About Haiti, Brazil and a Commodity Chain

Date Posted: Sun, 30 Apr 2011 08:33:00 -0400
Last of April’s Reviews

Today we present to you three reviews. One is about the momentous yet inscrutable Caribbean Revolution in Haiti (perhaps more significant now after the devastating 2010 earthquake). Another is about Brazil’s remarkable recent political history and foreign relations. And the last review is about cocaine, and though spotlighting the Andean region, it covers much more than that. So, with them we have a fair representation of Latin American geography.

Erica Johnson (Florida State University) first tells us that the book, _The Tree of Liberty_, is worth reading because it helps illuminate the many perplexing and subtle repercussions of the successful Haitian transformationfrom colonial slavery on Hispaniola. The editor of this collection, Doris L. Garraway, have gathered an exciting team of interdisciplinary scholars to examine cause and effect, literary consequence, and (most stimulating to me) the tracking of rumors and dissemination of ideas among Black populations outside of Haiti. At the core are concerns from scholars like Michel-Rolph Trouillot and David Patrick Geggus, who during the 1990s tried to initiate deeper understanding and interest on the Haitian Revolution and its impact throughout the Atlantic. Johnson gives us a close analysis of the original essays in this collection, helping to place them into its historiographical context.

http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=31511

In the second review, Shawn Smallman (Portland State University) informs us about Brazil’s potentially new boom through an examination of Sean W. Burges’ book. Smallman explains how _Brazilian Foreign Policy after the Cold War_ is among the best of a number ofpublications trying to explain Brazil’s political and economic resurgence in the last two decades. Smallman guides us through the book, shows the tricky research approach Burges had to do, and proves its value within its historiography. And as Smallman persuasively writes of Brazil’s economic discipline and political surprises, he also explains how the book’s limitations are as important as its strengths. This book, Smallman argues, is both accessible and a required reading for all advanced students, but even policymaking and those casually interested in Brazilian affairs should consider reading it.

http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=31664

Elaine Carey (St. Johns University) reviews the third book in this group, a work that has received significant attention even outside of scholarly circles. Carey tells us how Paul Gootenberg’s _Andean Cocaine_ is not your ordinary story of the miracle drug. It is rather a compelling account produced by a first-rate, multi-archival research. Gootenberg wrote a nuanced account of a currently controversial commodity chain (with all of its emotional baggage) as a product of a historical development. By observing how the plant became a national hope, then a medicine and next a narcotic (vice), we grasp a deeper understanding of not simply individual struggles, but of the particular nature of this epoch’s political economy. As Carey reminds us, there is a difference between coca and cocaine, and if we are able to distinguish these words’ historical contexts, we may come out of this reading a bit more enlightened. Carey’s review is an excellent introduction to the book, which she shows to be relevant to the entire hemisphere’s history.

http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=32733

I offer my sincere thanks to the reviewers and to the editorial team behind H-LatAm’s review project.

The One Left Behind Is Now With US

Dear Neteros,
A review that got delayed last Friday is now available.

In it, Norberto Barreto Velázquez performed a most difficult and yet necessary job of going through Julian Go’s dense book and distilling its essentials. Go, in an attempt at comparative history, looks at the elite’s in the Philippines and Puerto Rico as they struggled, maneuvered and adapted to living under the new American colonial masters. Barreto Velázquez’s review is a must-read for those interested in the subject of U.S. imperialism and those working on similar comparative works. Differently from the book itself, the review is readable and sensible. The fact that it is in Spanish shows our commitment to publish in languages other than English.

http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=31576

Thanks Norberto.

http://pucp.academia.edu/NorbertoBarreto 

Cheers,

Dennis R. Hidalgo

"The Broad and the Deep," introduction to H-LatAm reviews

Dear Neteros, We are happy to present four reviews for your enjoyment. As a group, they hint at the full length of interests implied in Latin American History. Both major periods are here represented, as well as South America and the Caribbean region. Our luck is such that among these reviews you will even find two essays attempting to do more than just examining a book.


1- In the review entitled, “Bolivia(s) Ascending,” David Sheinin opens up for us a collection of essays about Bolivia’s recent history. He does more than just reveal the publication’s links to the current administration. Sheinin is critical, but he also helps us see Evo Morales outside of the polarizing rhetoric that have characterized the recent events in Bolivia, and appreciate both his administration’s appeal and limitations.

http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=31614

David M. K. Sheininhttp://www.trentu.ca/history/publications_sheinin.php

2- Matilde Zimmermann provides us with a sense of the current debate over theinvasion of Bay of Pig or or Playa Girón by interlacing the critical examinations of two recent books. One of the books is a valuable Spanish translation, with a stimulating analysis, which reflects the author’s relative advantage on the island of Cuba. The other book is also predisposed, but toward the U.S., where the author originated. Both books mostly rely on different caches of sources, and as such they are more useful together than in isolation,
which is why Zimmermann tied them in tandem.

http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=31785
Matilde Zimmermann
http://www.slc.edu/undergraduate/study/history-social-sciences/history/faculty.html

3- The essay on Lascasian Studies is also an attempt to appreciate the field rather than just a single book. In here Lawrence A. Clayton focuses on three fairly currentbooks to draw attention to larger and older patterns of thinking about Bartolomé de las Casas. In this relatively longer essay, Clayton considers most major works about the “Defender of the Indians” to offer a heartfelt sympathetic line of reasoning in favor of Las Casas’s legacy. Meant to incite discussion, this essay takes a definitive position in a debate as old as the man himself.
http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=31181

Lawrence A. Clayton, University of Alabama
http://www.as.ua.edu/history/html/faculty/clayton.html


4- In, “Evolution of the Cuban Revolution,” Frank Argote-Freyre uses his familiarity with older versions of Balfour’s profile on Castro to assess the newness in the latest edition. By studying Castro we also study the Cuban Revolution, and in Balfour’s
book we are reminded about key points like how in the internal debates within the Cuban Revolution José Martí was more important than even Karl Marx. Argote-Freyre offers an engaging and impartial assessment of the book.

http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=31445

Frank Argote-Freyre, Kean University
http://www.kean.edu/~history/faculty.html#FRANK_ARGOTE-FREYRE


Thanks, again to my colleague editors Peter Blanchard, John F. Schwaller and Matthew D. Rothwell.


Sincerely yours,

Dennis R. Hidalgo
H-LatAm Review Editor
Virginia Tech

H-LatAm Reviews: On Crises, Transnationalism, and Madness

Dear Neteros,

Today we offer you reviews of books on three of the largest human ecologies of Latin America. These reviews range from mental illness in the southern cone, to the overflowing of Caribbean culture, and all the way to rhythms of crises in Mexico. The books are a monograph and two collections of essays. They are mostly concerned with the national period.

In the first review, Luis García Fanlo tells us about a book that unravels Buenos Aires’ madness as part of nation building. The Nineteenth Century brought more than immigrants and science to explain normalcy. There was a sinister positive design for homogeneity. To be crazy was not simply a mental illness, but also the unwillingness or incapacity to fit conceptual molds of citizenship. Fanlo tells us that Jonathan Ablard’s book, _Madness in Buenos Aires_, fills a niche in the history of psychiatry. In short, through careful archival research, the book’s author shows how cultural, political and social factors helped determine the capacity of the state to define and provide mental services. The reader may reasonably ask how would Ablard’s approach compare to Foucault’s study on madness and how was Argentina different from, for example, Brazil?

http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=31688

While exploring _Constructing Vernacular Culture_ Kate Houlden shows us a book on the edge of inter-disciplinarity that studies the Caribbean region through an array of provocative angles. This is a collection of fifteen tightly written essays meant to push the envelope. The authors propose to look at the Caribbean not only through the islands, but also beyond them to include the diasporic communities, to examine the migratory culture through the volatile vernacular and to include the electronic world as more

than an abstract venue of connection (among other views). Hardly any aspect of the trans-Caribbean culture goes unchallenged; even gossip is shown as a form of agency. And yet, the reviewer carefully reveals where the essays are at their best and where they could have been better. The historian may find this collection of studies a tease or a stimulus to move beyond geographical and traditional approaches to studying Caribbean History (the late nineteenth-century Antillean leaders/writers like Martí, Hostos, and Betances would be grateful).

http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=31721

Timothy J. Henderson cracks open _Cycles of Conflict, Centuries of Change_ a loquacious book of loosely assembled essays centered on a comparative rubric of Mexican revolutions or crises. The editors are concerned with the possibility that there is a spiral pattern of some sort revealed in the years of 1810 and 1910. (A colonialist could even add the years 1519, 1610s and 1710s). Are we seeing here a (rather dismal) vision of the future? The book brought together a group of well-known Mexicanists who, while exceptionally redundant, do manage to suggest new approaches and directions for the study of Mexican revolutions/crises. Yet, I still wonder if there aren’t enough commanding events in Mexican history for the historian to create countless of other rhythmic patterns?

http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=31471

A big thank-you to the reviewers for their time and for sharing their analyses with us:

Luis García Fanlo, Universidad de Buenos Aires

https://profiles.google.com/106846042918531195240/about

Kate Houlden, Queen Mary, University of London

http://qmul.academia.edu/KateHoulden

Timothy J. Henderson, Auburn University Montgomery

http://www.aum.edu/profile_ektid9416.aspx

And thank-you also to the team of editors from H-LatAm who assisted me in preparing these reviews for publication:

Peter Blanchard

Matthew Rothwell

John F. Schwaller

Sincerely yours,

Dennis R. Hidalgo

“A Strong Tree Protects its Timoun (Children).”

Circles of Hope, written by Karen Lynn Williams and illustrated by Linda Saport, Eerdmans Books, 2005.

It is not easy to find children's books with an appealing and compellingly timely story. This story is both beautiful and powerful. Children reading or listening to the narrative would learn about the plights of other children in Haiti, and their struggle to cope with unique challenges. After the January 12, 2010 earthquake these challenges have only grown worse, but, as this book tries to show, there is still hope.


The story is about a boy named Facile whose father has taught him the value of trees. He had planted a mango tree in honor of Facile’s birth, and this tree was now generously giving away fruits, shade, and preventing landslides. The father, however, had to leave to find work.
After the birth of his sister Lucia the boy decides to plant his own tree as a gift for her. But without his father around the task becomes really difficult. In fact, three times Facile attempted planting a mango tree without success. The first twig was eaten by a rambling goat. The second was swept away by rains. And the third was scorched by scrub fires.


After each failed attempt Facile asked a grown family member, “How can I plant a tree that would grow strong?” Every time he asked he received an answer that revealed the local Haitian techniques and means to handle the challenge of reforestation. Indeed, deforestation is a conspicuous yet subtle issue throughout the book, illuminating in this way the current environmental crisis in Haiti.


Close to the end, the boy learns from his uncle that he needed éspéré (hope) to make the tree grow. Facile himself also had the brilliant idea of using the many ubiquitous stones to build protective walls around the sprouting seed. Lucia’s tree finally began to grow tall and strong.

And one day, after a long absence because of work in the city, his father arrived home. Facile’s mother, who had sought medical treatment for the baby in the city, arrived too. They were all gladly greeted by the young mango tree that Facile had planted close to the house. Soon the boy’s ingenuity spreads around the community. Other trees, enclosed and sheltered by ordinary stonewalls, began to grow on nearby mountain tops, bringing back the green look these mountains used to have.


With gorgeous illustrations that resemble kids’ drawings, the narrative delicately touches on some of the current Haitian troubles. The abounding dust due to the scarcity of trees, the impact of showers on rootless soil, and the prevalent practice of scrub fires are some of them. The book also deftly considers the labor conundrum and the want of medical care that many households confront in rural sections of the country.


The happy ending with trees budding around mountaintops is not the only positive concept in the story. Facile’s evident resourcefulness and persistence in the face of constant disappointments are simply inspiring. The way in which the boy draws strength and ideas from family members also shows how the extended Haitian family plays such an important role in raising kids. But most importantly, the story reveals how the Haitian people possess the know-how to solve their own problems independently from foreign interference.

Haiti's Earthquake and the Environmental Crisis

I thought I should post a link to an older entry considering the current crisis in Haiti:
http://dennishidalgo.blogspot.com/2009/06/haitis-environment-and-social-justice.html

Fanon on National Consciousness

The purpose of this entry is to help you navigate through FrantzFanon’s chapter on National Consciousness and help you get ready for classroom discussion.

Fanon wrote this book in the three-year period in which he helped lead the psychiatric hospital in colonial Algiers, and as he wrote articles for revolutionary papers, and collaborated with the Algerian resistance. He did not have the assistance of an editor, the service of a computer or the disposal of a vast library (or the Internet for that matter). He engendered this work while he slept about four hours a day, hardly ate, and was under constant surveillance.

This is a work of painstaking pondering that comes from the meeting of considerable intellectual sweat, and hardcore, real-life political experience. At its heart, this chapter is a poignant demonstration of profound compassion for the unprivileged.

As an intellectual that trusted the people, Fanon main interest was to share with the Africans, who were on the brink of catapulting from colonialism, what he already knew about being a postcolonial, and what he thought will happen in the near future; all through the eyes of history. In fact, the Latin American past hanged predominately in Fanon’s head. Most Spanish America had over a century of postcolonial experience already, and Fanon wanted all Africans to avoid the pitfalls rendered clear through Western Hemisphere’s history.

Fanon objective was clear. He wanted to help deliver the promises of nationalism and avoid the “crude and fragile travesty of what might have been”. He had come to the conclusion that the hope of the postcolonial nation was not foreign investment or better relations with wealthy countries, but the mobilizing of its “revolutionary capital, which is the people”. In other words, the national leaders will achieve true independence only by trusting their own people.

But the main obstacle to the promise of nationalism was in fact the national bourgeoisie. These were the wealthy nationals who wanted to run the country after the exit of the colonial government. The problem was that they could not “rationalize” popular action.

The bourgeoisie has been crippled by colonialism; they had no economic power, no imagination and no political will. They were merely invested in small businesses, agriculture, and the liberal professions. They had neither financiers nor industrial magnates. They were “not engaged in production, nor in invention, nor building, nor labor.” Unfortunately, this caste had become the intermediary for the economic forces of the richest countries, and had neglected their role as national enablers. Thus, they could not deliver real independence, which in turn explains why postcolonial nations remained hanging as colonial drapes.

Read this chapter with these questions in mind:

What was Fanon's problem with producing only raw materials, nationalizing industries, promoting tourism, competition with other poor countries (as opposed to cooperation), chauvinism and tribalism?

Pay close attention at Fanon’s relentless assault on the national bourgeoisie. What was his problem with this “little greedy caste”? On the other hand, what is the responsibility of a strong bourgeoisie?

How do religious revivals may fuel racial rivalries?

What is the meaning of this phrase: “a racism of contempt: it minimizes everything it hates”?

How could African unity be achieved? What are the problems with a single party? What are the (harmful) pillars of regimes in underdeveloped countries?

Explain Fanon’s ideal: intellectuals collaborating with the masses against the national bourgeoisie.

What is the role of political party?

How Brasilia might have been a good example?

Note the industrialization and development against nature.

What was Fanon’s mood towards the plight of the African women?

What was his take regarding obscure language? And what does the unyielding black market said to him?

For Fanon, what produces the wealth of the rich? And what is the role of the education of the masses?

What are the pitfalls of youth’s pastimes, sports and national consciousness, and the quest for heroes?

What can the army bring to the construction of the nation, and what are the dangers of having the army involved in politics?

What do you find useful and revelatory in Fanon’s long essay?

Fanon ended the chapter with something that we may find controversial. He thought that a nation that is just coming out of colonialism should cultivate a sense of strong nationalism before developing social consciousness. In other words, people should feel united and develop a feel for national responsibility before demanding social justice. What do you think of this?