The empire beats on: Oyo, Bata drums and hegemony in nineteenth-century Cuba

The Lukumí people of Cuba, currently known as Yoruba, are descendants of one of the mightiest West African kingdoms, the Oyo, Empire. The Oyo-Yoruba were important cultural contributors to certain areas of the New World such as Cuba, Brazil, Trinidad, and to some degree Haiti and the Lesser Antilles. Anthropologist William Bascom has said that “no African group has had greater influence on New World culture than the Yoruba.” ^ After the devastation of the empire around 1825, two new Oyos resuscitated. The first, New Oyo, was established about 80 miles south of the ancient site around 1830. The second Oyo was instituted on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, in the city of Havana and its surrounding towns. Much of Oyo lie, as ancient Oyo is now called, was transported to the New World, reformed and adapted according to its new surroundings, and, it preserved its reign over its “subjects” through the retention and dissemination of its cultural and religious practices. ^ Using an interdisciplinary approach, this investigation will argue that of all the African groups brought to Cuba, the Oyo-Yoruba were the most influential in shaping Afro-Cuban culture since their introduction in the nineteenth century. The existence of batá drums in Cuba and the cultural components of this musical genre will serve as one of many examples to illustrate the vitality of Oyo cultural hegemony over Afro-Cubans. It is arguable that these drums and the culture that surrounded them were very important instruments used by the Oyo to counter the acculturation of many Africans in Cuba. Likewise, this culture became acculturative in itself by imposing its religious world views on non-Oyo ethnics and their descendants. Oral histories and narratives collected among Lukumí practitioners on the island and abroad have been invaluable archives to supplement and/or complement primary and secondary sources of information. ^

Invisible but not forgotten: The Afro-Argentine and Afro-Uruguayan experience from the sixteenth to the twentieth centuries

The problem to be examined in this thesis involves the supposedly overlooked history and contributions of Africans and their descendants in the River Plate countries of Argentina and Uruguay. Therefore, the primary purpose of the study is to narrate the social history of Afro-Argentines and Afro-Uruguayans from the sixteenth to the twentieth century. A secondary purpose, moreover, is to synthesize the academic literature on Blacks in the Rio de la Plata and their many cultural and other contributions to the current nation-states of Argentina and Uruguay. This thesis thereby challenges the regnant historiographical argument that African Argentines and African Uruguayans have been “forgotten” as historical actors by scholars both inside and outside the Rio de la Plata. By synthesizing the large body of historical and social science scholarship on Africans in the River Plate, as well as providing a thorough bibliography on the subject, this study attempts to proffer (to borrow the subtitle of Marvin Lewis' 1996 study of Afro-Argentine literature) “another dimension of the Black Diaspora” to the Americas. ^

Savages into citizens: Families, political purge, and reconciliation in Cordoba, Argentina, 1820--1862

This dissertation explores the political exclusion and reintegration of families and individuals in Córdoba, Argentina during the early nineteenth-century. Part one is an examination of how Federals in Córdoba managed the process of political identification and purge. Federals set up ad hoc institutions that were responsible for targeting political subversives within provincial communities. From 1831 to 1852, Federals managed to target, or “classify,” over 400 individuals and families in various towns and villages as “savage Unitarians,” a political label that meant the certain loss of rights, property, exile, and worse. Federals also sought active participation among “citizens” from all levels of society. Thus, I argue that the process of correctly identifying a “savage Unitarian” in Córdoba was constantly subject to modification at the local level. I also reconstruct the stories of accused families as they struggled to survive the political purges. Many of the families were large landowners and wealthy merchants, confirming that early republican Argentine political struggles were often intra-elite affairs. However, the “classified” individuals and families also represented a variety of socio-economic, ethnic, and racial groups. ^ The second part of this study focuses on families who petitioned Federal authorities for the restitution of rights and property. They proclaimed their loyalty to the “Federal cause,” and often, they had friends and family who could vouch for their claims. These petitions forced Federal authorities to doubt the precision of political identification and re-think how the ideology of Federalism was defined. Authorities granted most requests for repatriation, thereby creating a process of reintegration that included amnesty and restitution. Yet, this system failed to repair the psychological, emotional, materials, and political effects of political purge. Conflicts between society and state led to numerous misunderstandings about what restitution, justice, and reconciliation meant. The new regime's leaders more often denied restitution claims to formerly accused families and individuals, demonstrating that the journey from “savage” to citizen left an indelible imprint on family life in mid-nineteenth century Argentina. ^

Civilizing the tropics: The highlanders' failed attempt to transform the Colombian Amazon, 1850--1930

The subject of this dissertation is the nature of the environmental transformations, both symbolic and physical, that took place in Colombia between 1850 and 1930. This period begins with the attempt by the Colombian elite to leave behind colonial ties, overcome economic disorganization, and link Colombia to the international market. These efforts were part of a general project to “civilize” this tropical country. The period closes with the transition toward an industrialization and urbanization process led by the Colombian state during the 1930s. ^ Frequently, environmental studies as an academic field are dominated by biological concerns. However, most environmental thinking accepts their interdisciplinary nature. Under this framework not only spatial but also symbolic concerns are key elements in understanding environmental transformations. ^ This study finds that despite several attempts to transform the Colombian landscape physically, most of the substantive changes were localized and circumscribed to the Andean region. Other changes were mainly symbolic. This dissertation thus uses the Amazon as one of several regions that did not experience significant changes in the forest canopy. While highlanders originally dreamed of the Amazon as an untapped El Dorado, their failed attempts to exploit the region caused them to imagine it as a nightmarish “green hell”. ^ This dissertation concentrates on three pairs of concepts: tropicality/civilization, landscape/territory, and symbolic/material changes. It presents both a general vision of Colombia and case studies of three regions: Cundinamarca, and Cauca Valley are used to compare with the Amazon region that is developed at length. Whereas mainstream Colombian histories have either fixated on the Andean highlands or, in a relegated second place, on the Caribbean region, this dissertation attempts to significantly contribute to the historiography of Colombia by focusing on the largely neglected Amazonian region. ^ To understand imageries about Colombia's landscape, the dissertation relies on travel writings, chorographic descriptions and maps. It also makes uses legal documents and other published primary sources, including literary pieces and memoirs. ^

"And a child shall lead them?": Slavery, childhood, and African cultural identity in Jamaica, 1750--1838

Based primarily on archival evidence collected in Jamaica, this dissertation examined the nature of childhood in the plantation complex between 1750 and 1838, how colonial society and the slave community defined childhood, and how that definition changed over time. It proves how childhood and slavery influenced and changed each other during these years, with the abolitionist movement standing as the main catalyst for change. Although this project chronologically examined the changing nature of slave childhood in Jamaica through four shifts of Jamaican history, each chapter topically focused on slave childhood through the lenses of labor, family, resistance, race, status, culture, education, and freedom. ^ The research showed that although slavery forced slave children into an early adulthood, childhood was a contested process that changed with each generation of children. As the abolitionist movement motivated changes in planter opinion on the value of children to the plantation economy, planters placed increased responsibility on slave children to lead them towards economic stability and profitability. Meanwhile, slave children struggled to survive slavery by reinventing and modifying their ideas of family and kinship and reacting to their situation through various acts of resistance. Although slave parents gained many opportunities to raise their children on their own terms, they struggled to maintain control over that process as planters attempted to change the nature of African cultural identity in Jamaica by impressing Christian and English values on slave children. Under apprenticeship, childhood returned to its previous status as a liability in the eyes of the Jamaican planters. Yet, Jamaican children faced the prospect of an unwritten childhood, one that was free from planter control and gave Jamaican laborers hope for the future. In the end, this dissertation told the story of an overlooked childhood, one that was often defined by Jamaican planters, but frequently contested by the slaves themselves. ^

Una sociedad legalista: Abogados, procuradores de causas y la creación de una cultura legal colonial en Lima y Potosí, 1540–1670

This study deals with the formation, reproduction, and the role in litigation of two branches of the legal profession, lawyers and procurators. They were the experts in charge of civil, criminal, and ecclesiastical litigation during the Old Regime. While the lawyers provided erudite legal advice, procurators oriented and drove the procedure as legal representatives of their clients. The European legal revolutions of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries forged a new legal culture in which the lawsuit was reputed to be the best way to settle disputes. Likewise, that legal culture conferred an important place to specialists as legal facilitators of the contending parties. When Castilians exported their legal system to the New World, they spread a complex and bureaucratic framework, contributing to the reproduction of a class of experts in urban spaces. Lima and Potosi, two urban centers created in the sixteenth century, quickly became significant ‘legal cities’. This dissertation explores how the legal markets of these cities operated, the careers of their specialists, their professional options, social images regarding them, and litigation costs. This study examines the careers of 267 facilitators and demonstrates that they constituted a class of distinctive legal professionals. Legal culture embodies the representation and use of law. The closeness of specialists with litigants, in particular of procurators familiarized the parties with litigation and its complex processes. These specialists forged dominant legal discourses and manipulated juridical order. Litigants were not passive agents of their specialists. Caciques and members of the Hispanicized communities appropriated the law in a visible way as the growing litigiousness illustrates. Colonial law (of a pluralistic basis) was an arena of assertion and discussion of rights by different social actors, encomenderos, leading citizens, widows, native chieftains, artisans, and commoners. This study concludes that this struggle and manipulation served to legitimate the role of those legal experts and gave birth to a complex legalistic society in the Andes under Spanish Habsburg rule.

Liberalization without decentralization: Haiti under Namphy and Delatour, 1986–1987

Following Haitian President Jean-Claude Duvalier's flight into exile in February 1986, the President of Haiti's provisional Conseil National de Gouvernement (CNG), Lieutenant General Henri Namphy, and his Minister of Finance, Leslie Delatour, enacted liberal reforms. This study examined their initial doctrine, decrees, and institutions for democratization and free markets, within a historical context of over-centralization and exclusion. Its purpose was to explore the contradiction and consequences of pursuing liberalization by decree, without significant decentralization. The author extracted CNG doctrine from speeches, legislation, and economic records. He then juxtaposed it with the adverse results of market reforms and popular reactions gathered from nine Haitian newspapers and two archival collections. He found that CNG doctrine and institutions were inadequate for resolving exclusion and popular discontent. Rather the deficiency of market reforms and the insufficiency of representative institutions exacerbated exclusion, which the author identified as the source of confrontation and violence in 1987.

Para subsistir dignamente: Alberto Yarini and the search for Cubanidad, 1882-1910

This study looks at the broader transformations in Cuban history through the case study of a single, yet symbolic, man, and proposes a new paradigm for understanding the dynamics of Cuban society and culture. It also examines the implications for Cuba’s aspiring national identity at the turn of the twentieth century, by detailing the interplay between fact and fiction in the story of Alberto Yarini: elite born; well-educated; politically and socially well-connected; powerful; and celebrated Cuban racketeer and chulo (pimp). Yarini was described as vibrant and triumphant at a time when other nation-building forces in Cuba were weak and ambivalent. A century after his dramatic death, Yarini became the quintessential public man in Cuban lore who symbolized a cubanidad (Cuban national identity) not defined in terms of the ideological hegemony of class, race, or gender, and who through his actions dispelled the ambivalence that plagued Cuban nationalism. Using archival documents, contemporary newspaper accounts, court records, memoirs, and published works, this study analyzes the confluence of national events and individual action in the formation of Cuban national identity. It contends that for Cuba, the failure of nation-building experiments resulted in an ambivalent national identity based on failed philosophical and political ideals of equality and prosperity. These ideals played out within the context of the realities of racial discrimination, political dissonance, and class and gender barriers. Instead of a cohesive sense of national character, for Cubans the result was a competing set of identities including a populist version that was defined through identification with antitypes and pseudo-heroes such as Alberto Yarini y Ponce de León (1882-1910), a rising politician and celebrated chulo of the early republic. The telling and retelling of his story has given rise to what has been termed the island nation’s first national myth – one that continues to evolve and grow in the twenty-first century. For many Cubans, the Yarini antitype provided an idealized national identity which in many ways was—and many argue continues to be— the expression of an elusive and ambivalent cubanidad.

Negotiating identities, striving for state recognition: Blacks in Córdoba, Argentina 1776–1853

Race in Argentina played a significant role as a highly durable construct by identifying and advancing subjects (1776–1810) and citizens (1811–1853). My dissertation explores the intricacies of power relations by focusing on the ways in which race informed the legal process during the transition from a colonial to national State. It argues that the State’s development in both the colonial and national periods depended upon defining and classifying African descendants. In response, people of African descendent used the State’s assigned definitions and classifications to advance their legal identities. It employs race and culture as operative concepts, and law as a representation of the sometimes, tense relationship between social practices and the State’s concern for social peace. This dissertation examines the dynamic nature of the court. It utilizes the theoretical concepts multicentric legal orders that are analyzed through weak and strong legal pluralisms, and jurisdictional politics, from the late eighteenth to early nineteenth centuries. This dissertation juxtaposes various levels of jurisdiction (canon/state law and colonial/national law) to illuminate how people of color used the legal system to ameliorate their social condition. In each chapter the primary source materials are state generated documents which include criminal, ecclesiastical, civil, and marriage dissent court cases along with notarial and census records. Though it would appear that these documents would provide a superficial understanding of people of color, my analysis provides both a top-down and bottom-up approach that reflects a continuous negotiation for African descendants’ goal for State recognition. These approaches allow for implicit or explicit negotiation of a legal identity that transformed slaves and free African descendants into active agents of their own destinies.

Pirates, exiles, and empire: English seamen, Atlantic expansion, and Jamaican settlement, 1558–1658

A life of piracy offered marginal men a profession with a degree of autonomy, despite the brand of "outlaw" and the fear of prosecution. At various times throughout history, governments and crowned heads suspended much of their piracy prosecution, licensing men to work as "privateers" for the state, supplementing naval forces. This practice has a long history, but in sixteenth-century England, Elizabeth I (1558-1603) significantly altered this tradition. Recognizing her own weakness in effectively prosecuting these men and the profit they could contribute to the government, Elizabeth began incorporating pirates into the English naval corps in peacetime—not just in war. This practice increased English naval resources, income, and presence in the emerging Atlantic World, but also increased conflict with the powerful Spanish empire. By 1605, making peace with Spain, James VI/I (1603-1625) retracted Elizabeth's privateering promotion, prompting an emigration of English seamen to the American outposts they had developed in the previous century. Now exiles, no longer beholden to the Crown, seamen reverted back to piracy. The Carolinas and Jamaica served as bases for these rover communities. In 1650, the revolutionary leader Oliver Cromwell (1649-1658) once again recognized the merits of such policies. Determined to demonstrate his authority and solidify his rule, Cromwell offered citizenship and state support to Caribbean exiles in exchange for their aiding of his navy in the taking of Spanish Jamaica. Official chartering of Port Royal, Jamaica served as reward for these men's efforts and as the culmination of a century-long cycle of piracy legislation, creating one of England's most lucrative colonies in the middle of a traditionally Spanish Caribbean empire. Through legal and diplomatic records, correspondence, and naval and demographic records from England and Spain, this dissertation explores early modern piracy/privateering policy and its impact on the development of the Atlantic World. European disputes and imperial competition converged in these piracy debates with significant consequences for the definitions of criminality and citizenship and for the development of Atlantic empire.

Links across the Gulfstream: The Florida /Bahamas zone, 1780–1900

The links created between Florida and the Bahamas from 1780 to 1900 constituted a major influence in the evolution of a unique society. This dissertation adds to the understanding of this topic by using primary sources and architecture to follow the odyssey of the people who shaped this region. Building on the historiography which examined each area separately, this work focused on the ties forged in the interactions between Florida and the Bahamas. Following the immigrants who shaped Florida and the Bahamas, this work examines cultural holdovers which influenced this region during times of demographic flux. Aesthetic preferences stood out as one way that people maintained connections to their past. The use of architecture as a lens to view this process provides a concrete example of this phenomenon. The societies of Florida and the Bahamas remained intertwined during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Forced migrations shaped the trajectory of the evolution of a distinctive culture in these areas bordered by the Gulfstream. This dissertation proves that the links forged between these societies reinforced the patterns which endured throughout the maturation of this area.

Influence of religious coping on the substance use and HIV risk behaviors of recent Latino immigrants

This study examines the influence of acculturative stress on substance use and HIV risk behaviors among recent Latino immigrants. The central hypothesis of the study is that specific religious coping mechanisms influence the relationship that acculturative stress has on the substance use and HIV-risk behaviors of recent Latino immigrants. Within the Latino culture religiosity is a pervasive force, guiding attitudes, behaviors, and even social interactions. When controlling for education and socioeconomic status, Latinos have been found to use religious coping mechanisms more frequently than their Non-Latino White counterparts. In addition, less acculturated Latinos use religious coping strategies more frequently than those with higher levels of acculturation. Given its prominent role in Latino culture, it appears probable that this mechanism may prove to be influential during difficult life transitions, such as those experienced during the immigration process. This study examines the moderating influence of specific religious coping mechanisms on the relationship between acculturative stress and substance use/HIV risk behaviors of recent Latino immigrants. Analyses for the present study were conducted with wave 2 data from an ongoing longitudinal study investigating associations between pre-immigration factors and health behavior trajectories of recent Latino immigrants. Structural equation and zero-inflated Poisson modeling were implemented to test the specified models and examine the nature of the relationship among the variables. Moderating effects were found for negative religious coping. Higher levels of negative religious coping strengthened an inverse relationship between acculturative stress and substance use. Results also indicated direct relationships between religious coping mechanisms and substance use. External and positive religious coping were inversely related to substance use. Negative religious coping was positively related to substance use. This study aims to contribute knowledge of how religious coping influence's the adaptation process of recent Latino immigrants. Expanding scientific understanding as to the function and effect of these coping mechanisms could lead to enhanced culturally relevant approaches in service delivery among Latino populations. Furthermore this knowledge could inform research about specific cognitions and behaviors that need to be targeted in prevention and treatment programs with this population.

Desarrollismo y el progreso en la Argentina : un aporte marxista

El desarrollismo como ideología política enervó buena parte de la trama latinoamericana de las décadas de 1950 y de 1960. Si bien muchas veces se la puede entender como la mera adaptación del keynesianismo y la economía del desarrollo a las condiciones regionales, sus fuentes ideológicas resultaron mucho más complejas. Su configuración híbrida contuvo una mezcla de nacionalismo, economía del desarrollo, junto con marxismo y positivismo. Entre los ideólogos del desarrollismo argentino, nos interesa estudiar el aporte de un intelectual de formación leninista ortodoxa, Juan José Real, cuya participación resultaría problemática en el contexto de la agudización de la llamada Guerra Fría. En una mirada que combinaba la idea de ley aplicada a la historia y la voluntad como herramienta de cambio, Real sostenía que la etapa histórica que vivía el país requería la formación de un frente político cuyo objetivo debería ser la profundización del desarrollo capitalista, con la colaboración del capital extranjero, como la etapa necesaria para completar la formación de una nación, bajo el liderazgo de una burguesía modernizante.

Desarrollismo y el progreso en la Argentina : un aporte marxista

El desarrollismo como ideología política enervó buena parte de la trama latinoamericana de las décadas de 1950 y de 1960. Si bien muchas veces se la puede entender como la mera adaptación del keynesianismo y la economía del desarrollo a las condiciones regionales, sus fuentes ideológicas resultaron mucho más complejas. Su configuración híbrida contuvo una mezcla de nacionalismo, economía del desarrollo, junto con marxismo y positivismo. Entre los ideólogos del desarrollismo argentino, nos interesa estudiar el aporte de un intelectual de formación leninista ortodoxa, Juan José Real, cuya participación resultaría problemática en el contexto de la agudización de la llamada Guerra Fría. En una mirada que combinaba la idea de ley aplicada a la historia y la voluntad como herramienta de cambio, Real sostenía que la etapa histórica que vivía el país requería la formación de un frente político cuyo objetivo debería ser la profundización del desarrollo capitalista, con la colaboración del capital extranjero, como la etapa necesaria para completar la formación de una nación, bajo el liderazgo de una burguesía modernizante.

Desarrollismo y el progreso en la Argentina : un aporte marxista

El desarrollismo como ideología política enervó buena parte de la trama latinoamericana de las décadas de 1950 y de 1960. Si bien muchas veces se la puede entender como la mera adaptación del keynesianismo y la economía del desarrollo a las condiciones regionales, sus fuentes ideológicas resultaron mucho más complejas. Su configuración híbrida contuvo una mezcla de nacionalismo, economía del desarrollo, junto con marxismo y positivismo. Entre los ideólogos del desarrollismo argentino, nos interesa estudiar el aporte de un intelectual de formación leninista ortodoxa, Juan José Real, cuya participación resultaría problemática en el contexto de la agudización de la llamada Guerra Fría. En una mirada que combinaba la idea de ley aplicada a la historia y la voluntad como herramienta de cambio, Real sostenía que la etapa histórica que vivía el país requería la formación de un frente político cuyo objetivo debería ser la profundización del desarrollo capitalista, con la colaboración del capital extranjero, como la etapa necesaria para completar la formación de una nación, bajo el liderazgo de una burguesía modernizante.