raised in Hoboken, NJ, and is a first-generation high school and college graduate. Figueroa works on 20th-century U.S. Latinx Caribbean, Afro-Latinx, and Afro-Hispanic literature and culture. Her most recent book, Decolonizing Diasporas: Radical Mappings of Afro-Atlantic Literature, focuses on diasporic and exilic Puerto Rican, Cuban, Dominican, and Equatoguinean texts in contact. She is currently writing a book on Afro-Boricua Histories and audiovisual archives.
“Afro-Boricua Archives”
The everyday moments shown in Frank Espada’s photos of Afro-Puerto Ricans and Aracelis Girmay’s poem “You Are Who I Love” represent Black people’s daily life and survival in the diaspora. These ordinary moments ask us to “listen” in a particular way that Tina Campt calls the “quiet register.” This means paying attention to the everyday things essential to being human, especially in Black communities.
Inspired by Tina Campt’s ideas, Figueroa suggests we try to “listen” to images, not just look at them. In her book Listening to Images, Campt explains that photographs are more than just something to see—they also have sound, energy, and emotions that we can tune into. She encourages us to go beyond simply looking at pictures and pay attention to the feelings and experiences they carry, especially in the context of Black cultural studies.
“These images and stories are works of poetry that refuse dehumanization and accusations of cultural pathologies. Instead, Espada renders his subjects through a lens of love, celebration, and dignity.”
Inspired by Yomaira Figueroa’s method of describing and “listening” to photographs of Afro-Boricuas, how can we interpret these Frank Espada photos? What elements stand out? What stories do they suggest?
Aracelis Girmay
“Both Frank Espada’s photography and Girmay’s poetry allow Puerto Rican, Afro-Puerto Ricans, and other people of color to see themselves rendered beautifully as survivors and resistors. These bundles of photography and poetry can be cleaved together (but not apart) because they are visualizations of the human.”
Pick a line from Aracelis Girmay’s “You Are Who Are Love” and add five more lines inspired by the people and communities you love.
Conclusion
Girmay and Espada create an archive of who is loved. Those loved in these poems and photographs are colonial subjects, diasporic peoples, those resisting coloniality, and practicing old/creating new ways to love one another. Within Espada’s work, we must bend our ears to listen to the poetics of the image; in Girmay’s work, we must conjure and imagine the people, the bodies, and the immense love she writes about. We can listen to his images, read her poetry, and behold an indispensable way to see communities that have disappeared by the archive, coloniality, and erasure.
Dr. Amina Gautier is an award-winning academic and Afro-Boricua writer. She has written four short story collections, many individual stories, and literary criticism.
Now We Will Be Happy is a prize-winning collection of stories about Afro-Puerto Ricans, U.S.-born Puerto Ricans, and displaced native Puerto Ricans living between spaces while attempting to navigate the unique culture that defines Puerto Rican identity. Amina Gautier’s characters deal with the difficulties of bicultural identities in a world that wants them to choose only one.
Songs are prominently featured in many of the stories in the collection. The music alluded to in various stories also, directly or indirectly, reflects the experiences of native Puerto Ricans, Nuyoricans, and Afro-Puerto Ricans.
The short story “Aguanile” uses the song by Héctor Lavoe and Willie Colón of the same title to portray the emotional ties and fractures of a Puerto Rican family spread out between NY and Puerto Rico. Gautier explores the possibilities of intergenerational bonding, troubled masculinities, the failures of (grand) father figures, and the importance of Afro-Caribbean music (Salsa) as a grounding cultural phenomenon for Puerto Ricans in the US and the archipelago.
Héctor Lavoe, (born Héctor Juan Pérez Martínez) was a Puerto Rican salsa singer. Lavoe is considered to be possibly the best and most crucial singer and interpreter in the history of salsa music because he helped to establish the popularity of this musical genre in the decades of 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. His personality, style, and the qualities of his voice led him to a successful artistic career in the whole field of Latin music and salsa during the 1970s and 1980s. The clearness and brightness of his voice, impeccable diction, and the ability to sing long and fast phrases with total naturalness made him one of the favorite singers of the Latin public.
What is the role of this song within the short story? (Page 10)
II. Puerto Rican Voices: Season Five, Episode Two
Tito Matos: Ahora Sí (Noelia Quintero, 2022)
Following Tito Matos’s death, this biographical episode of Centro Voices examines his legacy as a musician, cultural worker, mutual aid organizer, and agitator. Using archival footage to reflect on Tito’s contributions to Plena, we discover how he built knowledge, occupied neglected spaces, and mentored students in Puerto Rico and the diaspora.
Discussion Questions
.What is Tito Matos’ legacy to Puerto Rican culture?
.How does Tito Matos’ experience with the Puerto Rican diaspora contribute to the evolution of Plena?
.With what purpose did Tito Matos founded la Casa de la Plena? Do you consider la “casa” an artivism effort? How does it resist gentrification and displacement?
.How did Tito Matos nurture younger generations of “pleneres”? What role did inclusivity play in his activist pedagogy?
.In what other forms did Tito Matos perform his activism?
Puerto Rico’s colonial society, although deeply entrenched in the institution of slavery, never had as high a percentage of enslaved people compared to other Caribbean islands like Cuba or Saint-Domingue (Haiti), where plantation economies were even more intensive.
By the early 19th century, enslaved Africans and their descendants made up about 11-15% of Puerto Rico’s population. This figure fluctuated depending on economic factors like the growth of sugar plantations, coffee production, and overall labor demands. For instance, in the mid-19th century, right before slavery was officially abolished in 1873, the enslaved population was estimated to be around 6% of the island’s total population, reflecting changes in labor structures and demographic shifts over time.
The number of free Black people increased during the 19th century due to manumission and legal frameworks that allowed enslaved people to earn their freedom. At the time of abolition, free Black people significantly outnumbered the enslaved Black population.
Bio
Yolanda Arroyo Pizarro is a Puerto Rican writer. She has published books that promote the discussion of Afro-identity and sexual diversity. She is also the founder and chair of Ancestral Black Women, created in response to UNESCO’s call to celebrate the International Decade for People of African Descent. In 2015, the UN invited her to speak about women, slavery, and creativity as part of the Remembering Slavery Program.
Her short story collection Las Negras won the 2013 National Short Story Prize from the PEN Club of Puerto Rico and explores the limits of the development of female characters who challenge hierarchies of colonial power.
The stories from Negras, “Wanwe,” “Midwives,” and “Arrowhead” pay attention to the violence of the Atlantic slave trade, from the capture in Africa to the forced labor in Puerto Rico and the colonial punishments against rebellious women. Although slavery is the backdrop of the collection, Arroyo Pizarro emphasizes the inner world, brilliant skills, and humanity of her enslaved protagonists.
“Arrowhead” portrays the exploitation endured by enslaved women, emphasizing that slavery did not strip them of their humanity. Enslaved Africans were manipulated, their desires exploited, and they were subjected to terror. Tshanwe’s experiences demonstrate how slave traders relied on the humanity of their captives to make the cruelty they inflicted significant. Arroyo Pizarro uses her narratives to depict acts of rebellion and survival against these atrocities.
.Analyze how and why Arroyo Pizarro presents sexual labor in “Arrowhead.”
.In what ways does Arroyo Pizarro present patriarchal/colonial violence?
.Why do you think the author paid attention to the linguistic barriers at the plantation?
.What is the relevance of the Namaqua women warriors in the story?
.How do you interpret the ending? Examine different connotations, meanings, and transformations of the “arrowhead.”
Creative Writing Exercise
Write a short poem based on the perspective of one of Arroyo Pizarro’s characters. Emphasize in the poem how the character you choose reflects on slavery and, if applicable, how they maintain dignity while facing oppression.
II. Enslaved Women and Subversion: the Violence of Turbulent Women
Herstorian, activist, educator, and founding member of the Organisation of Women of African and Asian Descent (OWAAD), Stella Dadzie’s book A Kick in the Belly: Women, Slavery, and Resistance delves into the nature, legacy, and impacts of African enslavement. She examines, in particular, how women disrupted the trade and forced labor economies in Africa and the Caribbean.
4:20-8:56
How did enslaved women in the Caribbean defy, rebel, and subvert exploitation?
In her chapter, Stella Dadzie presents many cases in which enslaved women presented opposition to slavery, subverted plantation hierarchies, resisted labor exploitation, and worked toward manumission (buying their freedom). Dadzie also looks at escapes, conspirations, and insurrections.
Lastly, she examines how many enslaved women transmitted culture and spiritual and healing rituals. She considers these practices as forms of rebellion, too, because colonial and plantation systems were designed to discourage or entirely eliminate African and Afro-descendants’ cultural knowledge.
Some examples from Dadzie’s chapter:
.refusing to do assigned tasks or going to strike (114-5)
.disobedience and negligence (119-21)
.physical or psychological retaliation (116)
.using domestic intimacy and sexual labor as a way to gain freedom (118-9)
.escapes (122-4)
.plotting and instigating rebellions (124-8)
.killing and poisoning their enslavers and overseers (128-30)
.learning new languages and European/colonial cultural practices while preserving theirs (130-2)
Group Discussion: chain reactions
Briefly compare and discuss examples of rebellion from Dadzie’s text and the short story we read.
Did you find a form of resistance that surprised you, or you didn’t know about it?
What things do you know about the Lenape and the Arawak (Taíno) indigenous groups? What cosmovisions do they have in common? To what extent does colonization in the Caribbean and what is now the US resemble?
Writing Exercise
Interpreting the significance of “The Golden Flower” myth, what type of relationship did the Arawak (Taíno) peoples have with their ecosystem? What spiritual beliefs can we distill from the myth?
“Boriken’s First Peoples”
Dr. Jorell Meléndez Badillo is a historian of Puerto Rico, the Caribbean, and Latin America. His work focuses on the global circulation of radical ideas from the standpoint of working-class intellectual communities.
Puerto Rico: A National History (2024) introduces Puerto Rico, its history, and the contemporary political moment. It is a national history of a country without a nation-state. It tells how Puerto Rico has been colonized for more than five centuries. However, it also documents how the people have resisted colonial domination. Ultimately, the book provides readers with an informed argument of how and why Puerto Rico arrived at its current juncture and how Puerto Ricans imagine possible futures in the face of austerity, failing infrastructures, and the rubble left behind by colonial neglect.
Initial Questions
According to Meléndez Badillo, what are some challenges in assessing and understanding Arawak (Taíno) culture in Puerto Rico and the Antilles?
What description do we have of the social, political, and economic structures of Arawak (Taíno) societies in the Caribbean before European contact? How did these structures influence their initial responses to European arrival?
In what ways did the Taíno resist European conquest through direct confrontation and more subtle forms of resistance? How effective were these methods in preserving their culture and autonomy?
What role did Taíno leaders (caciques) play in organizing resistance against the European colonizers?
How did the introduction of European diseases and weapons impact the ability of Taíno societies to resist colonization? In what ways did these external factors shape the outcome of their resistance efforts?
Arawak Survival
According to the video, in which ways has the native Arawak (Taíno) legacy perdured in Puerto Rico?
How did Taíno spiritual beliefs and practices influence their resistance to European domination? To what extent did these cultural and religious elements help sustain the Taíno identity and resilience in the face of colonization?
Imperialism is a policy or ideology of extending a country’s rule over foreign nations, often by military force or gaining political and economic control of other areas.
Colonialism is the policy of a country seeking to extend or retain its authority over other people or territories, generally aiming for economic dominance. In the process, colonizers may impose their religion, economics, and other cultural practices on the Indigenous peoples.
Puerto Rico
.After the Spanish-American War, Puerto Rico became a prize/colony under a new empire.
.U.S. companies benefitted from the unincorporated territory (colonial) status.
.Puerto Ricans on the island cannot participate in US political decisions.
.Imposed citizenship tied to the recruitment of soldiers and workers and to debilitate the pro-independence movement.
.Migration as a safety vault after World War II.
.Ongoing indifference and neglect from (and in) the U.S.
II. Puerto Ricans Building the Institutions for the Next Generations of Latinosby Clara Rodríguez
Central Question:
What is the legacy of the Puerto Rican community in New York City?
.In this essay, Clara E. Rodríguez’ s interest is in “how established ethnic communities have provided the historical base upon newer communities have developed.” (57)
.After World War I “subsequent Spanish-speaking groups built upon the established Puerto Rican communities in New York.” (58)
.Although their number were few and their communities small… (first paragraph, 59)
.But this Puerto Rican im (migration) took place… (second paragraph, 59)
. “The early immigrants entered a world where any departure from the white, nonethnic American- whether in language, accent, culture, or color- was often a basis for exclusion and discrimination.”
. “Those large numbers of Puerto Ricans who came after World War II… entered a system that embraced the entrenched assimilationist ethics of an earlier period. The diversity, cosmopolitanism, and international flavor that is much a part of New York today… was seldom acknowledged or taught during this hiatus period.” (60)
. “But this Latinos pushed ahead in spite of these reactions, and their children came together in the ‘Pa’lante,’ of ‘Forward’ rallying call. In so doing, they carved out new cultural and social spaces for Latinos” in NYC. (60)
III. “Puerto Rican Obituary”
Pedro Pietri (1944-2004)
Puerto Rican poet, playwright, performer, and founder of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe. He was born in Ponce, Puerto Rico. However, his family moved to New York City in 1947 when he was only three. After graduating from high school, Pietri worked various jobs until he was drafted into the Army and sent to fight in the Vietnam War. The experiences he faced in the Army and Vietnam, plus the discrimination he witnessed while growing up in New York, were the leading factors that would forge his personality and style of poetry.
Upon his discharge from the Army, Pietri affiliated himself with the Puerto Rican Civil Rights group The Young Lords.
In 1969, he read his poem, “Puerto Rican Obituary,” at one of the Young Lords’ events for the first time. The poem sketched the lives of five Puerto Ricans who came to the United States with unfulfilled dreams. By turns angry, heartbreaking, and hopeful, it was embraced by young Puerto Ricans imbued with a sense of pride and nationalism. It was a cry for social and cultural self-determination.
. What social issues the poet is trying to put into perspective in “Puerto Rican Obituary”?
.What are the poem’s meanings of “death” and “dying”?
.What solutions does Pietri propose to these issues?
IV. Blackout Poetry Workshop
Instructions:
Today:
Creating the Blackout Poem:
Read your chosen document several times, identifying noteworthy words or phrases.
Using a pencil and then a black marker, carefully black out the words you do not want to include in your poem, leaving only the selected words visible.
The goal is to create a poem that conveys a new counter-meaning or highlights themes from the original document.
For next week:
Polishing the Poem:
Once the blackout process is complete with a pencil, review your poems and make any final adjustments.
Consider how the remaining words flow together and if they effectively capture your intended message or emotion.
Repeat the blackout process with a black marker.
Reflection and Sharing:
After completing your blackout poem, you will write a short reflection (one page) on your process. You should consider why you chose certain words, what themes emerged, and how your poem connects to the historical context of the original document.
