Seeds of Resistance, Seeds of Hope: Place and Agency in the Conservation of Biodiversity

11. Exile Landscapes of Nostalgia and Hope in the Cuban Diaspora

240 CHAPTER ELEVEN Exile Landscapes of Nostalgia and Hope in the Cuban Diaspora Jenna E. Andrews-Swann Immigrants are defined by their mobility. They are always and forever distinguishable from those born in the host country. On a day-to-day basis they negotiate ways around experiences and memories of homeland and experiences and realities in the host country. Mariastella Pulvirenti, “Anchoring Mobile Subjectivities: Home, Identity, and Belonging among Italian Australian Migrants” The history of Cuban migration to the United States is a perplexing, complex tale. It is a story that provides some interesting fodder for discussions of identity in exile, owing to the island’s political past. Most notably, in the midst of negative repercussions of the 1959 Cuban Revolution , the U.S. travel and trade restrictions, and the subsequent dissolution of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, Cubans continue to leave the island in significant numbers. Scholars have often focused on the resultant Cuban diaspora (e.g., Behar and Suárez 2008; Duany 2005) and the effects of economically and politically motivated migration on the island and on places abroad. These migrants have settled in an array of locations around the world. However, U.S. policies toward Cuban exiles , historic political and economic agreements, ongoing cultural exchange between the two countries, and Cuba’s geographical proximity Exile Landscapes in the Cuban Diaspora 241 to the United States have meant that a large majority of Cubans who have fled the island now consider the United States their adopted home. Indeed, the first large-scale migration from Cuba to the United States dates back to the Ten Years’ War, which was waged in Cuba between 1868 and 1878. Many Cuban immigrants who have arrived in the United States (and elsewhere throughout the diaspora) variously label themselves exiliados (exiles), inmigrantes (immigrants), or refugiados (refugees), depending in part on the circumstances of their departure and resettlement. The usage of each of these labels is undoubtedly political. “Exile” connotes a decision to leave Cuba and withstand a period of absence from the country ; it suggests a strong stance against post-Revolutionary policies. The Cuban exile community in Miami is well known for its wealth and “success ,” but as Emily Skop (2001) notes, this community has been forced to incorporate new elements—in terms of both exiles’ reasons for leaving and their social class—as subsequent waves of Cubans arrive in Miami. Of course, Cuban exiles in the United States are not unique to Castro’s revolutionary government; they first arrived during the latter part of the nineteenth century in response to “Spanish colonial administration” (Pérez 1978:129). Modern, contemporary migration the world over is marked by a new global connectivity that seems to seep into even the most remote and isolated of places. But Arjun Appadurai (1990:3) notes that “if ‘a’ global cultural system is emerging, it is filled with ironies and resistances.” Diaspora is evidence of such resistance. That diasporas continue to exist amidst the forces of globalization is testament to the significance of maintaining an identity created within a particular spatial and historical context: the homeland. While akin to theories of transnationalism and border straddling, diasporas “usually pre-suppose longer distances and a separation more like exile: a constitutive taboo on return, or its postponement to a remote future. Diasporas also connect multiple communities of a dispersed population. Systematic border crossings may be part of this interconnection, but multi-locale diaspora cultures are not necessarily defined by a specific geopolitical boundary” (Clifford 1994:304). Members of a diaspora routinely share memories, longing, and nostalgia that may focus on a real or imagined homeland (Clifford 1994). The kinds of landscapes that are created in diaspora represent collections of places, created through sensory experiences and characterized by their ability to gather and hold memory (Casey 1998; Abercrombie 1998; see also chapter 4, this volume). Charles Tilley notes that “geographical experience begins in places, reaches out to others through spaces, and creates landscapes or regions for human existence” (qtd. in Escobar 2001:15). A place is not simply marked by a set of coordinates; rather, it is imbued with specific meaning for the people that occupy it and thus is a potential source of identity and resistance (Basso 1996; Casey 1997). Places are not bounded areas, but open, with porous boundaries that allow a place to intermingle with its surroundings so that places and their identifying features are constantly reconstituted...