Synopses & Reviews
"From its intervention in Cuba's war of independence from Spain to the naming of a 'transition coordinator' for the post-Castro period, the United States has long reacted to Cuba as a neuralgic issue. Louis Perez helps us understand the recurrent American attitudes of entitlement, domination, disappointment, and shock that have framed U.S. policies, and shows how U.S. experience with Cuba has shaped the broader world reputation of the United States. One can hope that tomorrow's policymakers will learn from this illuminating account."--Abraham F. Lowenthal, University of Southern California "Perez reminds us that the current U.S. policies toward Cuba and the hype about how the U.S. should 'manage' Cuba after Fidel are informed by deeply entrenched metaphors from the previous two centuries. This history reveals the ongoing blindness to social and political realities that such metaphors encourage. Cuba in the American Imagination is a timely addition to Perez's magisterial oeuvre."--Amy Kaplan, University of Pennsylvania "Perez is our best historian of U.S.-Cuban relations, and this book is in one sense a summation of his distinguished work over the past several decades. It is particularly significant because the U.S.-Cuban relationship is going to have to be fundamentally rethought and reshaped in the near future, and this work not only provides critical information, but also acts as a loud warning about how that debate must not be conducted."--Walter LaFeber, Emeritus, Cornell University
Review
"In
Cuba and the American Imagination, Louis A. Pérez Jr. adds to his impressive
oeuvre on US-Cuba relations in the twentieth century. . . . Compelling. . . . As the potential for change and dialogue between the United States and Cuba appears viable for the first time in decades, Perez's study remains prescient. . . . Perez's argument that metaphors matter and demonstrate hierarchies of power is convincing."
-EIAL: Estudios Interdisciplinarios de America Latina y el Caribe
Review
"[This] book needs to be read not only by scholars of U.S.-Cuban relations, but by anyone interested in the self-constructions of the United States."
-New West Indian Guide
Review
"An engaging and well-researched investigation into metaphors used by US politicians, journalists, and writers to depict Cuba. . . . Essential reading for Cuban experts, and it should be of interest to US and Latin American cultural historians."
-Journal of American Studies
Synopsis
For more than two hundred often turbulent years, Americans have imagined and described Cuba and its relationship to the United States by conjuring up a variety of striking images--Cuba as a woman, a neighbor, a ripe fruit, a child learning to ride a bicycle. One of the foremost historians of Cuba, Louis A. Perez Jr. offers a revealing history of these metaphorical and depictive motifs and discovers the powerful motives behind such characterizations of the island.
Synopsis
For more than two hundred years, Americans have imagined and described Cuba and its relationship to the United States by conjuring up a variety of striking images--Cuba as a woman, a neighbor, a ripe fruit, a child learning to ride a bicycle. Louis A. Perez Jr. offers a revealing history of these metaphorical and depictive motifs and discovers the powerful motives behind such characterizations of the island as they have persisted and changed since the early nineteenth century. Drawing on texts and visual images produced by Americans ranging from government officials, policy makers, and journalists to travelers, tourists, poets, and lyricists, Perez argues that these charged and coded images of persuasion and mediation were in service to America's imperial impulses over Cuba.
About the Author
Louis A. Perez Jr. is J. Carlyle Sitterson Professor of History and director of the Institute for the Study of the Americas at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the author of many award-winning books, including On Becoming Cuban: Identity, Nationality, and Culture and To Die in Cuba: Suicide and Society (both from the University of North Carolina Press).
Table of Contents
ContentsAcknowledgments
Introduction: The Idea of Cuba
Chapter 1. Metaphor between Motive and Meaning
Chapter 2. Imagining Self-Interest
Chapter 3. Metaphor as Paradigm
Chapter 4. On Gratitude as Moral Currency of Empire
Chapter 5. Shifting Metaphors, Changing Meanings: Representing Revolution
Chapter 6. Through the Prism of Metaphor: Accommodation to Empire
Notes
Index