Entry Questions
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.
Class Presentation
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.
Group Discussions
Group One
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?