The Afro-Latin@ Reader

by Roman, Miriam Jimenez; Flores, Juan

• ISBN13: 9780822345589
• ISBN10: 0822345587
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2010-06-16
• Publisher: Duke Univ Pr

Summary

The Afro-Latin@ Readerfocuses attention on a large, vibrant, yet oddly invisible community in the United States: people of African descent from Latin America and the Caribbean. The presence of Afro-Latin@s in the United States (and throughout the Americas) belies the notion that Blacks and Latin@s are two distinct categories or cultures. Afro-Latin@s are uniquely situated to bridge the widening social divide between Latin@s and African Americans. At the same time, their experiences reveal pervasive racism among Latin@s and ethnocentrism among African Americans. Offering insight into Afro-Latin@ life and new ways to understand culture, ethnicity, nation, identity, and antiracist politics,The Afro-Latin@ Readerpresents a kaleidoscopic view of Black Latin@s in the United States. It addresses history, music, gender, class, and media representations in more than sixty selections, including scholarly essays, memoirs, newspaper and magazine articles, poetry, short stories, and interviews. While the selections cover centuries of Afro-Latin@ history, from the mid-sixteenth-century arrival of Spanish-speaking Africans to the present, the majority focus on the past fifty years. The central question of how Afro-Latin@s relate to and experience U.S. racial ideologies is engaged throughout, in first-person accounts of growing up Afro-Latin@, a classic essay by a leader of the Young Lords, and a sociological analysis of answers to U.S. Census questions about race, as well as in pieces on hair-straightening, major-league baseball, and the Yoruba tradition. The contributions that Afro-Latin@s have made to U.S. culture are highlighted in essays on the illustrious Afro-Puerto Rican educator Arturo Alfonso Schomburg and music and dance genres from salsa to mambo, and boogaloo to hip-hop. Taken together, these and many more selections help to bring Afro-Latin@s in the United States into critical view.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. xiii
Editorial Note	p. xv
Introduction	p. 1
Historical Background before 1900
The Earliest Africans in North America	p. 19
Black Pioneers: The Spanish-Speaking Afro-Americans of the Southwest	p. 27
Slave and Free Women of Color in the Spanish Ports of New Orleans, Mobile, and Pensacola	p. 38
Afro-Cubans in Tampa	p. 51
Excerpt from Pulling the Muse from the Drum	p. 62
Arturo Alfonso Schomburg
Excerpt from "Racial Integrity: A Plea for the Establishment of a Chair of Negro History in Our Schools and Colleges,"	p. 67
The World of Arturo Alfonso Schomburg	p. 70
Invoking Arturo Schomburg's Legacy in Philadelphia	p. 92
Afro-Latin@s on the Color Line
Black Cuban, Black American	p. 99
A Puerto Rican in New York and Other Sketches	p. 113
Melba Alvarado, El Club Cubano Inter-Americano, and the Creation of Afro-Cubanidades in New York City	p. 120
An Uneven Playing Field: Afro-Latinos in Major League Baseball	p. 127
Changing Identities: An Afro-Latin@ Family Portrait	p. 142
iEso era tremendo! An Afro-Cuban Musician Remembers	p. 150
Roots of Salsa: Afro-Latin@ Popular Music
From "Indianola" to "Ño Colá": The Strange Career of the Afro-Puerto Rican Musician	p. 157
Excerpt from cu/bop	p. 176
Bauzá-Gillespie-Latin/Jazz: Difference, Modernity, and the Black Caribbean	p. 177
Contesting that Damned Mambo: Arsenio Rodríguez and the People of El Barrio and the Bronx in the 1950s	p. 187
Boogaloo and Latin Soul	p. 199
Excerpt from the salsa of bethesda fountain	p. 207
Black Latin@ Sixties
Hair Conking; Buy Black	p. 211
Carlos A. Cooks: Dominican Garveyite in Harlem	p. 215
Down These Mean Streets	p. 219
African Things	p. 232
Black Notes and "You Do Something to Me,"	p. 233
Before People Called Me a Spic, They Called Me a Nigger	p. 235
Excerpt from Jíbaro, My Pretty Nigger	p. 244
The Yoruba Orisha Tradition Comes to New York City	p. 245
Reflections and Lived Experiences of Afro-Latin@ Religiosity	p. 252
Discovering Myself: Un Testimonio	p. 262
Excerpt from Dominicanish	p. 266
Afro-Latinas
The Black Puerto Rican Woman in Contemporary American Society	p. 269
Something Latino Was Up with Us	p. 276
Excerpt from Poem for My Grifa-Rican Sistah, or Broken Ends Broken Promises	p. 280
Latinegras: Desired Women-Undesirable Mothers, Daughters, Sisters, and Wives	p. 282
Letter to a Friend	p. 296
Uncovering Mirrors: Afro-Latina Lesbian Subjects	p. 298
The Black Bellybutton of a Bongo	p. 314
Public Images and (Mis)Representations
Notes on Eusebia Cosme and Juano Hernández	p. 319
Desde el Mero Medio: Race Discrimination within the Latin@ Community	p. 323
Displaying Identity: Dominicans in the Black Mosaic of Washington, D.C.	p. 326
Bringing the Soul: Afros, Black Empowerment, and Lucecita Benítez	p. 343
Can BET Make You Black? Remixing and Reshaping Latin@s on Black Entertainment Television	p. 358
The Afro-Latino Connection: Can this group be the bridge to a broadbased Black-Hispanic alliance?	p. 364
Afro-Latin@s in the Hip Hop Zone
Ghettocentricity, Blackness, and Pan-Latinidad	p. 373
Chicano Rap Roots: Afro-Mexico and Black-Brown Cultural Exchange	p. 387
The Rise and Fall of Reggaeton: From Daddy Yankee to Tego Calderón and Beyond	p. 396
Do Plátanos Go wit' Collard Greens?	p. 404
Divas Don't Yield	p. 411
Living Afro-Latinidades
An Afro-Latina's Quest for Inclusion	p. 417
Retracing Migration: From Samaná to New York and Back Again	p. 422
Negotiating among Invisibilities: Tales of Afro-Latinidades in the United States	p. 426
We Are Black Too: Experiences of a Honduran Garifuna	p. 431
Profile of an Afro-Latina: Black, Mexican, Both	p. 434
Enrique Patterson: Black Cuban Intellectual in Cuban Miami	p. 439
Reflections about Race by a Negrito Acomplejao	p. 445
Divisible Blackness: Reflections on Heterogeneity and Racial Identity	p. 453
Nigger-Reecan Blues	p. 467
Afro-Latin@s: Present and Future Tenses
How Race Counts for Hispanic Americans	p. 471
Bleach in the Rainbow: Latino Ethnicity and Preference for Whiteness	p. 485
Brown Like Me?	p. 499
An Oral History Project In Western Puerto Rico Against the Myth of Racial Harmony in Puerto Rico	p. 508
Mexican Ways, African Roots	p. 512
Afro-Latin@s and the Latin@ Workplace	p. 520
Racial Politics in Multiethnic America: Black and Latin@ Identities and Coalitions	p. 527
Afro-Latinism in United States Society: A Commentary	p. 540
Sources and Permissions	p. 547
Contributors	p. 551
Index	p. 559
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