Political and racial discrimination cases

Feb. 20-26/Assignment 4: The Cuban Search for Nationhood [Discussion Board Forum]

Required Viewing/Readings:

1. Video: Jose Marti, in ‘Empire of Dreams,‘ Latino Americans 2, 2014. Jose Marti (12 min., Timestamp 4:10-16:50)

2. Historical Document: Jose Marti, ‘A Letter to the Board of Advisors for Key West,’ (1893) Cory Ledoux, ed., Our Americas Archive Partnership, Rice University, 2018, 5-7: Letter to the Key West Board of Advisors

3. Article: Gillian Finklea, ‘African Americans in Ybor City: Minorities of the Latin City,’ Univ. of Tampa, 2012, 5-40: African Americans in Ybor City African Americans in Ybor City – Alternative Formats

Discussion Board Question for Assignment 4 (see below for background):

Based on both the assigned segments of the Jose Marti video and Marti’s letter–as well as on the assigned reading on Afro-Cubans in Ybor City–post an initial response that synthesizes the political as well as social and cultural aspects of the Cuban-American search for nationhood. To what extent was Tampa’s Afro-Cuban community able to manifest nationalistic solidarity in the face of external segregation and discrimination, as covered in detail the Finklea article?

Historical Background:

This assignment’s video and readings assess the legacy of Jose Marti in the late 1800s as well as the role of Cubans in U.S. society in the early part of the twentieth century. Marti was a writer and early leader of the Cuban independence movement that sought separation from Spain and which began in 1868, It was renewed in 1895 with the onset of the Cuban-Spanish-American War, at which time Marti died in battle.

The second reading on Ybor City examines patterns of Cuban settlement and racial-ethnic conflict in the Tampa community in the early twentieth century. Southern Florida became an important extension of the Cuban presence in the U.S. Many Cubans, including a large contingent of Afro-Cubans, went to Key West and Ybor City (an immigrant neighborhood in Tampa) to seek work in cigar factories as tabaquerosand also to escape Spanish persecution and plan for revolts in their homeland. They continued migrating even after the establishment of the Republic of Cuba in 1902, however the Cuban and Cuban-American search for independent nationhood continued to face opposition on many fronts even after the success of Castro’s 1959 Revolution and the ensuing mass departure of exiles to Miami.

Materials:

Answer preview

However, despite the discrimination and external segregation, the Afro-Cuban community could foster nationalistic solidarity at the end of World War II when the Civil Rights movement influenced the various aspects that once discriminated against the Afro-Cuban. For instance, the Afro-Cubans were allowed to join the Marti-Maceo mutual aid club and formed closer relationships with African Americans through intermarriages (Finklea, 2012). The close association between Afro-Cubans and African-Americans was based on a common course, to overthrow Jim Crow’s laws and be accepted in society. The collaboration between the Afro-Cubans and the African-Americans played a key role in attaining liberation from white supremacists, as they realized they had much in common with the Anglos.

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