Un pueblo disperso: Dimensiones sociales y culturales de la diáspora cubana ed. by Jorge Duany (review)

Un pueblo disperso: Dimensiones sociales y culturales de la diáspora cubana, edited by Jorge Duany, contributes to the field of Cuban and Cuban American migration scholarship, by analyzing the evolution of Cuban migrants from exiles to members of a transnational diasporic community. The book forces the reader to look beyond traditional perceptions of Cuban migrations as affluent, hard-line, patriarchal, and socially conservative, in order to analyze the seismic shifts in attitudes and cultural production in the more recent Cuban migrations. Although this approach is not new to the field of Cuban migration studies, the monograph complies twenty-six chapters whose authors apply an array of theoretical approaches from postmodern to area studies in order to underscore the transnational character of current Cuban diaspora, accessed through literary criticism, visual arts, cultural studies, sociology, history, anthropology, and geography. Collectively, the chapters mark the shift that began post-1980, characterized by a proclivity for greater "espacios de encuentro" among families, scholars, and producers of culture. As Jorge Duany writes, "Muchos de los emigrados cubanos en la época postsoviética no encajan bien dentro de las representaciones convencionales del exilio histórico, tanto en su perfil socioeconómico y racial como en sus actitudes y prácticas políticas" (34). Although Duany's introduction is mostly descriptive, what ties these chapters together is the interplay between memory (or postmemory), cultural bifurcation, and an increase in exchange between Cubans on and off the island. The monograph's chronological framework divides migrations into three time periods: 1959–1979, 1980–2000, and 2001 to the present.

Although Duany cautions us not to prematurely declare the death of exile (34–35), chapters like Gustavo Pérez-Firmat's "Destierro y destiempo" clearly stand out because of an absence of interpersonal connections with the island. As Pérez-Firmat says, "No digo que el futuro haya pasado para todos. Solo digo que ha pasado para mi y para gente como yo, últimos sobrevivientes del llamado exilio histórico" (428). Un pueblo disperso underscores that the Cuban diaspora no longer takes its cues from "el exilio historico," but from the people, interpersonal relationships, authors, singers, and writers on the island.

Several chapters engage Marianne Hirsh's theory of postmemory (González, Urbistondo, Alvarez Borland), whereby the works of island authors—Wendy Guerra, Cuban American, Daína Chaviano, and American of Cuban parents Ana Menéndez—utilize "a powerful connection to traumatic events a generation beyond the lived experiences" (387). To this end, these authors embark on journeys to places inside and outside Cuba, reconstructing fragmented histories and creating an alternative archive. In addition, Un pueblo disperso evidences the central role of female characters as transformational beings, representing nation and identity (Rosales, Rubio, Gossler Esquilín, Celaya, González, Fajardo-Cárdenas). Un pueblo disperso engages leading Cuban musicologists, filmmakers, authors, and musicians who thematically incorporate returning diaspora into their work (Díaz Ayala, Gámez Torres, Ro-sales, Granados, González), signaling cultural exchanges through scholarly and artistic production.

Un pueblo disperso employs sociological data (Portes and Puhrmann, and Aysa-Lastra, Grenier, and Gladwin) to underscore the changes in Cuban diasporic attitudes and economic power. Although the authors omit the larger problems of a lack of social and economic mobility that plague the "99 percent" living in the United States, the Cuban migrant trends of "downward economic averages," a proclivity for transnationality, an appreciation for social achievements of the Cuban Revolution in education and health care, and a downward assimilation pattern of the children of emigrants from Cuba since the 1980s point to an end of the "American dream" for more recent arrivals (144–146). This perhaps explains why an increasing number of migrants have chosen to migrate elsewhere.

Nora Gámez Torres's chapter "La Habana está en todas partes: Young Musicians and the Symbolic Redefinition of the Cuban Nation" exemplifies how a transnational discourse has occurred in the...