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Caribbean Literature refers to the body of written works produced by authors from the Caribbean region, encompassing diverse genres and languages. It reflects the unique cultural, historical, and social experiences of Caribbean societies, often addressing themes of identity, colonialism, migration, and the interplay of various cultural influences.

El artículo examina la representación de la infancia en la literatura caribeña contemporánea a través del concepto poéticas de la niñería perversa. A partir del análisis de Papi (2005) de Rita Indiana Hernández y El pie de mi padre (2002)...more

El artículo examina la representación de la infancia en la literatura caribeña contemporánea a través del concepto poéticas de la niñería perversa. A partir del análisis de Papi (2005) de Rita Indiana Hernández y El pie de mi padre (2002) de Zoé Valdés, se estudia cómo las autoras desafían la representación convencional de la infancia mediante personajes como la hija del narcotraficante, Alma Desamparada y Black Hole. Para esto, se profundiza en experiencias marcadas por la violencia, los abusos y la desviación de la sexualidad normativa como elementos constitutivos y distintivos de la identidad de los personajes. Los principales referentes teóricos en este estudio son Jean Baudrillard, Georges Bataille, Julia Kristeva y Michel Foucault, pues sus reflexiones sobre lo abyecto y la tipología de individuos monstruosos, correccionarios y onanistas permiten explorar esta poética emergente.

The wholly unexpected and anomalous award of the prestigious European Council prize to the Krasnoiarsk Museum Center (Siberia) in 1998 for "contributing to the development of European ideas" caused a minor international...more

The wholly unexpected and anomalous award of the prestigious European Council prize to the Krasnoiarsk Museum Center (Siberia) in 1998 for "contributing to the development of European ideas" caused a minor international sensation. A refurbished version of the former Lenin Museum, which opened during glasnost, the Museum Center became an experimental exhibition ground that showed remarkable imagination and resourcefulness in realizing the potential of an excellently equipped building, advantageous location, and enormous open spaces. Collaborating with lively local movements, the Center simultaneously imported traveling exhibits from other museums and arranged expositions that thematized its geographical identity. The two Biennials organized by the Center (1995, 1997) demonstrated the artistic rewards of integrating architecture and local territory into a novel conceptual product original enough to compete in the international cultural market.

… the poor past used to believe in us, his great grandchildren. He dreamed that we could escape from the trap which in every generation was set by Danton and Robespierre, Beria and the other ambitious disciples. Because there is no...more

… the poor past used to believe in us, his great grandchildren. He dreamed that we could escape from the trap which in every generation was set by Danton and Robespierre, Beria and the other ambitious disciples. Because there is no refuge, there is refuge. Because invisible things exist together with sounds that no one hears. There is no consolation and there is consolation, under the elbow of desire, where pearls would grow, if only tears had memories. … dawn and the milkman get up early and run through the snow, leaving white traces, soon filled with water. A small bird drinks that water and it sings and once more it saves the disorder of things and you and me and the singing.

The fear of the unknown, the fear of Sycorax, both because she is female and dark as in both being unknown and dark-skinned is what still holds this piece of land.., in thrall to Europe and Prospero. While being articulate in...more

The fear of the unknown, the fear of Sycorax, both because she is female and dark as in both being unknown and dark-skinned is what still holds this piece of land.., in thrall to Europe and Prospero. While being articulate in Caliban's and so Prospero's tongues, we are still dumb in the language of Sycorax, whatever that might be. We await the Ceremony of the Souls. --M. NourbeSe Philip, "A Piece of Land Surrounded" ... This damned witch, Sycorax / For mischiefs manifold, and sorceries [too] terrible / To enter human hearing, from Algiers, / Thou know'st, was banished./... --Shakespeare, "The Tempest" Abstract Working from the perspective of decolonial feminism, this essay critiques works that view Caliban in Shakespeare's The Tempest (1611) as a symbol of resistance to eurocentrism, as represented in the character of Prospero. I focus on the literary figure Sycorax, the racialized, sexualized and witched mother of Caliban, because the celebration...

The purpose of this article is to analyse alliteration in proverbs. These are creations of the collective imaginary or facts of the language belonging to the expressive linguistic area of a specific people. Like other mnemotechnical means...more

The purpose of this article is to analyse alliteration in proverbs. These are creations of the collective imaginary or facts of the language belonging to the expressive linguistic area of a specific people. Like other mnemotechnical means such as rhyme or assonance, the alliteration contributes to put out in bold relief the music and the rhythm in proverbs. It also helps to make the ideas whith a moral value more obvious. I have described the structure of the alliteration, especially in arranging the alliterant words. I have also emphasized the effects of using this stylistic means which is frequently used in paremiology.

Water is dizzyingly vast in the form of ocean. While the “world ocean” comprises “the dominant feature of planet Earth” (Rozwadowski), water is intimately close and organic, forming 60% of our body and 73% of our brain. This paradox is...more

Water is dizzyingly vast in the form of ocean. While the “world ocean” comprises “the dominant feature of planet Earth” (Rozwadowski), water is intimately close and organic, forming 60% of our body and 73% of our brain. This paradox is materialized when we encounter water bodies and forms. The word “encounter” in the preceding sentence instantly poses a political issue: the scarcity or abundance of water resources and the consequent challenges; for example, the Middle East, having only 1.4% of the world’s renewable freshwater, has been struggling with processing drinking water while Bangladesh, having more than 6% of its land as permanent water, has been grappling with flood and water body encroachment. These challenges are sometimes more than natural, especially when control of internal water bodies (lake, ground water) and transboundary rivers conditions international relations and justice. It is against this scenario that this Plenary gathers insights from Blue Humanities, Literary Ecology, Planetarity, and Decoloniality to propose a pedagogical framework for planetary comparative literature.       
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The plenary is premised upon the conviction that we now need a critical-affective venture of ‘translating’ not only of words but of the world that is as peopled by humans as animated by living and non-living nature. This venture requires collaborative (playing different roles) and collective (towards shared agenda) contributions, involving human personnel from across nations, cultures, ethnicities, and languages. Comparative literature, due to its transnational and cross-linguistic reach, is one of the best means that enable us to form inter-cultural collective interactions and activate planetary pedagogy – one that broaches animal and environmental issues across the planet so that we share insights, accommodate diversities, respond affirmatively, and translate (transform) productively.
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In a bid to sample what planetary pedagogy is like, this Plenary offers an outline of a course on planetary comparative literature that addresses water-imagining (how we use myths and narratives for identity formation), blue economy (how we exploit and optimize water and marine environment), and hydropolitics (how states manage transnational water bodies). For this Plenary, I will concentrate on the literatures of South Asia and Middle East. I intend to sample a handful of classical and modern literatures of Bangladesh and India from South Asia and Iraq, Israel, Palestine, and Syria from Middle East to chart the shift from ‘reverence’ for water bodies in classical literatures (e.g. Kalidasa’s Meghdutam and Abu Nuwas’ ‘river poems’) to the contemporary writers’ takes on the politics of ‘rupture’ embodied by hypermodernity (e.g. Chakma poems on Kaptai Dam and Palestinian ‘hydrofiction’ that exposes how the Palestine-Israel conflict involves not only land but also ‘water justice’). The pedagogical framework proposes transnational collaboration in order to accommodate personnel (teachers, learners) from more than one country and raise funding or grants for comparative Blue Humanities due to its effective participation in initiating or challenging large strategic interests. Addressing the issues of relevance and sustainability that current market-driven pedagogies are posing for the Humanities, I contend that planetary comparative literature on hydropolitics is sustainable: it mobilizes people not to lose heart rather innovate ways to combat climate crises and it equips readers and leaders with ideas and inspiration for uncertain futures.

N , I     our little prejudices against dialect. Writers have been criticised for making such free use of it: some people seem to feel that readers abroad would get the impression that we can't or never speak proper...more

N , I     our little prejudices against dialect. Writers have been criticised for making such free use of it: some people seem to feel that readers abroad would get the impression that we can't or never speak proper English. Closer to home, there are a lot of reasons against it which you would know for yourselves -one should say 'How are you,'  'what happening?'. Our dialect has its roots among whom are called 'common' people, and the quicker one can dissociate one's self from this group, the more the chances of social success. But what in fact is wrong with dialect? All over the world there are people who have their own peculiar way of speaking, who take a language and break it up to suit their needs, ignoring the rules of grammar. It might surprise some of you to know that in England, home of the English language, there are great sections of the population who speak their own kind of English: the Cockneys are perhaps the most widely known. If readers could take the various dialects spoken all over England, not to mention the varieties of the language all over the world, I didn't see why ours was harder to understand or make sense. In fact, the more I reflected on our picturesque manner of speaking, the more convinced I became that there was a rhythm and flavour here which was unique and attractive. The idea came to me that if I could use this dialect writing correct spelling, it might be possible to retain most of the essential qualities of rhythm and flow and still make it easier to be accepted by people who had no knowledge of the way we speak. Experiment soon proved that this was the answer to the problem. I not only captured a wider audience but I found a fluency and ease in expressing my thoughts and ideas. This followed naturally, as being a born and bred Trinidadian, I was much more at home with the dialect than with standard English.

This essay examines the ways that genocide is always rhetorically justified and inscribed on the body before it is literally enacted, as well as the ways that the act of defining what constitutes a genocide is a shifting, politically...more

This essay examines the ways that genocide is always rhetorically justified and inscribed on the body before it is literally enacted, as well as the ways that the act of defining what constitutes a genocide is a shifting, politically motivated, and fraught process of uncertainty, social positioning, and willful ignorance. I begin this exploration with two symbolic texts – Coetzee’s Waiting for the Barbarians and Paul Lynch’s 2023 novel Prophet Song – as both situate totalitarianism, resistance, and genocide within the space of simultaneity the always eminent, already past, and pervasively present. Neither text focuses on an actual historical event, but both illustrate the ways that humanity has and will continue to engage in the same cycles of violent erasure. Finally, I bring these texts into conversation with Edwidge Danticat’s 1998 novel The Farming of Bones and the ways that its protagonist, unlike the Magistrate, rhetorically exhumes the bones of the Haitians who were murdered during the historical Parsley Massacre of 1937 ordered by Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina, then dictator of the Dominican Republic.

V. S. Naipaul was one of the most prolific writers of the modern time. His writings fluctuate between a sense of psychological crisis triggered by collapse of colonization towards the midst Twentieth century and the meaning of a free man....more

V. S. Naipaul was one of the most prolific writers of the modern time. His writings fluctuate between a sense of psychological crisis triggered by collapse of colonization towards the midst Twentieth century and the meaning of a free man. In other words, his writings look at what does it take to be a free man in a decolonized world; whether this freedom is achieved at the cost of the crisis or within the crisis, or whether the crisis itself is a part of the freedom. However, the understanding of the answer to these questions in his readers seems to be very limiting. The sense of the crisis and the freedom in him has been understood as something narrowing and damaging. However, this can be contested and the sense of crisis, its cause and affect can be best understood with a point of reference to the idea of "irresponsibility" and "contamination" in Jacques Derrida and Gayatri Spivak. His discourse is a meditation on several world contexts-Indian, European, African and Caribbean for instance. This paper contends to say and establish that the sense of crisis in Naipaul as far as his writings on the Caribbean context are concerned, is not damaging, rather it is an enabling phenomenon ensuring a sense of freedom.

This paper seeks to examine how Caryl Phillips in his neo-slave narratives, revisit the history of slavery by allowing their characters reveal their traumatic memories. It aims to demonstrate how slave victims uncover and recover the...more

This paper seeks to examine how Caryl Phillips in his neo-slave narratives, revisit the history of slavery by allowing their characters reveal their traumatic memories. It aims to demonstrate how slave victims uncover and recover the forgotten and manipulated histories of their bondage. The neoslave narratives under study include Higher Ground, Cambridge, Crossing the River and The Nature of Blood. The analysis of these novels is based on the assumption that the characters reconstruct history by recounting their experiences through memory. Informed by psychoanalysis and new historicism theory, the study finds that memory recovery takes place through a constant shift from present to past both in the characters’ psyche and in the narrative. It reveals that the narrative methods used by Phillips to revisit the history of slavery, re-centers the voice of slaves giving them therefore the occasion to tell their own tale. These narrative methods highlight the way that the dismantling of a ...

Many postcolonial writers have entered into a critical dialogue with English classic texts, where the classic text is revised and functions as an important imaginative resource. If as John Mc Lead puts it in Beginning Postcolonialism, “A...more

Many postcolonial writers have entered into a critical dialogue with English classic texts, where the classic text is revised and functions as an important imaginative resource. If as John Mc Lead puts it in Beginning Postcolonialism, “A re-writing often e to resist or challenge colonialist representations of colonised peoples and culture perceived in the source text” (168), then the textual fragments present in Annie John gives the occasion for their revision. This paper seeks to bring out the textual allusions present in Jamaica Kincaid’s Annie John. If any text is a transformation of previous texts, as Gerard Genette remarks (1997), then Annie John carries within it, aspects of texts from which it was inspired. And if any text is an intertext, then meaning in Annie John is influenced by the text or set of texts that contributed in its construction. The hypertextual relation therefore that exists between a text or hypertext and a previous text (hypotext) leads to the determination...

In general, Jamaica Kincaid's fiction is a reflection on gender relations, sexuality, power and motherhood including the bonds between mothers and daughters, adults and children, men and women, colonizer and colonized. The aim of this...more

In general, Jamaica Kincaid's fiction is a reflection on gender relations, sexuality, power and motherhood including the bonds between mothers and daughters, adults and children, men and women, colonizer and colonized. The aim of this paper is first to analyze the novel Annie John written by Jamaica Kincaid in 1985, bearing in mind the main character's relationship with her mother, with her motherland and with the colonial education imposed by the British Empire. Afterwards, the goal is to investigate the colonial discourse and its relation with the canon, by observing in which ways Kincaid subverts the imperialist discourse to develop her own sense of justice and injustice in a world of powerful and powerless.

Ali Jimale Ahmed's reflective essay on Nuruddin Farah is at once intimate, generous, and intellectually grounding. Written from the vantage point of a former student, colleague, and fellow writer, it reminds us that Farah is not only...more

Ali Jimale Ahmed's reflective essay on Nuruddin Farah is at once intimate, generous, and intellectually grounding. Written from the vantage point of a former student, colleague, and fellow writer, it reminds us that Farah is not only Somalia's most internationally recognizable novelist, but also a formative teacher and a moral presence whose work has refused to let Somalia slip into global amnesia. Ahmed's insistence that Farah's writing has kept Somalia "alive" during periods of donor fatigue and political abandonment is persuasive, and his discussion of Somali culture as metaphor-based rather than proverb-based offers an especially illuminating lens through which to read Farah's aesthetic and ethical commitments.

This essay is written in conversation with Ali Jimale Ahmed’s “Nuruddin Farah and Somali Culture” (Tydskrif vir Letterkunde 57[1], 2020).

The Caribbean Sexuality Research Group (CSRG) is indeed proud to have been given the opportunity of contributing to this special issue of Sexuality & Culture. The CSRG is a non-profit, non-discriminatory working group that recognises...more

The Caribbean Sexuality Research Group (CSRG) is indeed proud to have been given the opportunity of contributing to this special issue of Sexuality & Culture. The CSRG is a non-profit, non-discriminatory working group that recognises diversity in orientation, language and ethnicity throughout the region and focuses on research into sexualities in the Caribbean and its diaspora. The group is comprised of professionals from a wide variety of areas related to human sexuality. The articles in this issue of Sexuality & Culture reflect a small part of that diversity, as seven of our twenty-five members have been included in here. In their article, Cowell and Saunders explore the challenge of legal reform as it relates to the public discourse around heteronormativitiy and homosexuality. In Wine, Women and Song, Hubert Devonish examines the explicit sexual expression of Caribbean women in dance and the challenging of male dominance through these public displays. Carpenter and Walters, in A So Di Ting Set, take the reader through a decade of musical expression in Barbados and Jamaica comparing these with the current sex role stereotypes of men and women emerging from both countries. In Goodbye to Flesh, Anna Perkins looks at the fleshy images of Carnival in Trinidad against the backdrop of a tradition of Christian repression of the body's desires. Christopher Charles closes this issue with his article on skin bleaching among dark skinned women driven by the perception that lighter skinned women or ''brownings'' are the sexual ideal. Each of these articles exposes a particular aspect of Caribbean culture that is integral to sexual expression, sexual identity and sexual desire. In the Caribbean, music plays a vital role in informing and reflecting the everyday experience of its people. It is impossible to go across any of the islands on a given day without hearing music played in public and private spaces. As expressions of this musicality, K. Carpenter (&)

In 1998 behaalde ze (cum laude) zowel haar master Franse taal en letterkunde aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam als haar master Afrikanistiek aan de Universiteit Leiden. In 2005 promoveerde ze (cum laude) op het proefschrift: Après...more

In 1998 behaalde ze (cum laude) zowel haar master Franse taal en letterkunde aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam als haar master Afrikanistiek aan de Universiteit Leiden. In 2005 promoveerde ze (cum laude) op het proefschrift: Après Corneille, après Racine. Marie-Anne Barbier et la tragédie post-classique. Het proefschrift werd bekroond met de Keetje Hodsonprijs 2006 van de Koninklijke Hollandsche Maatschappij der Wetenschappen. Montoya werkte met een Veni-subsidie als postdoctoraal onderzoeker aan de Universiteit Leiden en de Rijksuniversiteit Groningen. Bij die laatste universiteit kreeg ze een Rosalind Franklin Fellowship voor onderzoek bij de Opleiding Romaanse talen en culturen (2007-2012). Sinds 2012 is Montoya verbonden aan de Radboud Universiteit, vanaf april 2014 als hoogleraar Franse letterkunde en cultuur. Momenteel doet ze onderzoek naar de internationale verspreiding en invloed van Franstalige pedagogische geschriften in de achttiende eeuw. Ze publiceerde meerdere boeken en artikelen over de Verlichting, vrouwelijk auteurschap, literair medievalisme en boekgeschiedenis, waaronder Medievalist Enlightenment: Charles Perrault to Jean-Jacques Rousseau (Cambridge 2012). Tevens is ze oprichter en directeur van het Kenniscentrum Frankrijk-Nederland, een interuniversitair platform voor Nederlands onderzoek, onderwijs en informatie over de Franstalige cultuur en samenleving. for mer le coeur et eclair er l'espr it: lezen in de achttiende eeuw Former le coeur et éclairer l'esprit: lezen in de achttiende eeuw Rede uitgesproken bij de aanvaarding van het ambt van hoogleraar Franse letterkunde en cultuur aan de Faculteit der Letteren van de Radboud Universiteit op vrijdag 19 december 2014 door prof. dr. Alicia C. Montoya 4 Opmaak en productie: Radboud Universiteit, Facilitair Bedrijf, Print en Druk Fotografie omslag: Bert Beelen ISBN nummer: 978-90-9028834-5 © Prof. dr. Alicia C. Montoya, Nijmegen, 2014 Niets uit deze uitgave mag worden vermenigvuldigd en/of openbaar worden gemaakt middels druk, fotokopie, microfilm, geluidsband of op welke andere wijze dan ook, zonder voorafgaande schriftelijke toestemming van de copyrighthouder.

Abstract In the website of the American Psychology Association trauma is defined as ‘an emotional response to a terrible event like an accident, rape or natural disaster. Immediately after the event, shock and denial are typical....more

Abstract 
In the website of the American Psychology Association trauma is defined as ‘an
emotional response to a terrible event like an accident, rape or natural disaster.
Immediately after the event, shock and denial are typical. Longer term reactions
include unpredictable emotions, flashbacks, strained relationships and even
physical symptoms like headaches or nausea.’1 Two points in the above definition
are key terms to investigating trauma. The first is that trauma is a response. The
second is that it has immediate response and a long-term one. Even though the
quotation above does not include war veterans as victims of primary trauma or
secondary one, it actually encodes the psychological pain that cripples the
veterans’ psyches. Witnessing traumatic war events or participating in them entails
suffering as a result. Victims of war feel bitter trauma; therefore they show
evidence of fragmentation and disconnectedness. Shattered selves are split between
the public sphere and the private one. War veterans draw the attention to
themselves as suffering post-traumatic-stress disorder. With the formation of the
‘rap groups’ in the sixties in America, Vietnam War veterans shared their war
wounds. They felt the need to voice out the pain that had been soaked in their
psyches. In this chapter I intend to focus on Maxine Hong Kingston’s The Fifth
Book of Peace (2004) wherein she faithfully reports the writing workshops, a
project she started with war veterans in order to cure their shattered selves through
the art of writing. How the writing activities are planned and how they are
separated with meditative walking and the ringing of the bell of mindfulness, how
the veterans engage in the act of writing about their painful experiences, how
Kingston withdraws from the center of the workshops and steps backward to let the
veterans experience writing and so be one writer among them is what I will give
due emphasis in my chapter. I will be referring to an anthology by war veterans
entitled Veterans of War, Veterans of Peace (2006) for which Kingston is the
editor.
Key Words: War, trauma, shattered, fragmentation, healing, writing, meditative
walking, atrocious scenes, reclusion, soul wounds.

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Tous droits réservés © Association pour l'Étude des Littératures africaines (APELA), 2010 Ce document est protégé par la loi sur le droit d'auteur. L'utilisation des services d'Érudit (y compris la reproduction) est assujettie à sa politique d'utilisation que vous pouvez consulter en ligne. Cet article est diffusé et préservé par Érudit. Érudit est un consortium interuniversitaire sans but lucratif composé de

The modern world has changed the meaning of the word revolution. The original meaning-the turning of the worlds and the stars-has another, now the more usual, placed beside it: a violent breaking with the old order and the establishment...more

The modern world has changed the meaning of the word revolution. The original meaning-the turning of the worlds and the stars-has another, now the more usual, placed beside it: a violent breaking with the old order and the establishment of a new, more just, or more rational order. The turning of the stars was a visible manifestation of circular time; in its new meaning, revolution became the most perfect expression of sequential, linear, and irreversible time. One implied the eternal return of the past; the other the destruction of the past and the building of a new society. -Octavio Paz 1 Para mí, no existe la modernidad en el sentido que se le otorga. -Alejo Carpentier 2 Although the modern world has changed the meaning of the word revolution, when Alejo Carpentier writes about the revolution most closely identified with modernity, he applies the ancient meaning of the word to it. Because he does not believe in the modernity of the French Revolution. Because he does not believe in the modernity of modernity. From the very first line of El siglo de las luces, the guillotine (la Máquina), the machine of a violent breaking, is juxtaposed with the constellations of the night sky, with the turning of the worlds and the stars. 3 The ephemeral product of instrumental reason is dwarfed by the vast permanent-seeming cosmos. Carpentier does not, however, "analyze" the relationship between the Machine and the stars. 4 Although El siglo de las luces is not devoid of analysis, by virtue of its

This special issue aims to illustrate how the emerging approach of archipelagic thinking can contribute to political theory and international relations theory, and it attempts to grapple with the geopolitical and ontological complexities...more

This special issue aims to illustrate how the emerging approach of archipelagic thinking can contribute to political theory and international relations theory, and it attempts to grapple with the geopolitical and ontological complexities of the South China Sea and Western Pacific. Archipelagic thinking is an emerging interdisciplinary approach in island studies, political anthropology and political ecology. The interest of archipelagic thinking for political theorising rests on the following considerations: (1) it builds on the legacy of global anti-colonial and postcolonial movements that gained traction from the 1960s onwards and led to the development of decolonial and postcolonial critiques, subaltern studies and political ecology (Braverman and Johnson 2020); (2) it challenges dominant configurations of sovereignty over the state, population and territory, and reimagines political subjectivity and the possibilities of relationality (Espejo 2020; Youatt 2020). Third, it overlaps with, and is theoretically informed by, the advent of 'geophilosophy' (Povinelli 2016), posthumanism (Braidotti 2013; Haraway 2016) and the political ecology based on science and technology studies, or STS (Latour 2017; Liboiron 2021). Archipelagic thinking emphasises the interconnectedness between human and non-human beings, viewing all as relational beings-none exist as independent or self-sufficient entities (Pugh 2018). It thematises resilience ontologies, where relationality is animated, adaptive and continually modulating in response to various contexts, relationships and conditions. As a result, the environment is no longer seen as a passive object but rather as an active agent in the foreground.

Que los escritores del neobarroco cubano tuvieron un interés particular por la poesía de Luis de Góngora no es ningún secreto ni ninguna novedad. La crítica se ha ocupado extensamente de él, manifiesto tanto en las teorizaciones sobre el...more

Que los escritores del neobarroco cubano tuvieron un interés particular por la poesía de Luis de Góngora no es ningún secreto ni ninguna novedad. La crítica se ha ocupado extensamente de él, manifiesto tanto en las teorizaciones sobre el barroco como en la obra poética y novelística de estos autores 1 . No obstante, sobre la relación del neobarroco con sor Juana Inés de la Cruz se ha dicho menos. Siendo la monja la máxima exponente del barroco americano colonial, ¿no habría sido natural que fuera ella quien ocupara la posición icónica y central en las teorizaciones sobre el nuevo barroco latinoamericano? Este trabajo parte de esta especulación, de esta suerte de expectativa no cumplida, para explorar la posición que el neobarroco cubano otorgó a sor Juana en su genealogía literaria. 1 Sobre Góngora y Lezama, ver González Echevarría ("Apetitos de Góngora y Lezama" y "Lezama, Góngora y la poética del mal gusto"). Sobre Góngora y Sarduy, ver Quesada y Guerrero ("Góngora, Sarduy y el neobarroco"). Para discusiones más generales sobre el lugar de Góngora en la obra de estos autores, ver Moraña ("Baroque/Neobaroque/Ultrabaroque"), Beverley, Chiampi ("As Serpes de Gôngora") y Dávila.

The social, ideological, and political factors that have shaped Caribbean identity today have also pigeonholed it within an imaginary that is alternately idealized and chaotic. In Sea and Land: An Environmental History of the Caribbean,...more

The social, ideological, and political factors that have shaped Caribbean identity today have also pigeonholed it within an imaginary that is alternately idealized and chaotic. In Sea and Land: An Environmental History of the Caribbean, historians Stuart B. Schwartz and Matthew Mulcahy highlight the modern vision of this region as both utopian and dystopian: European migrants who ventured to the Caribbean in the early modern era encountered a world of simultaneously great promise and peril […]. Islands and surrounding mainland territories with climates of "eternal spring," lush tropical vegetation, and a seemingly endless promise of profit, and perhaps even redemption, created Edenic expectations among many colonialists. But if the attractions of the region seemed promising, a paradise, its perils,

Partant d'une réflexion sur l'absence des femmes -soit comme sujet, soit comme objet ou comme point de référence -dans la plupart des textes fondateurs de la créolité, nous adoptons une perspective transversale pour relever les principaux...more

Partant d'une réflexion sur l'absence des femmes -soit comme sujet, soit comme objet ou comme point de référence -dans la plupart des textes fondateurs de la créolité, nous adoptons une perspective transversale pour relever les principaux enjeux qui, à leur tour, fondent la prise de la parole littéraire de femmes migrantes entre différentes îles, physiques et symboliques. Pour ce faire nous appelons à des exemples puisés chez quelques écrivaines des Antilles françaises -Simone Schwarz Bart, Maryse Condé et Gisèle Pineau -mais aussi chez une auteure du Cap Vert, Dina Salústio, pour montrer brièvement la contribution de ces voix à l'affirmation littéraire des espaces de liminarité, tout en essayant d'éviter une cristallisation insulaire figée.

In The Inheritance of Loss and A House for Mr. Biswas, food might be recognized as an all-important metaphor for self-identification. Food is loaded with meaning about relations, communion, home and identity. In the said texts, food...more

In The Inheritance of Loss and A House for Mr. Biswas, food might be recognized as an all-important metaphor for self-identification. Food is loaded with meaning about relations, communion, home and identity. In the said texts, food becomes a powerful voice for an emptiness which lives on as a physical craving and a continual sense of discomfort. Identity seems to become physical and instinctive when it comes to food. Interestingly in the postcolonial moment, food appears to lose its capacity for gratification and either acts as a catalyst for evoking disappointment, or a metaphor for self-estrangement that is usually experienced by the displaced subject. This paper aims to show the effects of colonization on the characters' eating habits and their struggle at dining table and around kitchen. The native is lured into preferring western food over local cuisine so as to cover his colonial inadequacy but most often get deprived of the food that has been satisfying both to his palate and his stomach.

En el presente artículo se ofrece una panorámica de la moda en España en 1916, partiendo de la sección "La moda femenina", que la revista madrileña La Esfera incluye entre sus páginas, bajo la firma de "Rosalinda". Se detiene tanto en...more

En el presente artículo se ofrece una panorámica de la moda en España en 1916, partiendo de la sección "La moda femenina", que la revista madrileña La Esfera incluye entre sus páginas, bajo la firma de "Rosalinda". Se detiene tanto en vestidos como en complementos.

espanolNos proponemos analizar la obra de teatro del escritor antillano Aime Cesaire Una tempestad: Adaptacion de La tempestad de Shakespeare para un teatro negro, teniendo en cuenta lecturas de pensadores criticos al colonialismo y de...more

espanolNos proponemos analizar la obra de teatro del escritor antillano Aime Cesaire Una tempestad: Adaptacion de La tempestad de Shakespeare para un teatro negro, teniendo en cuenta lecturas de pensadores criticos al colonialismo y de autores que reflexionan en torno a la etapa actual de depredacion de la “Naturaleza” (nocion heredada de la modernidad que sera problematizada a lo largo del trabajo [Latour, 2017]). Para ello nos detendremos en los dialogos y en la relacion y disputas que, en la obra, se establecen entre los personajes de Prospero, Caliban y Sycorax, y como a partir de dichos personajes (Caliban y Sycorax) se pueden establecer figuras que proyecten una critica o contranarrativa a la matriz “civilizatoria” que representa el personaje de Prospero y que concibe a la “Naturaleza” como objeto a disposicion del hombre para ser explotado. Presentamos asi una relectura de Una tempestad a cincuenta anos de su estreno y en relacion con una etapa que algunos autores como Bruno ...

In order to overcome the silence that had been instilled by colonial-ism, several postcolonial female writers employ fiction to restore their local culture and reflect on their representation in historical writings. For female writers,...more

In order to overcome the silence that had been instilled by colonial-ism, several postcolonial female writers employ fiction to restore their local culture and reflect on their representation in historical writings. For female writers, literature often becomes a medium through which they can become active agents of their own destiny by establishing a voice for themselves. Writing becomes a means of reclaiming traditional discourses relating to women. The following study is primarily focused on Calixthe Beyala, a Cameroonian novelist, and specifically concentrates on the manner in which Beyala makes use of her female protagonist in Tu t‟appelleras Tanga to portray the realities facing African Francophone females. The study aims at illustrating that the female protagonist plays a critical role in mirror-ing both the conditions of females in African societies and the conditions pertaining to Womanism in a universal context. Through the role of the protagonist, the study reveals that th...

Raphaël Confiant est l'un des représentants les plus prolifiques de la littérature francophone des Antilles. L'écrivain martiniquais est connu, entre autres, pour son ouvrage l'Éloge de la créolité écrit avec Patrick Chamoiseau et Jean...more

Raphaël Confiant est l'un des représentants les plus prolifiques de la littérature francophone des Antilles. L'écrivain martiniquais est connu, entre autres, pour son ouvrage l'Éloge de la créolité écrit avec Patrick Chamoiseau et Jean Bernabé. Un texte qui pourrait être considéré comme un manifeste de la littérature créole et qui souligne l'importance de la tradition caribéenne et la valeur du métissage. Dans cet entretien accordé par l'écrivain, apparaissent des pensées, des paroles et des opinions qui font partie de la poétique de l'auteur et qui enrichissent la connaissance de son fascinant parcours artistique et littéraire, mais aussi de son activité de traducteur. C'est précisément la traduction qui prend un aspect original et inédit qui nourrit la langue créole et la langue française dans une relation certainement fructueuse. Dans son discours, Confiant s'interroge également sur la notion d'identité fixe et met en avant l'importance de la mémoire antillaise, qu'il considère comme éclatée et en perpétuelle évolution. Sa démarche littéraire, marquée par l'utilisation de la langue créole, est un acte de résistance contre l'uniformisation culturelle et une manière de valoriser la richesse et la diversité de la culture caribéenne. L'auteur parle également de l'importance d'un genre littéraire tel que le roman policier. Ce genre lui permet de se libérer des contraintes de la littérature habituelle et d'explorer une forme d'écriture plus libre.

Although Chinese American literature has been an expanding field in the US, not many scholars have been interested in Chinese Caribbean studies, be it in history, anthropology, sociology, literature, or the arts. I would like to...more

Although Chinese American literature has been an expanding field in the US, not many scholars have been interested in Chinese Caribbean studies, be it in history, anthropology, sociology, literature, or the arts. I would like to interrogate some of the modalities of such neglect and voice concern over the lack of acknowledgement of the Chinese minority in the Caribbean-as we know, it is never a good sign when a society ignores its minorities, however small they may be, and the blind spots are often the most interesting ones. Walton Look-Lai, Trevor Millett and Andrew Wilson are among the few scholars who have invested the Chinese diaspora in the Caribbean and have led major research in the field. Meiling Jin, Patricia Powell and Jan Lowe Shinebourne are among the few authors who have actually written about the Chinese diaspora in the Caribbean in their fiction. Their novels and short stories testify to the little space that has so far been granted to Chinese Caribbean studies. They are also opening new horizons by reading and writing the Chinese Caribbean people and writers (back) into (textual) existence. The history of the Chinese in the Caribbean started in 1806 in Trinidad. It had been hoped that a substitute for the Atlantic slave trade could be found in an island recently acquired by the British (1797), at a moment when the Abolitionist movement was gaining momemtum in the UK and when it was felt that the slave trade, if not yet slavery, would have to be abolished soon. The French islands were also threatening to propagate the revolutionary fever that was going to prove so efficient in Haiti (with major slave revolts in 1791, and the first Black Republic being declared in 1804). The Fortitude, belonging to the East India Company, landed in Trinidad on October 12, 1806, bringing 192 Chinese. However, the whole experiment was aborted: within a few years, only twenty to thirty Chinese remained; the others had gone back. In order to ensure future success, women were essential (not a single woman was among the 192 original emigrants and only twenty percent of migrants before 1870 were women) and emigrants would have to be selected according to the agricultural needs of the colony. After another "stillborn effort at recruiting Chinese labour for Jamaica, British Guiana and Trinidad in 1843," 3 the idea of a Chinese settlement in the West Indies was actively revived in the 1850s. The slave trade had long been abolished in the British Empire (1807) as well as more recently slavery (1833), which forced planters to look for labor other than among former African slaves. Even though Chinese immigration had started as early as the sixteenth century, migration from the mainland to the Western hemisphere intensified in the nineteenth century due to increasing domestic crises, social upheavals and trade pressures, as well as greater Western imperialism, which culminated in the two Opium Wars (1839-1842 and 1856-1860), which exacerbated migratory movements. About seven and a half million Chinese left China for overseas destinations in the nineteenth century. 600,000 went to the Americas (Central and Latin America, and the Caribbean), and about 20,000, mostly from Fujian and Guangdong provinces (formerly Fukien and Kwangtung), went to the British West Indies. The peak of Chinese emigration to the Caribbean occured between 1853 and 1866, but it actually

Twenty-five years have elapsed since the publication of Beloved. In all its complexity, Toni Morrison’s novel forms a peak, both concluding the previous decades of neo-slave narratives and introducing the following ones. As the following...more

Twenty-five years have elapsed since the publication of Beloved. In all its complexity, Toni Morrison’s novel forms a peak, both concluding the previous decades of neo-slave narratives and introducing the following ones. As the following article argues, reviewing the many ways the novel has closed a period and opened a new one will help us gain a new perspective and understand new articulations and developments in slavery literature. Misrahi-Barak contends that the genre of the neo-slave narrative has ceased to be African-American only, but has become transnational and global, dialogic, polyphonic and trans-generic. It has also been instrumental in implementing a rapprochement between disciplines that used to be watertight.

HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access archive for the deposit and dissemination of scientific research documents, whether they are published or not. The documents may come from teaching and research institutions in France or abroad, or...more

HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access archive for the deposit and dissemination of scientific research documents, whether they are published or not. The documents may come from teaching and research institutions in France or abroad, or from public or private research centers. L'archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, émanant des établissements d'enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés.

An astonishing number of the Canadian short stories published since the 1970s have been written by writers who have emigrated from the Caribbean. Even if most of these writers started out with poetry, one cannot fail to perceive that all...more

An astonishing number of the Canadian short stories published since the 1970s have been written by writers who have emigrated from the Caribbean. Even if most of these writers started out with poetry, one cannot fail to perceive that all of them have turned to the medium of the short story in order to express themselves and deal with the predicament of the immigrant, as if the very frame of the short story made it easier to master it all.

espoir dans la société haïtienne. Nous avons exploré le rôle de l'engagement politique à travers le personnage principal, Manuel, et la symbolique des luttes communautaires dans un contexte postcolonial. La méthode d'analyse utilisée...more

espoir dans la société haïtienne. Nous avons exploré le rôle de l'engagement politique à travers le personnage principal, Manuel, et la symbolique des luttes communautaires dans un contexte postcolonial. La méthode d'analyse utilisée repose sur une approche multidimensionnelle combinant l'analyse littéraire traditionnelle avec des éléments de critique postcoloniale et de sociologie. Au cours de l'étude, nous nous sommes concentrés sur les thèmes majeurs du roman pour souligner l'actualité de l'oeuvre de Roumain. L'étude a porté une attention particulière à l'usage du réalisme magique par Roumain ce qui nous a permis de relier le réel et le surnaturel pour illustrer les tensions internes de la société haïtienne. Les résultats obtenus montrent que Gouverneurs de la rosée est une oeuvre engagée qui offre une critique acerbe des injustices sociales tout en soulignant l'importance de la résistance collective. L'étude conclut que même si le roman est écrit depuis des années, il continue à nous parler aujourd'hui et se révèle être un outil puissant de réflexion sur les enjeux politiques et culturels de la société actuelle.

Reed Dasenbrock You've been living in Canada now for some years. Sam Selvon: Yes, I moved in 1978, and I've been in Canada now about ten years. RD: Why Canada? Selvon: I came to England in 1950, and I spent twenty-eight years of...more

Reed Dasenbrock You've been living in Canada now for some years. Sam Selvon: Yes, I moved in 1978, and I've been in Canada now about ten years. RD: Why Canada? Selvon: I came to England in 1950, and I spent twenty-eight years of my life here which I consider to be a good slice of my life. I suddenly felt that I had had enough of English tradition and European culture. I wanted to get back to the West before it was too late. Everyone asks why I selected Canada. Some of my wife's relatives who had settled there some years ago were doing pretty well for themselves, so she said,'let's go to Canada,' and that's how I ended up there. This serial is available in Kunapipi:https://ro.uow.edu.au/kunapipi/vol17/iss1/22 114 Reed Dasenbrock and Feroza Jussawalla Sam Selvon: Interview with Reed Dasenbrock and Feroza Jussawalla Reed Dasenbrock You've been living in Canada now for some years. Sam Selvon: Yes, I moved in 1978, and I've been in Canada now about te...

Set in-between the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico the Yucatan Peninsular is a symbol of ambivalence, difference and hybridity. The fixed idea of Nation, its origins and its definitions are forced to change as the experience of...more

Set in-between the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico the Yucatan Peninsular is a symbol of ambivalence, difference and hybridity. The fixed idea of Nation, its origins and its definitions are forced to change as the experience of social reality offers us new models of ambiguity and liminality, which turn against the binary and lineal models of the hegemonic vision of National identity. This article explores the situation through a re-reading of the works of two Yucatecan writers: Ermilo Abreu Gómez, a writer well known within the National canon; and Joaquín Bestard Vásquez, a less known narrator. Both authors construct a regional identity formed from the marginal world of the periphery that looks towards the formation of a multiple Caribbean identity.

Este ensayo explora las construcciones literarias de la identidad regional en el Caribe continental en el contexto de conceptos como hibridez, mestizaje, heterogeneidad, interacciones inter/intraculturales y la poética de la relación, que...more

Este ensayo explora las construcciones literarias de la identidad regional en el Caribe continental en el contexto de conceptos como hibridez, mestizaje, heterogeneidad, interacciones inter/intraculturales y la poética de la relación, que nos permiten acercar a las complejas dinámicas identitarias a nivel nacional y regional. Al repensar hibridez como un conjunto de procesos variados e inestables es posible leer la región continental como un área diferenciada, que manifiesta una dinámica -una y diversa‖ y modelos de migraciñn y movimiento similares a las islas. La articulación (o negociación) de la zona continental es compleja, pues no solamente bailan al ritmo de las islas sino también juegan otras dinámicas (nacionales) hacia su interior, y con el resto del continente americano. El ensayo discute construcciones identitarias en escritores contemporáneos de Yucatán, Belice y Guyana, con énfasis particular en el caso de Yucatán. Cet essai explore les constructions littéraires de l'identité régionale dans les Caraïbes continentales dans le contexte de concepts comme l'hybridation, le métissage, l'hétérogénéité, les interactions inter/intra culturelles et la poésie de la relation qui nous permettent une approche des dynamique identitaires complexes au niveau national et régional. En repensant l'hybridation comme un ensemble de procédés variés et instables, il est possible de lire la région continentale en tant que zone différenciée, qui manifeste une dynamique « unique et diverse » ainsi que des modèles de migration et de mouvement similaires aux îles. L'articulation (ou la négociation) de la zone continentale est complexe, non seulement parce qu'elle danse au rythme des îles mais parce que d'autres dynamiques (nationales) jouent vers son intérieur et avec le reste du continent américain. L'essai discute des constructions identitaires des écrivains contemporains du Yucatan, du Belize et de la Guyane, avec une emphase particulière sur le cas du Yucatan. -[…] to look from the inside out (for someone on the inside) is not only legitimate, it is the only point of view‖ Franklin Knight -[…] so there we are, all tangled up together, the old barriers breaking down and the new ones not yet established, a time of transition, always and inescapably turbulent.‖ Tinkuy n° 13 Section d'Études hispaniques Junio 2010 Université de Montréal 48 C.L.R. James. ¿Un Caribe postcolonial? Desafiando la hibridez En una región tan diversa como el Caribe, pero que también vive su diversidad como una característica definitoria, es necesario comprender que un espacio cultural no necesita estar cerrado para ser definido, ni tampoco debe ser necesariamente un espacio fijo ni armonioso. Como argumenta Jorge Giovannetti entre otros especialistas 1 , movimiento, flujo, flexibilidad y negociación, dentro y fuera del Caribe son sus cualidades intrínsecas y definitorias, que corren en contra del flujo lineal de la lñgica occidental, pero son ese -huracán que ruge‖ con los ritmos que marcan la vida cotidiana y el movimiento de la región: […] the first to cross the linguistic and political barriers within the region were (and are) the actors of whom social scientists and historians speak. Caribbean peoples have for years ignored linguistic and political frontiers and have moved from one island to the other, from their individual countries to the mainland, from the region to the metropolis, and back again. (Giovannetti 2006, 1) Este ensayo explora las construcciones literarias de la identidad regional en el Caribe continental en el contexto de conceptos como hibridez, mestizaje, heterogeneidad, interacciones inter/intraculturales y la poética de la relación, que nos permiten acercar a las complejas dinámicas identitarias a nivel nacional y regional. Arguyo que en mucha de la narrativa caribeña continental actual, subyace la necesidad de hacer visible la hibridez como fuerza creativa, transformando lo híbrido en un proceso dinámico que construye -estéticamente-sobre la diferencia, en vez de existir como un producto estático con la finalidad de armonizar y fusionar 2 . Es decir, no es suficiente leer la hibridez como sinónimo de mestizaje o transculturación, términos empleados para acomodar una multitud de diferencias bajo la pretensión de una unión armoniosa 3 . La hibridez como estrategia narrativa, activada en el proyecto creativo, 1 La investigadora cubana Yolanda Wood planteó hace dos décadas que el Caribe requiere de límites y fronteras fluctuantes, y en particular señaló la necesidad de considerar los cambios históricos y su impacto sobre las definiciones de la región, que luego cambiarían en el tiempo y el espacio. Ver: "Repensar el espacio Caribe",

Este artículo forma parte de una investigación más amplia que explora las fronteras porosas de un Caribe continental y sus articulaciones con un Caribe insular. Mi interés particular es en las diferentes expresiones de conectividad /o...more

Este artículo forma parte de una investigación más amplia que explora las fronteras porosas de un Caribe continental y sus articulaciones con un Caribe insular. Mi interés particular es en las diferentes expresiones de conectividad /o des-conectividad que se evidencian en textos literarios en las áreas continentales, donde encontramos situaciones de cuasi-insularidad, como en Yucatán y Belice, pero que a la vez son territorios multiculturales que comparten historias que unen y cruzan las fronteras políticas. Las últimas cuatro décadas han generado una explosión de textos literarios en Belice que juntos muestran respuestas diversas a la idea de una cultura nacional. En este artículo identifico algunas de los proyectos y las pautas innovadores que interrogan la imagen de la nación, focalizando en la mujer, migración y fronteras.

Este artigo explora a imagen da Plantation em textos narrativos do Caribe continental, especificamente em textos de escritores yucatecos contemporâneos. Minha análise explora os romances recentes de Joaquín Bestard (1935-) e revela como...more

Este artigo explora a imagen da Plantation em textos narrativos do Caribe continental, especificamente em textos de escritores yucatecos contemporâneos. Minha análise explora os romances recentes de Joaquín Bestard (1935-) e revela como estes textos de fin-de-siècle tecem um mundo de fragmentos, representando uma imagem múltipla da identidade regional. Os textos oferecem o que cheguei a nomear de "alternativas simultâneas", versões distintas das historias e relatos que existem em determinado momento. Aponto dois aspectos particulares da narrativa de Bestard: em primeiro lugar, a construção de um espaço narrativo alternativo; em segundo lugar, o uso da fragmentação como estratégia narrativa e também como conceito que alimenta sua proposta de identidade narrativa regional. Ambas as estratégias nos permitem explorar os limites que determinam y marcam o discurso literário nacional y como ele está articulado com as necessidades e demandas regionais.

Empleando un corpus que incluye textos escritos y orales de la Yucatán, este artículo muestra cómo la memoria cultural nos habilita para crear una cartografía de la región del Caribe continental, por medio de la traza de rutas y signos de...more

Empleando un corpus que incluye textos escritos y orales de la Yucatán, este artículo muestra cómo la memoria cultural nos habilita para crear una cartografía de la región del Caribe continental, por medio de la traza de rutas y signos de los huracanes, narrados en estos relatos. Escritos y/o narrados en español y en maya, y con su origen en los puertos costeros y también en los pueblos al interior, estas narrativas de huracanes revelan un intricado y complejo mapeo de la zona de huracanes en el Caribe continental. Hago hincapié en cómo el huracán, leída como metanarrativa (Schwartz 1 ), no solamente teje las historias vividas por el impacto de la tormenta, y el mapa que resultaría, sino esta investigación prioriza una lectura que ofrece una "manera de mirar" (Lamming), una manera de sonar (Brathwaite) y una manera de contar (Berger), que juntos revelan el huracán como leitmotif para comprender la memoria cultural de la región.

Preface simplify and clarify these ideas as much as possible. Further inquiry and reflection will reveal pretty quickly that the primary sources are much richer than I have represented them and that real life is never quite so neat. I...more

Preface simplify and clarify these ideas as much as possible. Further inquiry and reflection will reveal pretty quickly that the primary sources are much richer than I have represented them and that real life is never quite so neat. I have been helped in this approach by the give and take of countless classroom discussions. There is no better arena for testing the clarity, consistency, and viability of ideas so close to the heart. But even more, some early drafts of these studies benefited from careful reviews given to me by student tutors Mary Fortson and Janine Hyde. Later drafts were improved by the many thoughtful and sensitive suggestions I received from colleagues, especially Grace Fala and Donna Weimer. Most of all I am indebted to Judy Katz, colleague in the English Department, whose many helps I could not have done without. Her constant support, gentle prodding, and patient questioning kept the book alive when it was in danger of being stillborn. Thanks also to Bill Russey and Jarmila Polte for frequent computer rescue missions, and especially to Art Manion, whose technical skills were indispensable in getting the manuscript to its final form. The index was prepared by my wife, Shirley Wagoner, to whom I am grateful for yet another instance of the deictic role she has played in my life. For help in getting this project launched I owe thanks to former academic dean Karen Sandier, and to Graydon F. Snyder, formerly of the Chicago Theological Seminary, and especially to Robert W. Neff, president of Juniata College, for his unqualified endorsement and unflagging insistence that I see the book into publication.

El Morro and la Punta forts in Havana, and that of San Juan de Ulúa in Veracruz. Designs by N. Gutiérrez M. based on plans by B. Antonelli Gatehouse design. Miguel Sánchez Taramas, Cit., Sheet XIV. Gatehouse above the ditch and facing a...more

El Morro and la Punta forts in Havana, and that of San Juan de Ulúa in Veracruz. Designs by N. Gutiérrez M. based on plans by B. Antonelli Gatehouse design. Miguel Sánchez Taramas, Cit., Sheet XIV. Gatehouse above the ditch and facing a ravelin and covered way. Photo by N. Gutiérrez Montoya.

This article explores how memory is recovered and represented in the novels "Un plat de porc aux bananes vertes" (1967) by the Franco-Guadeloupean couple Simone and André Schwarz-Bart and "La mémoire aux abois" (2010) by the Haitian...more

This article explores how memory is recovered and represented in the novels "Un plat de porc aux bananes vertes" (1967) by the Franco-Guadeloupean couple Simone and André Schwarz-Bart and "La mémoire aux abois" (2010) by the Haitian Évelyne Trouillot. Drawing on Régine Robin's typologies of memory described in "Le roman mémoriel" (1989), it examines the interplay between individual, collective, national and cultural memory, analyzing how fragmented recollections, silences, and sensory stimuli articulate diasporic and intergenerational remembrance. Through polyphonic female voices, the novels challenge dominant historical narratives and foreground subaltern, decolonial modes of memory rooted in Caribbean postcolonial experience.

This article interrogates the conceptual distinction between independence and freedom by foregrounding decolonization as the essential condition for genuine liberation. Drawing on political philosophy and postcolonial theory, it argues...more

This article interrogates the conceptual distinction between independence and freedom by foregrounding decolonization as the essential condition for genuine liberation. Drawing on political philosophy and postcolonial theory, it argues that independence—understood as the formal transfer of sovereignty from an imperial power to a nation-state—does not, in itself, dismantle the structural, economic, cultural, and epistemic systems established under colonial domination. Using Haiti as its central case study, the article examines how the world’s first Black republic and the only state born of a successful slave revolution achieved an unprecedented rupture with colonial rule in 1804, yet subsequently entered a postcolonial condition marked by continuity rather than rupture with colonial structures. Central to this analysis is the concept of the Haytian Dream, articulated as a political philosophy rooted in decolonization, collective dignity, and uncompromising sovereignty, and most fully embodied in the political thought and praxis of Jean-Jacques Dessalines. The study demonstrates how Dessalines’s vision anticipated later decolonial theory by insisting on the total abolition of slavery, the rejection of colonial identity, and the redefinition of citizenship and nationhood outside European frameworks. It further argues that the assassination of Dessalines in 1806 constituted not merely a political coup but the internal dismantling of Haiti’s decolonial project, paving the way for postcolonial domination through debt, elite rule, cultural hierarchy, and mental colonization. By tracing the persistence of colonial power in political institutions, economic dependency, education, religion, and consciousness, the article contends that true freedom must be understood as an ongoing process of decolonization rather than a legal status achieved at independence. Ultimately, this study positions Haiti’s revolutionary experience as both a historical warning and a theoretical foundation for understanding decolonization as a sustained struggle for structural, cultural, and psychological liberation