NOTES
Introduction
1. Mirta Ojito, “Best of Friends, Worlds Apart,” New York Times, June 5, 2000, http://
2. Racial categorization works differently in Cuba as intermediary categories between black and white are officially recognized. In addition, prevailing discourses privilege national identity over racial identity. Such “racial democracy” discourses are related to Cuban Patriots’ efforts to unify the country during the struggle for independence from Spain between 1868 and 1898 by repudiating racial separatism. However, such discourses have also served to silence anti-racist efforts.
3. The distinction being made here between a “black” and “white” Cuban is specific to the U.S. context. Ojito’s article implies that these men were not “black” and “white” in the same way before emigrating but are cast as black and white by Anglos, African Americans, and other Cubans in a way that “matters.” Though divisions between white and black Cubans indeed exist in Cuba, the men’s experiences point to the idea that there is a particular way the divide between white and black Cubans in the United States is “artificial” and created in this national context.
4. Ojito, “Best of Friends.”
5. Membership in these groups is, of course, not mutually exclusive. However, in Miami, African Americans were often distinguished from “Cubans” without accounting for the racial diversity among Cubans; generations of Cuban immigrants shared a culture and country of origin but had differing political perspectives and U.S. experiences based on immigration cohort effects; and divisions were manifest between black and white Cubans regardless of cultural and other similarities.
6. Rather than referring to the idea of citizenship as defined through legal processes, I use the term “citizenship” broadly to refer to a sense of being accepted or included within the nation. My use is similar to Cainkar and Maira’s notion of “cultural citizenship,” which they define as “the everyday experience of belonging to the nation-state in relation to experiences of inclusion and exclusion” (2005, 3).
7. As I am primarily concerned with discussing the dynamics of race as it operates in the context of the United States, in this book I use the terms “white,” white supremacy,” and “whiteness” to capture the overarching power dynamic, put in place by white Anglo settlers and the United States’ slave societies, which frames racial relations in the United States.
8. Here I am referencing Flores and Jiménez Román’s (2009) “triple consciousness,” which argues that Afro-Latinos in the United States have a compounded experience of discrimination on the basis of their race and their ethnicity, while also being viewed as not “true blacks” by some African Americans. Because of such experiences, Afro-Latinos see the world through several lenses.
9. In the book, the term “Miami” refers to both the city of Miami and the larger Miami-Dade metro area.
10. Black immigrants are current U.S. residents born outside the United States who indicate that their race is black or is mixed-race black, regardless of whether they also claim to be of Hispanic origin (U.S. Census 2010).
11. For instance, according to the 2010 Census, the Miami metro area ranks among the top ten of the U.S. metro areas with both the largest black populations and highest black-white segregation. It also has significant Latino-white segregation (see Logan and Stults 2011).
12. According to Maria Cristina García’s sources, anywhere from 10 to 40 percent of the Marielitos were black (García 1996, 60). An El Miami Herald article put the percentage of blacks in Mariel at 19.6 percent (Voboril 1980, 4), while Bach, Bach, and Triplett (1981–1982) cite the percentage of blacks as 40 percent. During the fourth wave, or Balsero crisis, the percentage of blacks and mulatos was also significant, 8.3 percent as compared with the 3 percent that arrived before 1980 (Ackerman and Clark 1995).
13. It should be noted that because of resettlement efforts and discriminatory practices, black Cubans do not always end up settling in Miami once they migrate to the United States. According to figures from the Metro-Dade County Planning Department (cited in Dunn 1997, 336), there were about 2,629 blacks from Cuba in the county in 1980 (accounting for about 8 percent of all blacks) and 6,382 blacks from Cuba in the county in 1990 (accounting for about 6.5 percent of all blacks).
14. There is quantitative evidence that backs up the problems with the “worthiness” narrative positioned here. Such studies demonstrate that although blacks are out-educating and out-saving whites, they do not receive the same material returns. See, for example, Hamilton, Darity, Price, and Sridharan 2015; Nam, Hamilton, Darity, and Price 2015.
15. John J. Betancur (2014, 363) also emphasizes such strategies of divide and conquer in his work on black-Latino relations, arguing that relations between these groups are manipulated by dominant actors within a racial matrix of structural and institutional power.
16. Here I am mainly discussing white Cuban Americans, but we should also take into consideration Cuban diversity when thinking about this. It could be argued also that many nonwhite (mixed-race) and black Cubans have more in common with other Latinos in terms of racialized experiences, especially if they live outside Miami.
17. See also Neil Foley’s (2010) riveting analysis of the failures of black-brown solidarity efforts in Texas during and after World War II.
18. For example, Márquez (2014), Marrow (2011), and Ribas (2015).
19. Exceptions include Woltman and Newbold (2009) and Skop (2001), which are studies focusing specifically on race. For studies that mention the role of blackness in the Mariel stigma see Aguirre (1984); Bach et al. (1981–1982); Hufker and Cavender (1990, 33); Portes and Stepick (1994); Soruco (1996, 10); and Boswell and Curtis (1984).
20. “Mariel” and “Marielito” refer to the port, Mariel, from which the third wave of refugees departed. The diminutive term Marielito, though widely used in scholarly writing, began as a derogatory term.
21. The founder of the Miami Times, Henry Ethelbert Sigismund Reeves, was Bahamian-born (Rose 2015, 24).
22. An analysis of these periodiquitos is not included in the current discussion. However, in a study of a sample of periodiquitos published in 1980, I found Cuban American perspectives in these sources to be consistent in their general tone with my findings in El Miami Herald.
23. While African American and Spanish-language newspapers provided an archive of perspectives emanating from these communities, no comparable post-1980 “Afro-Cuban immigrant archive” exists.
1. Race Making
1. The controversial people Mandela thanked for their financial and military support of the African National Congress included Yasir Arafat, Muammar Gaddafi, and Fidel Castro (Sawyer 2006).
2. This is not to deny the agency of both groups—agency that was surely expressed in the adroitness with which they appealed to these gatekeepers.
3. See http://
4. See Dunn (2013; 2016) and Connoly (2014) for more on the history of black exploitation in the area and details of the horrendous violence blacks experienced.
5. See Dunn (1997) and Rose (2015) for more information on Afro-Caribbean/West Indian migration to Miami and the important role Bahamians played in Miami’s history.
6. The post–Fidel Castro revolution Cuban community came to the United States in four distinctive waves. The third and fourth waves will be discussed in more detail in coming chapters. Though not the topic of this book, it should be noted that Cubans had a long history of migration to the United States (in smaller numbers) well before the Castro revolution (see Greenbaum 2002; López 2010; Shell-Weiss 2009).
7. The 1973 ordinance had officially declared Miami a bilingual city. The Metro Commission (an elected board tasked with representing the citizens of the county’s districts) and Mayor Jack Orr had decided to make this declaration as the city sought to further integrate Cuban refugees and to adapt to the fact that government officials and first responders needed to be able to communicate with Miami-Dade County’s rapidly growing Spanish-speaking population.
8. See Darity (2011) for an excellent take-down of “underclass” theory and the victim-blaming discourse in relation to this topic.
9. See De Genova (2005, 298) for a discussion of other early African American intellectuals who have critiqued the erasure of African Americans from the idea of who can be “American.”
10. Aja and Marchevsky (2017) examine similar good/bad immigrant undercurrents related to “Dreamers,” undocumented immigrants, and recent deportation policy.
11. This idea of what makes one a “good immigrant” is also similar to Espiritu’s (2006, 2014) notion of the “good refugee” who is a grateful contributor the U.S. nation and its national interests.
12. I use the term “native” instead of Kim’s term “insider” to link the idea of nativism. See also De Genova (2006) for an integral discussion of nativism and constructions of immigrant foreignness.
13. See Guinier and Torres’s use of the term “nativism” to describe black attitudes toward Mexicans in Los Angeles (2002, 241).
14. John J. Betancur (2014, 353) refers to this game (that blacks and Latinos in his analysis are compelled to take part in) as “the game of racial domination.”
2. Marielitos, the Criminalization of Blackness, and Constructions of Worthy Citizenship
1. Right before the Mariel exodus began, the U.S. government had passed the Refugee Act of March 1980. According to this act, the Marielitos could not be accepted automatically as refugees; their status would be determined by review on a case-by-case basis. The act limited Cuban immigration by establishing a yearly quota of 19,500 Cuban refugees and required individual case reviews to determine eligibility for refugee status. If approved, refugees could become permanent residents after two years (Masud-Piloto 1996).
2. This characterization did lasting damage: studies on the adaptation of Marielitos, years after they first arrived, show signs that Mariel immigrants continued to suffer social consequences, such as higher rates of imprisonment than other Cubans, likely due to the greater surveillance they received (Aguirre 1984; G. A. Fernández 2002; Lisandro Pérez 2001).
3. As Gonzalez (2011) argues, this nativist backlash, beginning in 1980, was the third major eruption since the nation’s founding.
4. Likely due to the differences in the way racial categories are understood in the United States and in Cuba (affecting self-reports), there is variation in official statistics about the racial makeup of the Mariel wave. For instance, an El Miami Herald article (Voboril 1980, 4) put the percentage of blacks in Mariel at 19.6 percent, while Bach, Bach, and Triplett (1981–1982) cite the percentage of blacks as 40 percent.
5. The “one-drop rule” refers to the idea in the United States that the children of black and white unions are black (rather than white or “biracial”). Even people whose forebears are mostly white but can trace back to at least one black grandparent or forebear would be counted as black (F. J. Davis 2001).
6. Although marriage between blacks and whites was officially prohibited in 1805, this law was not enforced until 1864 (Martinez-Alier 1989).
7. Cheryl Brownstein, “Llegan familiares de cubano que sobrevivió al paredón,” [news story] El Miami Herald, April 15, 1980, 2. Throughout this book, English translations of the original Spanish from both El Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald are used. The original Spanish was translated by a professional translator of Cuban descent who lives in Miami.
8. “Mujeres y niños duermen en barracas en Cayo Hueso” [news story], El Miami Herald, April 26, 1980, 5.
9. Guillermo Martínez, “Alternativas de nuevos exilados son reducidas” [news story], El Miami Herald, April 9, 1980, 4.
10. Johnson, L. B. (1966). Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Lyndon B. Johnson, 1965. Vol. 2. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
11. Roberto Fabricio, “Que vengan los asilados!” [editorial], El Miami Herald, April 12, 1980, 4.
12. Roberto Fabricio, “Un problema de imagen” [op-ed], El Miami Herald, July 3, 1980, 8.
13. Dan Williams, “ ‘Escoria’ es lastre y sambenito del nuevo exilio” [top news story], El Miami Herald, September 1, 1980, 1, 3.
14. Luis R. Caceres Jr., “Apuntes de lo del Mariel” [op-ed], El Miami Herald, September 23, 1980, 4.
15. Juan J. Alborna Salado, “Los jóvenes del Mariel” [op-ed], El Miami Herald, September 8, 1980, 6.
16. “Antonio” is the only interviewee quoted here who would not be considered “black” by others or based on self-identification, but he was interviewed because of his connections to other Afro-Cubans who arrived during Mariel.
17. Melquíades B. Fuentes, “El exilio nuevo si tiene iniciativa” [letter to the editor], El Miami Herald, September 6, 1980, 4.
18. Romilio Espinosa Pereda, “Condena ataques a los recién llegados” [letter to the editor], El Miami Herald, September 8, 1980, 6.
19. Braulio Sáenz, “Los refugiados no son escoria” [letter to the editor], El Miami Herald, September 30, 1980, 4.
20. Williams, “ ‘Escoria’ es lastre y sambenito del nuevo exilio.”
21. Dan Williams, “Nuevo exilio es ‘clase obrera sólida,’ dice estudio” [news story], El Miami Herald, September 1, 1980, 3.
22. The Mariel exodus led to the creation of an organization that was expressly tasked with counteracting all the anti-Cuban articles and stereotypes that were circulating. The organization, FACE (Facts about Cuban Exiles), also worked to promote a positive image of Cubans through articles and films. Although the organization began in Miami, it grew to have chapters across the country (Portes and Stepick 1994, 35).
23. George Stein and Guillermo Martinez, “Cifras policiales comprometen a refugiados” [news story], El Miami Herald, September 18, 1980, 1, 3.
24. Zita Arorcha, “Abarrotada la cárcel de Dade por refugiados” [news story], El Miami Herald, September 11, 1980, 1; Eric Rieder, “Refugiados matan a hombre en bar” [news story], El Miami Herald, September 22, 1980, 2.
25. Dan Williams and Joan Fleischman, “Achacan a refugiados alza del crimen en Miami Beach” [news story], El Miami Herald, July 25, 1980, 2.
26. Ibid.
27. Portes and Stepick’s 1994 study corroborates my findings that Cubans had consolidated negative views of the Marielitos. They provide evidence from their survey research, which also demonstrated that Mariel Cubans perceived that older Cubans discriminated against them (see pages 31–33 for some examples of the comments they gleaned from their survey).
28. Cesar E. Montejo, “Benefició a Castro éxodo del Mariel” [letter to the editor], El Miami Herald, September 1, 1980, 4.
29. George Stein and Guillermo Martinez, “Cifras policiales comprometen a refugiados” [news story], El Miami Herald, September 18, 1980, 1, 3.
30. Williard P. Rose and Stephen Doig, “Furiosos, achacan a Cubanos” [news story], El Miami Herald, May 29, 1980, 1.
31. More details on the McDuffie case and uprising will be provided in Chapter 3.
32. “Falta un plan para asimilar al nuevo exiliado Cubano” [editorial], El Miami Herald, May 31, 1980, 6.
33. Guillermo Martinez, “Ciudad de carpas: ‘Ghetto’ Cubano en Miami” [news story], El Miami Herald, August 24, 1980, 1, 5.
34. Dan Williams, “Esperanza y desesperación en el campamiento de carpas,” [news story] El Miami Herald, August 31, 1980, 10. Other stories that reported on the larger number of blacks among the newcomers include an April news story, “The Situation in the Peruvian Embassy Is Tense,” which reported on “the extraordinary diversity of the previous ones, between the blacks, whites, and mulattos that are there” (Guillermo Martínez and Dan Williams, “Tensa la situación en embajada peruana,” El Miami Herald, April 10, 1980), 1. In May, two news stories provided estimates of the percentage of blacks among the Marielitos. One states that almost 20 percent of the new arrivals were black but notes that the majority (a little over 80 percent) were white (Mary Voboril, “Sumase al éxodo lo más valioso de la población de Cuba,” El Miami Herald, May 5, 1980, 4). The other, “The Recently Arrived: Younger and Poorer,” cites research by sociologist Juan Clark from Miami-Dade Community College, along with statistics taken from the Opa-locka Center for Refugees and the Elgin Air Force Base, which also states that blacks constituted 20 percent of the Marielitos. The article describes the new arrivals: “The overwhelming majority are men, which represents a notable change from the previous Cuban immigrants; there are also many more blacks than ever before” (Guy Gugliotta, “Recién llegados: Mas jóvenes y pobres,” El Miami Herald, May 11, 1980,1).
35. “Urge unidad a los Cubanos exiliados” [unsigned letter to the editor], El Miami Herald, July 7, 1980, 4.
36. Helio Nardo, “Comportamiento en Estados Unidos” [letter to the editor], El Miami Herald, July 12, 1980, 6.
37. Jose Cobo, “Refugiados: Están en nación de leyes” [letter to the editor], El Miami Herald, June 2, 1980, 6.
38. “Carter cavila mientras los refugiados se enfurecen” [editorial], El Miami Herald, June 3, 1980, 4.
39. Because I was also interested in whether the paper noted the larger presence of Afro-Cubans, every story that mentioned the word “black” or “Afro-Cuban,” as well as those that contained pictures of Cubans who appeared to be black, was also collected to determine the context in which the words were mentioned and black Cubans were depicted.
40. Juan Casanova, “Diez mil buscaban refugio y hallaron el infierno” [feature article], El Miami Herald, June 1, 1980, 1.
41. Ileana Orozo, “Exiliados del Mariel tienen vida nueva” [feature article], El Miami Herald, June 21, 1980, 8.
42. Ileana Orozo, “Familia no se desalienta, a pesar de problemas: Los Casanova se adaptan, poco a poco” [feature article], El Miami Herald, July 26, 1980, 10.
43. Ileana Orozo, “Los Casanova van adaptándose al exilio” [feature article], El Miami Herald, September 6, 1980, 7.
44. Ibid.
45. Ibid.
46. Just one of the articles describes an incident when Juan faced discrimination, from a pair of women who refused to give him a ride after he answered “yes” to their question of whether he was Cuban. It is not clear from the story what the ethnic and racial backgrounds of the women were (whether they were African American or Anglos).
47. Orozo, “Familia no se desalienta,” El Miami Herald, 10.
48. See Espíritu (2006, 2014) for a discussion of how such redemption stories of “good refugees” were also expected of Vietnamese refugees who came to the United States in the 1970s and 1980s.
49. Orozo, “Familia no se desalienta,” 10.
50. Juan Casanova, “Diez mil buscaban refugio y hallaron el infierno” [feature story], El Miami Herald, June 1, 1980, 1.
51. Martínez and Williams, “Tensa la situación en embajada peruana,” 1; Voboril, “Sumase al éxodo lo más valioso,” 4; Gugliotta, “Recién llegados,” 1.
52. As noted earlier, since many of the news stories were written first in English and then translated, it is also possible that the inattention to race, at least in news stories, was related to the perspectives of writers or editors from the English-language paper. These writers or decision makers may have ignored the issue of race in reporting on Cubans.
3. And Justice for All?
1. See Antonio López (2012, 157) for more discussion on the Cuban cop involved in this brutality case.
2. See Connolly (2014) for more details on how whites utilized real estate practices to continue to disenfranchise blacks.
3. The first Haitian boat people, most threatened by the Duvalier regime, began arriving in Miami in September 1963. By 1964, members of the middle classes also began leaving, and during the 1960s and 1970s, some members of the lower classes began to leave (primarily for New York) (Stepick 1992).
4. This amount of coverage is still significant given that the publication is a weekly rather than daily newspaper. However, it is a smaller number in comparison to the newspaper’s coverage of other timely topics.
5. “America’s Partiality to Cubans” [editorial], Miami Times, May 1, 1980, 4.
6. “Government Should Accommodate Those Cubans Wanting to Go Back” [editorial], Miami Times, August 21, 1980, 5.
7. “ ‘No Habla Español’ Costs Black Maids Their Jobs” [news story], Miami Times, August 7, 1980, 1. This proposal, also referenced in earlier chapters, would prohibit the use of Metro funds for programs that used any language other than English (García 1996).
8. “Bilingualism an Excuse for Discrimination” [letter to the editor], Miami Times, October 9, 1980, 35.
9. “Cubans Should Not Be “One up” on Blacks” [letter to the editor], Miami Times, May 15, 1980, 35.
10. “Bilingualism an Excuse for Discrimination,” 35.
11. See also “Immigrants Insist on Bilingualism” [letter to the editor], Miami Times, September 6, 1980, 39.
12. “South Florida’s Goal: Keep out Haitians” [letter to the editor], Miami Times, September 30, 1980, 13A.
13. Bayard Rustin, “Tragedy in Miami: Oppressed vs. Oppressed” [op-ed], Miami Times, June 5, 1980, 5.
14. See Stepick (1992) for a more complete discussion of the changes in immigration policy toward Cubans and Haitians in the 1980s.
15. Ricky Thomas, “Immigration Policies Should Be Colorblind” [op-ed], Miami Times, April 17, 1980, 6.
16. Ibid.
17. Ricky Thomas, “Cuban Sealift Illegal” [op-ed], Miami Times, April 1980, 5.
18. The United States had recently passed the 1980 Refugee Act. This act was more restrictive toward Cuban immigration in that it made Cuban acceptance into the United States less automatic, but the act was viewed as an important move to make immigration and asylum policy more equitable for people arriving from other countries (such as Haiti).
19. “Haitian Refugees Finally Noticed” [editorial], Miami Times, May 6, 1980, 1.
20. Vernon Jordan, “A Fair Break for Haitian Refugees” [op-ed], Miami Times, June 5, 1980, 5.
21. Rustin, “Tragedy in Miami,” 5.
22. “NAACP Decries Anti-Bilingual Petition” [news story], Miami Times, August 18, 1980, 25.
23. “Cuban Refugees and Haitian Refugees” [editorial], Miami Times, May 15, 1980, 4.
24. Haiba Jabali, “Reflection” [op-ed], Miami Times, April 24, 1980, 24.
25. Haiba Jabali, “Afro-Cuban Refugee Point of View” [op-ed], Miami Times, May 15, 1980, 11.
26. “Cuban Refugees and Haitian refugees,” 4.
27. “South Florida’s Goal,” 13A.
28. This is not to deny that there are also some Afro-Cubans who align with white Cubans and attempt to dissociate from African Americans. See Michelle Hay’s (2009) study for her take on the important role their exposure to African American political culture and philosophies played in the lives and self-identifications of the Florida and New York-based Afro-Cuban immigrants she interviewed.
29. The adoption of AAVE was less noticeable among women. For the five men who adopted this manner of speaking, four lived in Los Angeles, where they became proficient in African American English because jobs and neighborhoods put them in contact with black Americans. In Miami, interviewees on the whole were less proficient in English in general and in AAVE in particular.
4. Framing the Balsero Crisis
1. It should be noted that suffering also has later associations with other important African American social movements, such as Black Lives Matter.
2. See Louis A. Pérez (1995) for a more complete discussion of the impact of the “special period” on the Cuban economy.
3. See Soderlund (2003) and Girard (2004) for more detailed discussion of the reasoning behind political opposition to Clinton’s stance on Haiti.
4. During the George H. W. Bush administration, a coup in Haiti took out the U.S.-backed Jean Bertrand Aristide in 1991, and in 1994 Clinton made moves to intervene and restore the ousted leader with a military invasion of Haiti (Girard 2004).
5. See Chapter 3 for a brief discussion of the complicated political relationship the United States has had with Haiti. This relationship, which alternated in U.S. support and condemnation of the Haitian leadership, likely contributed to the contradictions in the U.S. government and general public’s stance on Haiti during the 1990s.
6. On September 19, 1994, U.S. troops went to Haiti, but the conflict was ultimately resolved without war, and Aristide was successfully reinstated to power through a deal negotiated by Jimmy Carter, Colin Powell, and others (Girard 2004).
7. In an effort to appease the Cuban American community, on August 20 Clinton requested a meeting with Miami leaders, including the influential Jorge Mas Canosa, the leader of the Cuban American National Foundation. In the meeting, Clinton promised to further strengthen the embargo against Cuba in exchange for support of his new policy (Henken 2005). The president was able to appease some Cubans with these agreements, but others lamented the fact that repatriation was now an option and that refugees found at sea would not be immediately brought to the United States.
8. To investigate the discursive framing of the Balseros and the crisis in El Nuevo Herald, I analyzed 319 articles, the results from a search for the key word “Balsero” in the online database of El Nuevo Herald between the dates of July 1, 1994, and December 31, 1994. The online database allows searches for articles from 1982 to the present. The term “Balsero” was the common word used within the media to describe the refugees who arrived on rafts, and thus a search for this word was most likely to yield stories about the refugees fleeing Cuba at the time. Of those articles, I counted only those stories dealing with the Balseros in the United States, Cuba, and Guantánamo, leaving out stories reporting on their condition in other resettlement countries such as Panama, the Cayman Islands, and Spain. Stories that made only passing reference to the Balseros were also excluded. The overall tone of the articles and the most prevalent themes regarding the reception of the Balseros by the established Cuban community were identified. Only six stories about the Balseros have a negative tone.
9. Ramón Cotta, “El costo es moral” [editorial], El Nuevo Herald, October 5, 1994, A10.
10. Christopher Marquis, “Se desvanece el trato especial para los cubanos” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, November 20, 1994, A1.
11. María A. Morales, Jannice Reyes, Ivan Román, and Maydel Santana, “Freno a éxodo provoca furia y lágrimas” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, August 20, 1994, A1.
12. Roberto Suarez, “Cuba: Peligro en la orilla” [editorial], El Nuevo Herald, September 4, 1994, A22.
13. Cynthia Corzo, “Llega de cuba madre de balsero ahogado” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, November 5, 1994, B1.
14. Liz Balmaseda, “Cuba se desangra en cada balsa” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, August 17, 1994, B1.
15. Ana Santiago, Ivan Román, and Francisco García Azuero, “Fugitivos de cuba afirman hubo tiroteo al dejar Mariel” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, August 11, 1994, A1.
16. Ironically, the U.S. blockade is likely one of the reasons there was no milk.
17. Francisco Garcia Azuero and Jannice Reyes, “No regresa a la base de Guantánamo niño refugiado” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, September 29, 1994, B1.
18. The plight of immigrating children has been a subject of the national debate more recently. The United States made the controversial move (April 2018) to ramp up punishment of migrants attempting to cross the U.S.–Mexico border. Rather than rewarding migrants for giving their children a chance at “a better life,” the United States began separating children from their parents (even those seeking asylum) as a deterrent for illegal entry into the United States. However, the moral outcry among members of the U.S. public was dramatic, and in response, on June 20 of that year, President Trump signed an executive order to end the practice, which his attorney general, Jeff Sessions, had initiated.
19. Agencia Reuter, “Profesionales crean ‘incipiente democracia’ en Guantánamo” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, November 5, 1994, A12.
20. Gustavo Peña, “Diez de octubre en la vorágine” [editorial], El Nuevo Herald, October 10, 1994, A10.
21. Joanne Cavanaugh, “Balseros se ayudan mutuamente tras el paso de Gordon” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, November 16, 1994, A8.
22. Francisco García Azuero and Ivan Roman, “Agencias tramitan casos de cientos de refugiados,” [news story] El Nuevo Herald, August 19, 1994, B1.
23. Elaine De Valle, “Misivas de niños escolares infunden esperanza a los refugiados” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, September 4, 1994, B3.
24. Aminda Marques Gonzalez, “Herald galardona a 6 activistas de la comunidad” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, September 30, 1994, B1. That year (1994), El Nuevo Herald proved its own endorsement of such activities by honoring community activists for their support of the newcomers.
25. Ivan Roman, “ ‘Red’ ayuda a balserosa conseguir trabajo” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, September 1, 1994, B1.
26. Maydel Santana, “Grupo femenino presiona por ayuda a balseros” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, September 15, 1994, B1. William Allen happens to be Afro-Cuban. Special thanks to Holly Ackerman and her extensive knowledge of the Miami community during the Balsero crisis for pointing this out.
27. Daniel Mórcate, “El año de la reconcentración” [editorial], El Nuevo Herald, November 3, 1994, A16.
28. Clemence Fiagome, “Attorneys Demand Release of Names of Haitian Refugees Held at Guantánamo: Double Standard Policy Protected,” Miami Times, September 8, 1994, 1.
29. William D. C. Clark, “We Are a Community Controlled by Others and Failed by Our Leaders,” Miami Times, November 24, 1994, 5A.
30. In an op-ed, Jackson weighs in on Clinton’s policy toward Cuba with a stance that expresses sympathy for members of the Cuban American community and with a position aligned with liberal anti-imperial politics. See Jesse Jackson, “Clinton Is Digging a Deeper Hole with Hard-Line Cuban Policy [column: “New Ideas for America”], Miami Times, September 1, 1994, 5A.
31. A search for articles in the Miami Times in bound newspaper archives and on microfilm covering the Balsero crisis and its aftermath between the dates of July 1, 1994, and December 31, 1994, yielded twenty-two articles. Articles with a focus on Afro-Cubans numbered eight, including op-eds by Rosa Reed, a Miami Afro-Cuban businesswoman.
32. “The Haitian Impasse” [editorial], Miami Times, July 14, 1994, 5A.
33. Seleatha Virgille, “President Clinton’s New Cuba Policy Is Welcome” [letter to the editor], Miami Times, September 1, 1994, 4A.
34. “What about Haiti?” [editorial], Miami Times, August 25, 1994, 4A.
35. “Street Talk: What Should the U.S. Do about Mariel II?” [feature article], Miami Times, August 11, 1994, 5A.
36. “Street Talk: What Effect Will the Cuban Crisis Have on the Black Community? [feature article], Miami Times, September 1, 1994, 5A.
37. Christopher Marquis, “Se desvanece el trato especial para los cubanos” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, November 20, 1994, 1A.
38. Fabiola Santiago, “Listas 40,000 libras de donaciones para Guantánamo” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, September 8, 1994, 12A.
39. Lizette Álvarez, “Miami se prepara para recibir miles de balseros” [news story], El Nuevo Herald, November 17, 1994, 1A.
40. Blacks and mulattos were 8.3 percent of this population. They were 3.1 percent of the pre-1980 population (Ackerman and Clark 1995).
41. To determine how and if Afro-Cubans came into conversations about the Balsero crisis, I conducted a search for the key words “negro/a,” “mulato/a,” and “afrocubana/o” within the Balsero articles. After eliminating articles with a nonracial use of these terms, the search yielded only five articles; three made reference to Afro-Cuban gods to whom Balseros prayed for safe journey, and the other two discussed discrimination experienced by Afro-Cubans. The database does not include pictures; therefore, it could not be determined whether the paper included black Cubans in photos.
42. Here Amador is referring to Clinton’s efforts to reinstate Haiti’s ousted leader Jean Bertrand Aristide.
43. Dora Amador, “A puerta cerrada” [op-ed], El Nuevo Herald, September 22, 1994, A16.
44. Mohamed Hamaludin, “Immigrants as Scapegoats” [op-ed], Miami Times, October 6, 1994, 5A.
45. Manning Marable, “Blacks and Latinos Must Identify Common Interest and Seek to Unite” [op-ed], Miami Times, December 29, 1994, 5A.
46. “Afro-Cuban Dissident Takes Refuge in Miami,” Miami Times, July 14, 1994, 2A.
47. The Malecón riot that broke out on August 5, 1994, when outraged Cubans gathered and broke store windows, is an example of the extent of unrest that Cubans were experiencing during the “special period.”
48. Ricardo E. Gonzalez, “Race at Heart of Cuba Crisis” [op-ed], Miami Times, September 1, 1994, 4A.
49. “Thousands Flee from Castro’s Failed Revolution” [photo essay], Miami Times, September 1, 1994, 3A.
50. “Rafter Stocking up for Sea Trip” [photo essay], Miami Times, September 8, 1994, 2A.
51. However, the “Afro-Cuban” was dropped from her byline in September.
52. Rosa Reed, “Support the President on His Tough Stand against Castro” [op-ed], Miami Times, August 25, 1994, 2A.
53. Ibid.
54. Rosa Reed, “Is Castro Winning the Immigration Stalemate?” [op-ed], Miami Times, September 1, 1994, 4A. Aja (2016) picks up on this idea of Afro-Cuban invisibility in his book’s title and content.
55. Teele was a high-profile politician who ran for mayor of Miami in 1996 but lost to Alex Penelas. He had a successful but troubled political career, and as he was awaiting trial in 2005 for fraud charges, he walked into the Miami Herald building and shot himself to death. His supporters claim that his “trial and conviction by the media” can be blamed for his death.
56. Rosa Reed, “Cuban Power in Miami” [op-ed], Miami Times, December 22, 1994, 4A.
57. Rosa Reed, “Elect Candidates Who Are Caring” [op-ed], Miami Times, November 3, 1994, 5A.
5. Afro-Cuban Encounters at the Intersections of Blackness and Latinidad
1. Parts of this chapter previously appeared in “ ‘Other’ than Black: Afro-Cubans Negotiating Identity in the United States,” in Una Ventana a Cuba y los Estudios Cubanos: A Window into Cuba and Cuban Studies, ed. Amalia Cabezas, Ivette N. Hernandez-Torres, Sara Johnson, and Rodrigo Lazo. A joint publication of the University of California—Cuba Academic Initiative, and Ediciones Callejon, Puerto Rico.
2. The findings of my investigation of Afro-Cuban experiences with people of Mexican descent in Los Angeles corroborate those of scholars who have examined Afro-Cuban experiences in other geographic contexts with large Mexican populations such as Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Austin, Texas (e.g., Dowling and Newby 2010; Newby and Dowling 2007), but builds on them, identifying points of division between Afro-Cubans and Mexicans in Los Angeles and spotlighting particular nuances that can provide a basis for a shared Latino identity.
3. Elsewhere I have defined “micro-level rejections” as “irritating personal affronts that uphold rigid or racist ideals and exclude [people] from what they perceive as their rightful membership in certain groups.” Micro-level rejections are distinguished from “microaggressions” because they are perpetrated not by whites but by members of minority groups (Gosin 2017, 21).
4. All names are pseudonyms. Interviews conducted in Spanish have been translated.
5. In Alan Aja’s book (2016) on Afro-Cubans in Miami, along with examples of Afro-Cubans who readily defended their blackness, he also encountered several examples of Afro-Cubans being less affirming of blackness and seeking like their white compatriots to “identify up” or dissociate from blackness (17). That my respondents were less likely to do so may be attributed to several factors such as their self-selection to be a part of a study focused on race, the fact that many of my respondents were active in preserving African elements of Cuban culture in their work and leisure, and the fact that I the interviewer am not only black but African American. Accordingly, I can only purport to have captured a sample of Afro-Cuban immigrant experiences. Nevertheless, the findings provide important insights into the differential ways particular segments of the Afro-Cuban immigrant population encounter and deal with race in the U.S. context.
6. While the extent to which Martí truly cared about the condition of blacks themselves is suspect for some scholars, he did seek to convince his white compatriots of the value of black inclusion in the nation, thereby emphasizing a need to relinquish anti-black impulses for a “greater good.”
7. Miscegenation laws were overturned in 1967 in the landmark case of Loving v. the State of Virginia.
8. The U.S. Census does allow people to claim multiracial identities in the fact that they can choose more than one race. However, they cannot choose a term than signifies a “new” category based on mixture, such as “multiracial” or “mestizo.” Some multiracial activists in the United States have advocated for such a term because they believe it would better capture who they perceive themselves to be.
9. Race and ethnicity technically differ from each other. However, they are often conflated in the wider racial hierarchy of U.S. society, and they are also not mutually exclusive (Cornell and Hartman 1998).
10. It should be noted that the idealization of racial democracy varies and is configured differently in specific Latin American national contexts.
11. Some hybrid identity terms include creole, jíbaro, mestizo, and mulato. Depending on specific national contexts, these terms are used to indicate racial mixture and/or cultural mixture (see Wade 1997).
12. See Martínez-Echazábal (1998) for a critical overview on the discourse of African/European mestizaje and its use in defining Latin American national identities.
13. It must be noted that a situational use of labels could also come from a more “positive” place as individuals use such labels to signify their connections to various communities. Many thanks to Tere Ceseña Bontempo for this reminder.
14. The respondents were less likely to interact with Anglo whites on a daily basis, but some did provide stories about negative interactions with whites. I center my focus on their experiences with other minorities, however, as I am interested in placing focused attention on the race-related interactions between groups of color in the geographical contexts of Miami and Los Angeles.
15. This translates as “Cuban croquettes” and a “fried beef dish.”
16. Mark Hugo Lopez and Daniel Dockterman, “U.S. Hispanic Country of Origin Counts for Nation, Top 30 Metropolitan Areas,” Pew Hispanic Center, May 26, 2011, http://
17. See also Aja’s (2016) discussion of how despite the idealization of Cuban national identity as a delicious “ajiaco” or soup wherein people of various colors come together to compose it (Fernando Ortiz 1940), Afro-Cubans have been “evicted” from the white Cuban American exile community.
18. The Castro government took on the project of celebrating Cuba’s African heritage, particularly its contributions to music and dance. These efforts have been criticized as merely superficial by many in and out of Cuba. Still, efforts by Castro to honor the African contribution to Cuban national identity and to equalize the society after his revolution did allow some gains for black Cubans (De la Fuente 2001; Gómez-Garcia 1998; Sawyer 2006).
19. In this book, I am primarily concerned with the operations of race in the U.S. context and therefore am taking a neutral analytical stance regarding Cuba.
20. See Clealand (2017) for her crucial contribution to the conversation of how race operates in Cuba today, wherein she provides important context and findings that illuminate the variations of political racial consciousness among black Cubans still on the island.
21. This process of relying on racial ideologies from the home country to contest U.S. experiences of race is similar to what Joe Feagin (2010) calls “home culture frames,” wherein immigrants make use of racial frames of reference from the home culture in order to maintain their distinctive values and resist assimilation into the U.S. dominant majority (see also Dowling 2014; Gosin 2017).
22. One of Aja’s (2016) respondents had a remarkably similar exchange about his racial/ethnic identity.
23. In Cuba, these terms refer to specific phenotypes. A “mulato” can range in skin tone from light to medium brown, while a person described as “jabao” often has light skin with a reddish tone, with “kinky,” sometimes reddish hair and “African” features. The term “jabao” is similar to the African American term “redbone.”
24. A 1.5-generation immigrant refers to a person who emigrated as a child and so has mostly grown up in the receiving country.
25. “Chico” is a slang term used by some African Americans to refer to people of Latino descent.
26. U.S. Census Bureau, “State and County QuickFacts,” http://
27. The term “Mexican” was often used by interviewees to refer to anyone of Mexican descent with no distinction made for immigration status or generation. The Mexican population is composed of very different cohorts, including newly arriving immigrants, old immigrants and their children, and a small representation of the descendants of Mexicans native to California.
Conclusion
1. This comment refers to a statement made by Juror B37 while being interviewed by CNN journalist Anderson Cooper (2013). See Cooper, “Juror B37: Zimmerman’s Heart Was in the Right Place,” Anderson Cooper 360, July 16, 2013, http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2013/07/16/juror-b37-zimmermans-heart-was-in-the-right-place/?iref=allsearch.
2. Ailsa Chang, “Critics: Immigration Reform Takes Jobs away from Black Workers,” NPR, July 15, 2013, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=202401675.
3. Dylan Rodriguez, “Inaugurating Multiculturalist White Supremacy,” Colorlines, November 10, 2008, http://
4. See Michelle Ye Hee Lee, “Donald Trump’s False Comments Connecting Mexican Immigrants and Crime,” Washington Post, July 8, 2015, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2015/07/08/donald-trumps-false-comments-connecting-mexican-immigrants-and-crime/?utm_term=.e767aef50c83.
5. See Amanda Sakuma, “Trump Did Better with Blacks, Hispanics, Than Romney in ’12: Exit Polls,” NBC News, November 9, 2016, https://
6. One of the earliest writers on the subject of black and Latino conflict, Nicolas Vaca (2004), warned us against thinking that an alliance can always be presumed, or taken for granted, as historical conditions and specific contexts change.
7. See Jens Manuel Krogstad and Mark Hugo Lopez, “Hillary Clinton Won Latino Vote but Fell Below 2012 Support for Obama,” Pew Research Center, November 29, 2016, http://
8. See Sakuma, “Trump Did Better with Blacks.”
9. See also arguments made by Betancur (2005b).
10. See Molly Roberts, “Stop Blaming White Supremacy on ‘Identity Politics,’ ” Washington Post, August 14, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2017/08/14/stop-blaming-charlottesville-on-identity-politics/?utm_term=.c976af0780a8.
11. See Robinson and Chang (2017) for good examples of the directions of such scholarship.
12. Although a discussion of black African immigrant experiences is outside the scope of this book, there is a growing body of scholarship on African immigrants that adds further insight into these themes.
13. Dora Amador, “A puerta cerrada,” El Nuevo Herald, September 22, 1994, A16.
14. For more on these ideas see Beltrán (2010) and Dean (1996) on notions of “reflective solidarity” and on how “we” political identities are generated and performed.
15. See Planning Research, Department Of Planning And Zoning, “Hispanics by Country of Origin in Miami-Dade” Issue 16 (2011) for a percentage breakdown of the Latino population in Miami based on data from the 2010 census, https://
16. Aranda et al. 2009; 2014 provide an illuminating discussion of how the good immigrant ideal is deployed by various other immigrant groups in Miami that are not included in the current analysis.
17. Casey Woods, “Obama First Democrat to Win Florida’s Hispanic Vote,” Miami Herald, November 5, 2008, https://
18. Pop culture attests to this; popular second-generation (white) Cuban American rapper Pit Bull commonly collaborates with African American and Haitian artists, and his record label, Bad Boy Latino, is a brainchild of African American producer P. Diddy and Latin Music producer and Miami cultural icon Emilio Estefan. By naming two of his albums to reappropriate the image of the Marielitos, for example, El Mariel (2006) and The Boatlift (2007), Pit Bull employs a practice that recalls the celebration by hip hop artists of the main character in the movie Scarface. The movie, depicting a Marielito who is a gangster and criminal anti-hero, has been criticized for its stereotypical depiction of Cubans who arrived during the Mariel exodus. As Antonio López (2012) notes, the lead actor, Al Pacino, was literally in brownface in the role. Still, Pit Bull invokes the character in the tradition of hip hop’s glorification of movie gangster anti-heroes in order to tell stories from the perspective of “the underdog.”