Synopses & Reviews
After Cuba’s 1959 revolution, the Castro government sought to instill a new social order. Hoping to achieve a new and egalitarian society, the state invested in policies designed to promote the well-being of women and children. Yet once the Soviet Union fell and Cuba’s economic troubles worsened, these programs began to collapse, with serious results for Cuban families.
Conceiving Cuba offers an intimate look at how, with the island’s political and economic future in question, reproduction has become the subject of heated public debates and agonizing private decisions. Drawing from several years of first-hand observations and interviews, anthropologist Elise Andaya takes us inside Cuba’s households and medical systems. Along the way, she introduces us to the women who wrestle with the difficult question of whether they can afford a child, as well as the doctors who, with only meager resources at their disposal, struggle to balance the needs of their patients with the mandates of the state.
Andaya’s groundbreaking research considers not only how socialist policies have profoundly affected the ways Cuban families imagine the future, but also how the current crisis in reproduction has deeply influenced ordinary Cubans’ views on socialism and the future of the revolution. Casting a sympathetic eye upon a troubled state, Conceiving Cuba gives new life to the notion that the personal is always political.
Review
andquot;Alyshia Galvez challenges conventional wisdom on how Latinas plan families, making a very important contribution to understanding the Latino health paradox.andquot;
Review
andquot;This wonderful book demonstrates how immigrant knowledge is rendered irrelevant by the New York City medical establishment, and contributes to our understanding of large-scale transnational immigration issues examined through the lens of gender, pregnancy, and reproduction.andquot;
Review
andquot;For years, health professionals have been intrigued by the so-called 'birth-weight paradox'andmdash;the fact that recently arrived Mexican immigrant women have fewer pregnancy complications and fewer low-birth-weight babies than their socioeconomic status would predict. Galvez casts the large New York City public hospital prenatal clinic at which she did her interviews as a site of 'subjectification'andmdash;the molding of Mexican immigrant women and their families into racialized, needy, passive subjects of medicalization, state intervention, and monitoring. In large part, the women submit because of their own narratives of bettering themselves by their move to the US. This brief description cannot do justice to the richness of Galvez's analysis and the complexity of the women's negotiations with the US health care system. Highly recommended.andquot;
Review
"Andaya reveals the complex entanglement of women’s reproductive choices, healthcare practices, and the state’s agenda to reshape gender ideologies. This rich ethnography will appeal to regional specialists, and to scholars of gender, reproduction, post-socialism, and social change."
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andquot;Marchi provides a unique and valuable account of the rise of Day of the Dead celebrations in the US, demonstrating the complex dynamics of ethnic and cultural identity in the contemporary cultural economy, urban community, and media environment.andquot;
Review
andquot;What a difference a day (the Day of the Dead) makes! In the U.S. in the past generation, a Latin American family/religious ritual has been reinvented as a holiday of ethnic pride that builds bridges between new and settled immigrants, between Latinos and Anglos, and across cultural identity, consumerism, and political protest. Regina Marchi reveals all this in a marvelous work, a rare blend of charm, grace, attentive field work, and theoretical savvy.
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Review
andquot;Regina Marchi speaks directly to all of those wondering how Mexico's tradition of re-membering the dead within living communities became US America's newest holiday. The book thoughtfully records the voices of significant Chicanas/os whose traditional and non-traditional approaches initiated this transformation.andquot;
Review
andquot;While pre-Hispanic New World populations have long venerated cherished ancestors via elaborate household altars, mountain shrines, carved monuments, and other ritual devices, Marchi challenges popular misconceptions through a nuanced blending of ethnography, historiography, oral history, and critical cultural analysis. She cogently argues that media portrayals that typically seek to ascribe the 'Mexican' Dfa de los Muertos to a legendary pre-Columbianandmdash;read Aztecandmdash;origin necessarily fail to account for the otherwise authentic sources of this now pan-American celebration with Hispanic Catholic roots and a newfound international audience. Highly recommended.andquot;
Review
andquot;The focus on Latino males is timely and fills an important gap in our knowledge of this population. The tone, identification, description, and explanation of various health problems that are seriously affecting the health of Latinos within a social and structural lens all demonstrate a well thoughtout comprehensive approach. Health Issues in Latino Males not only contributes to the scholarship on this topic but also serves as a catalyst for future research.andquot;
Review
andquot;The unique characteristics of U.S. Latino males will pose challenges and opportunities for the nation's employers, educational institutions, and health agencies. Those responsible for these areas would be wise to become more familiar with their needs and issues.
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Review
andquot;This is an informative, data-driven volume for students and health professionals with an interest in Latino male health. Highly recommended.andquot;
Review
andquot;Latina/o Sexualities is a brilliant collection that provides groundbreaking analyses of the myriad connections between sexuality and race.andquot;
Review
andquot;Filled with provocative arguments and illuminating insights, Latina/o Sexualities marks a new and exciting epoch in the study of human sexuality and its interactions with race and class; a must-read for scholars and students of ethnic studies and human sexuality.andquot;
Review
andquot;A pathbreaking contribution and the definite resource for interdisciplinary scholars in the growing field of Latino sexualities. A highly sophisticated intervention that fills the existing void of empirical research in this area, while drawing from and critically engaging with the social and behavioral science literature. This volume will forever challenge us to rethink the categories, methods and approaches scholars use in this rapidly developing field of study.andquot;
Review
andquot;Two groundbreaking, indispensable guides for serious scholars of sexualities who wish to understand both the heterogeneous sexualities of African Americans and Latinos as well as how greater attention to race, ethnicity, class and culture provides important new directions for the field.andquot;
Synopsis
According to the Latina health paradox, Mexican immigrant women have less complicated pregnancies and more favorable birth outcomes than many other groups, in spite of socioeconomic disadvantage. Alyshia Gandaacute;lvez provides an ethnographic examination of this paradox. What are the ways that Mexican immigrant women care for themselves during their pregnancies? How do they decide to leave behind some of the practices they bring with them on their pathways of migration in favor of biomedical approaches to pregnancy and childbirth?
This book takes us from inside the halls of a busy metropolitan hospitalandrsquo;s public prenatal clinic to the Oaxaca and Puebla states in Mexico to look at the ways Mexican women manage their pregnancies. The mystery of the paradox lies perhaps not in the recipes Mexican-born women have for good perinatal health, but in the prenatal encounter in the United States. Patient Citizens, Immigrant Mothers is a migration story and a look at the ways that immigrants are received by our medical institutions and by our society
Synopsis
Conceiving Cuba offers an intimate look at how the institutions promoting the well-being of mothers and children, once a cornerstone of the socialist system, collapsed with the fall of the Soviet Union, throwing both individual families and the nation itself into profound crisis. Drawing from years of first-hand observations and interviews, anthropologist Elise Andaya takes us inside the island’s households and medical facilities, as they struggle to make do with limited resources and grapple with difficult questions concerning family planning, reproductive health, and the future of the socialist revolution itself.
Synopsis
Honoring relatives by tending graves, building altars, and cooking festive meals has been an honored tradition among Latin Americans for centuries. The tribute, "el Dia de los Muertos," has enjoyed renewed popularity since the 1970s when Latino activists and artists in the United States began expanding "Day of the Dead" north of the border with celebrations of performance art, Aztec danza, art exhibits, and other public expressions.
Focusing on the power of ritual to serve as a communication medium, Regina M. Marchi combines a mix of ethnography, historical research, oral history, and critical cultural analysis to explore the manifold and unexpected transformations that occur when the tradition is embraced by the mainstream. A testament to the complex nature of ethnic identity, Day of the Dead in the USA provides insight into the power of ritual to create community, transmit oppositional messages, and advance educational, political, and economic goals.
Synopsis
It is estimated that more than 50 million Latinos live in the United States. This is projected to more than double by 2050. In Health Issues in Latino Males experts from public health, medicine, and sociology examine the issues affecting Latino men's health and recommend policies to overcome inequities and better serve this population. The book addresses sexual and reproductive health; alcohol, tobacco, and drug use; mental and physical health among those in the juvenile justice or prison systems; chronic diseases; HIV/AIDS; Alzheimer's and dementia; and health issues among war veterans. It discusses utilization, insurance coverage, and research programs, and includes an extensive appendix charting epidemiological data on Latino health.
Synopsis
Latina/os are currently the largest minority population in the United States. They are also one of the fastest growing. Yet, we have very limited research and understanding of their sexualities. Instead, stereotypical images flourish even though scholars have challenged the validity and narrowness of these images and the lack of attention to the larger social context. Gathering the latest empirical work in the social and behavioral sciences, this reader offers us a critical lens through which to understand these images and the social context framing Latina/os and their sexualities.
Situated at the juncture of Latina/o studies and sexualities studies, Latina/o Sexualities provides a single resource that addresses the current state of knowledge from a multidisciplinary perspective. Contributors synthesize and critique the literature and carve a separate space where issues of Latina/o sexualities can be explored given the limitations of prevalent research models. This work compels the current wave in sexuality studies to be more inclusive of ethnic minorities and sets an agenda that policy makers and researchers will find invaluable.
About the Author
MARILYN AGUIRRE-MOLINA, one of the nation's leading authorities on Latino/a health issues, is a professor of public health at the City University of New York, and director of the university's Institute for Health Equity.
LUISA N. BORRELL is an associate professor in the department of health sciences, Lehman College, City University of New York.
WILLIAM VEGA is a professor of family medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles, director of the Luskin Center for Innovation, and codirector of the Multicultural Research Network on Health and Health Care.
Table of Contents
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction
An Ancient and Modern Festival
Mexico's Special Relationship with Day of the Dead
Day of the Dead in the United States
Ritual Communication and Community Building
US Day of the Dead as Political Communication: A Moral Economy
Day of the Dead in the US Media: The Celebration Goes Mainstream
The Expanding Hybridity of an Already Hybrid Tradition
The Commoditization of a Death Ritual
Conclusion: What We Can Learn from Day of the Dead
Methodological Appendix
Notes
Glossary
Bibliography
Index