"Sin dejar de ser cubanos": Cuban Blacks and the Challenges of Garveyism in Cuba

Resumen: While the history of Garveyism in Cuba has attracted significant attention from scholars in recent years, most studies assume — based largely on the lukewarm reception given by the members of the exclusive Club Atenas to Marcus Garvey when he visited Havana in 1921 — that Cubans of African descent generally ignored the movement. This article examines more closely the Afro-Cuban experience with Garveyism and the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA). The writings of Cubans who identified as Garveyites, especially letters to the editor published in the official UNIA newspaper, The Negro World, help us to better understand the dimensions of Afro-Cuban involvement with the UNIA. What were the goals of those Cubans who did identify as Garveyites? What aspects of the UNIA's program appealed to them most strongly? What particular obstacles and pressures did they face as native Cubans advocating mobilization along racial lines? In seeking to answer these questions, this study examines the ideology of Cuban Garveyites and explores the challenges they confronted as they attempted to promote black pride, racial equality, and Pan-Africanism without denying their identity as Cuban citizens. The prevailing notion of a "raceless" Cuban national identity and a myth of racial equality in Cuba ultimately served as the greatest obstacles to the further spread of Garveyism among the Afro-Cuban population. 

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Año: 2003

Como citar: McLeod, M. (2003).