1111 2 3 4 5 622 The Diaspora Strikes Back 7 8 9 1011 1 In The Diaspora Strikes Back, Juan Flores flips the immigration process on 2 its head: what happens to the home country as a result of the constant streams 3111 of emigrants and remittances flowing in from abroad? He looks at how 4 “Nuyoricans” (Puerto Rican New Yorkers) bring challenges and changes to 5 Puerto Rico, introducing salsa music, hip hop and inner-city New York 6 culture to the Caribbean island. While he focuses on Puerto Ricans, 7 Dominicans and Cubans the model is broadly applicable. Indians in London, 8 Japanese in Sao Paulo, Turks in Berlin, Mexicans in Los Angeles, all transmit 9 such “cultural remittances” back to their home countries, often with dramatic 20111 consequences. This ongoing process is both massive and global, and Flores’ 1 account is relevant across disciplines. 2 3 Juan Flores is a professor at New York University. 4 5 6 7 8 9 30111 1 2 3 4 35 6 7 8 9 40111 1 2 3222 Cultural Spaces Series Edited by Sharon Zukin, Brooklyn College and the City University Graduate Center Books in the series Available: Buyways by Catherine Gudis Silicon Alley by Michael Indergaard Capitalism’s Eye by Kevin Hetherington After the World Trade Center edited by Michael Sorkin and Sharon Zukin Branding New York by Miriam Greenberg The Global Architect by Donald McNeill Forthcoming: Chinatowns by Gregor Benton The Diaspora Strikes Back by Juan Flores Foodies by Shyon Baumann and Josee Johnston 1111 2 3 4 5 THE 622 7 8 DIASPORA 9 1011 1 2 STRIKES 3111 4 5 BACK 6 7 8 9 Caribeño Tales 20111 1 of Learning 2 and Turning 3 4 5 6 7 JUAN FLORES 8 9 30111 1 2 3 4 35 6 7 8 9 40111 1 2 3222 First published 2009 by Routledge 270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016 Simultaneously published in the UK by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2008. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.” © 2009 Taylor & Francis All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Flores, Juan, 1943- The diaspora strikes back : Caribbean Latino tales of learning and turning / by Juan Flores. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. 1. Return migration – Social aspects – Puerto Rico. 2. Puerto Ricans – Migrations. 3. Puerto Rico – Emigration and immigration. I. Title. JV7382.F56 2008 304.8Ј7295073 – dc22 2007052005 ISBN 0-203-89461-8 Master e-book ISBN ISBN13: 978–0–415–95260–6 (hbk) ISBN13: 978–0–415–95261–3 (pbk) ISBN13: 978–0–203–89461–3 (ebk) ISBN10: 0–415–95260–3 (hbk) ISBN10: 0–415–95261–1 (pbk) ISBN10: 0–203–89461–8 (ebk) 1111 2 3 4 5 622 CONTENTS 7 8 9 1011 1 2 List of Illustrations vi 3111 Foreword by Series Editor vii 4 Acknowledgments ix 5 6 Introduction: Caribeños, Counterstreams, 7 and Cultural Remittances 1 8 9 Part 1: Conceptual Bearings 20111 1 1. Thinking Diaspora From Below 15 2 2. Of Remigrants and Remittances 33 3 3. Caribeño Counterstream 51 4 5 Part 2: Narrative Groundings 6 7 4. Tales of Learning and Turning 75 8 Introducing the Tales 75 9 Tales of Learning and Turning 81 30111 Reading the Tales 141 1 2 Part 3: Style Transfers 3 4 5. Bring the Salsa: Diaspora Music as Source 35 and Challenge 151 6 6. Open Mic: Poetry, Performance, Emerging 7 Identities 173 8 9 Coda: Visual Crossings 199 40111 1 Notes 207 2 Bibliography 217 3222 Index 229 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Cover image: “Salon de calle”, artist Carmelo Sobrino “Marielena” in Knee Socks, Puerto Rico, 1968 viii Wall graffiti in Barrio La Cuarta, Ponce, Puerto Rico, 2005 14 Suitcase, Dominican Republic, 2007 32 Conjunto La Plata, Puerto Rico, 1947 50 “Nury” (on left) and a friend, La Romana, Dominic Republic, 2007 74 “Esther” Telling Her Story, Hormigueros, Puerto Rico, 2007 82 “Pedro” Sitting by the Malecón, Havana, Cuba, 2002 140 Asalto Navideño album cover. Courtesy of Izzy Sanabria 150 DJ Laylo (“Ursula”) and Nomadic Wax, New York, 2007 163 Bronx poet “Mariposa” (María Fernández) reciting her poem “Ode to a Diasporican” at the University of Puerto Rico in Mayagüez 172 DJ Flipper at annual hip hop festival, Alamar, Cuba, 2001 194 Official Seal of the Institute of Puerto Rican Culture, artist Lorenzo Homar, 1961 198 Jorge Soto, “Untitled” (interpretation of the seal of the Institute for Puerto Rican Culture), drawing, artist Jorge Soto 198 1111 SERIES FOREWORD 2 3 4 5 622 7 The Cultural Spaces series presents in- 8 depth, sociological portraits and interpretations of people and places in 9 constant change. Some authors look at geographical spaces like cities, 1011 neighborhoods, industrial districts like “Silicon Alley,” and even buildings 1 like New York’s World Trade Center site. Other authors write about the 2 social practices that develop around modern spaces—the “branding” of New 3111 York City to overcome an image crisis in the 1960s and 1970s; the invention 4 of highway billboards in the 1920s when Americans geared up for long- 5 distance driving; and the creation of consumer goods in the late nineteenth 6 century home, museum, and city. The common element these authors share 7 is a desire to document tensions between elite cultures and the cultures of 8 the streets—between “high” and “low” culture, political domination and 9 countercultural style, and conventional and unconventional cultural forms. 20111 The Diaspora Strikes Back allow us to look at the new face of immigration— 1 circular migration between home country and host country—in an 2 unconventional way. Though we know that immigrants bring the cultural 3 norms and values of their home country with them, we rarely pay attention 4 to the ways of looking and thinking they bring back with them when they 5 return home after years of living, working, and raising a family overseas. These 6 migrants travel with a double baggage: the culture they were born into at home, 7 and the culture they have learned and created in their host country. When 8 they return home—some, after spending their entire working life in the host 9 country—they bring back the original culture they left with, many years ago, 30111 which is now old-fashioned, but they also bring back the way of life they have 1 learned in their host country as well as the hybrid or fusion culture they and 2 their fellow immigrants have created to survive and thrive there. In contrast 3 to the economic remittances, or money, that immigrants send home, they bring 4 with them cultural remittances. 35 Those who did not leave home are not always glad to see this new culture. 6 In fact, they may be quite critical of the return migrants, who want to teach 7 them new musical styles, a new language, and new forms of political protest. 8 Gradually, the return migrants and those who did not leave home forge yet 9 another new culture, a fusion of styles and values that the migrants bring 40111 home and the residue of tradition. 1 To show how this new culture is created, Juan Flores treats us to first- 2 person stories from the Caribbean migration of Puerto Rico, the Dominican 3222 viii SERIES FOREWORD Republic, and Cuba. This migration stream has a long history in North America. It is connected with the Atlantic slave trade, the expansion of the United States’ influence throughout the western hemisphere, and North America’s drive to industrialization, and then to factory shutdowns and outsourcing, in the 20th century. But the Caribbean migration is also connected with salsa, merengue, and hip hop—three powerful cultural forms that, themselves, have traveled the circular passage from the Caribbean to the U.S. and back to the islands. These cultural remittances show us the “other” face of immigration in The Diaspora Strikes Back. Sharon Zukin Series Editor 1111 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 2 3 4 5 622 7 I have been thinking about this book for 8 many years, and have talked about the themes of culture and return migration 9 with hundreds of people. I would like to thank all of them by name for their 1011 generous help in all aspects of the work, but will limit myself to those with 1 whom I spoke most directly about this subject. 2 I begin with the storytellers, those wonderful Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, 3111 and Cubans in a range of different places and from many walks of life who 4 were willing to sit with me and tell their stories. I thank them for helping 5 me ground my thinking in the real lives of real people. I regret not being 6 able to name each of them individually, but here are those who expressly said 7 that they were willing or even wanted to be mentioned by name: Aracelis 8 Román, Ariel Fernández Díaz, Loira Limbal, Venus Castro, John Sánchez, 9 José Irizarry, Iris Toro, Sebastián Ramírez, Josefina Báez, Chiqui Vicioso, 20111 Richard Hernández, Kaity Trinidad, José Rodríguez Calderón, Guillermo 1 Ayala, and Victoria García.