CONSUMING IDENTITIES: CROSSCURRENTS OF TOURISM, DIASPORA, AND MOBILITY IN CARIBBEAN LITERATURE AND CULTURE By ANGELIQUE V. NIXON A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2008 1 © 2008 Angelique V. Nixon 2 For the struggle, to be human, Black woman, and free… 3 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This project marks both an end and a beginning in my work as an emerging scholar, critic, and teacher. I gained a new respect for my writing process and the growing pains I experienced along the way. I would never have made these discoveries without the dedication and support of my committee to whom I bestow a great deal of appreciation. I am indebted to Leah Rosenberg, Malini Johar Schueller, Faye Harrison, Apollo Amoko, and Amy Ongiri for working with me on this project. I must extend a special thanks to Leah, my committee chair, for meticulous comments and excellent suggestions on the entire project, and for working with me through multiple revisions. Also, I wish to thank the people I interviewed in the Bahamas who work in the tourist and culture industries. These interviews were vital to my research and project. Also I must thank all my friends and colleagues who gave me valuable feedback on my ideas and/or read various chapters of this project. I am especially grateful to Marlo David, Belinda Wallace, LaMonda Horton-Stallings, Marlon Moore, Darius Bost, and Kevin Brown for listening, reading, and sharing with me during the revision process. Moreover, I would like to acknowledge all the Caribbean people who work in the tourist industry, particularly those in the lowest paying jobs (in service and sex) and the communities affected by tourism. I embarked on this project in the spirit of resistance to exploitation and systems of oppression; and I emerged from it in that same spirit with assurance that the struggle continues and that it must be led by those most affected. As a former tourist industry worker, I grappled with these issues in a very personal way but also through an academic lens. Therefore, I acknowledge my years of graduate study in the United States alongside my years of working in the Bahamian tourist economy as a bartender/server in various bars/restaurants and as a junior accountant in offshore banking. These experiences helped me think through the complicated connections among travel, migration, and the African Diaspora that led me to do this research. 4 To those who are my family, I appreciate your encouragement and love through my years of studying: Eduardo Marrero, Susana Marrero, Jheaneale Bahadosingh, Bianca Zaiem, Vanessa Eneas, Tania Nixon, Evelyn Vaccaro, my cousin Nabila Darville, my aunt Halson Roker, and my grandmother Viola Nixon. Also, I must extend special appreciation to Lyn Darville, who has been a mother to me since I was very young—your support, love, and kindness have helped me to become the woman I am today. To the children and young people in my life, I search for hope and stay in the struggle for you: my godchild/niece Giovanna Eneas, my niece Penelope Lightbourn, my spirit nephews Tunde and Ade Azikwe, my brothers Trevize and Sean Nixon, and my niece Alexia Toltin. Finally, to all the ancestors, including my mother Kim Howard and my grandmother Mabel Sistella Charles, thank you for guiding my spirit. 5 TABLE OF CONTENTS page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...............................................................................................................4 ABSTRACT .....................................................................................................................................7 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................................9 2 RESISTING PARADISE: BAHAMIAN LITERATURE AND THE CULTURE OF A TOURIST ECONOMY ..........................................................................................................43 Reflections on Culture and Tourism .......................................................................................48 Junkanoo Festivals and the Production of Culture in the Bahamas ........................................59 Arlene Nash-Ferguson’s Educulture and the Junkanoo Experience .......................................68 Reimaginings in/of “Paradise” – (Re)writing History, Identity, and Sexuality .....................73 3 “WE HAVE SOMETHING TO TEACH THE WORLD”: ERNA BRODBER’S BLACKSPACE, BUILDING COMMUNITY AND EDUCO-TOURISM .........................103 Resisting (Neo)Colonial Discourse and Spirit Thievery in Myal .........................................106 An Ethical and Sustainable Vision of Tourism: Blackspace and Educo-Tourism ...............123 4 THE POLITICS OF RETURN: WRITING AGAINST EXPLOITATIVE CONSUMPTION AND TOURISM .....................................................................................136 Caribbean Writers, Return, and Mobility .............................................................................139 Resisting the Travel Guide ...................................................................................................145 “The Event of Tourism” – Returning to A Small Place ........................................................151 ‘So we do not forget’: Carnival, Resistance, and Return in After the Dance .......................163 5 AFRICAN DIASPORA TRAVEL AND IDENTITY ..........................................................178 African Diasporic Connections: Paule Marshall, The Big Drum, and Heritage Tourism ....182 African Diasporic Politics: Audre Lorde, Black Liberation, and Revolutionary Tourism ...193 6 CONCLUSION .....................................................................................................................210 WORKS CITED ..........................................................................................................................226 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH .......................................................................................................234 6 Abstract of Dissertation Presented to the Graduate School of the University of Florida in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy CONSUMING IDENTITIES: CROSSCURRENTS OF TOURISM, DIASPORA, AND MOBILITY IN CARIBBEAN LITERATURE AND CULTURE By Angelique V. Nixon December 2008 Chair: Leah Rosenberg Major: English In the Caribbean, tourism is the dominant industry and primary site of neocolonialism, and therefore it shapes economic realities along with national culture and identity. Caribbean writers and artists contend with the region’s overdependence on the tourist industry and address the many ways that tourism continues the legacy of colonialism. Thus, the influence of tourism over national arts and culture evokes strong reactions from artists and writers. They assert a spectrum of positions: while some artists work within the tourist economy to develop alternative models of tourism consistent with their conceptions of national identity and culture, others condemn the exploitative nature of tourism by exposing the strong continuities between the racial, sexual, and gender politics of slavery and colonialism and those of contemporary tourism. Their critiques of tourism as a form of neocolonialism are in accord with the dominant view of Caribbean scholars, such as Franz Fanon, Clive Thomas, Polly Pattullo, Mimi Sheller, Cynthia Enloe, and Ian Strachan. In order to reveal the importance of both tourism and diaspora in shaping Caribbean culture and identity, this project examines literature and activism by several Caribbean writers inside and outside the region. I interrogate contemporary Caribbean discourse, with a focus on resistance to neocolonialism found in Caribbean writers and intellectuals’ direct engagement 7 with tourism. While the location and mobility of Caribbean writers may inform their engagement, these writers, in similar ways, resist the dominant narratives of Caribbean tourism and create alternative narratives written from the perspective of the colonized, gendered, sexualized, and racialized subject. These writers are located in the region, such as Marion Bethel, Erna Brodber, and Oonya Kempadoo; they also live abroad, like Christian Campbell, Edwidge Danticat, and Jamaica Kincaid, and include second-generation Caribbean American writers, such as Audre Lorde and Paule Marshall. Critical perspectives and new models constitute effective forms of resistance by influencing the vision and practice of Caribbean tourism. Overall, Caribbean writers illustrate what Caribbean scholars have also argued—that the histories of slavery and colonialism are intimately bound to economics, movement, and representation in the neocolonial present. 8 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION In the post-independence period, the Caribbean remains deeply affected, materially and culturally, by colonial exploitation, which manifests itself in many forms—foreign investment, globalization, transnational corporations, tourism, and cultural production, among others. As the most dominant industry in the region, tourism is one of the largest sites of neocolonialism, shaping economic realities and national culture.1 Hence, there exists a strong discord between the tourist industry and national governments who invest in tourism and Caribbean producers of culture—writers and artists—who must negotiate with the region’s overdependence on tourism. Due to the extraordinary power of tourism, a large number and