The Caribbean

1. The Caribbean

2. Introduction • Complex colonial history (Spanish, British, French, Dutch, and U.S.) • Plantation America (eg. Sugarcane) • Ethnicity of African origin • Isolated proximity • Isolation: cultural diversity, limited economic opportunities • Proximity: transnational connections, economic dependence

3. Environmental Geography

4. The Antillean islands The rimland • The Antillean islands: separate the Caribbean sea from the Atlantic ocean; densely populated • The rimland: biological diversity; sparsely populated

5. Greater Antilles • Four large islands: Cuba, Jamaica, Hispaniola (Haiti, the Dominican Republic), and Puerto Rico • Majority of population • High mountain ranges The Antillean islands • Can be divided into Greater Antilles and Lesser Antilles

6. The Antillean islands • Lesser Antilles • Double arc of small islands stretching from the Virgin Islands to Trinidad • Footholds for rival European colonial powers • Inner arc: mountainous islands of volcanic origin (eg. Montserrat) • Outer arc: low-lying islands with volcanic base  ideal for growing sugarcane (eg. Antigua, Barbados)

8. Tectonic plates in the Antillean islands • Heavier North and South American plates go underneath the Caribbean plate • Creates subduction zone, and high mountains with volcanic activities • Caribbean plate: limestone + volcanic rocks • South American plate: sedimentary rock • eg. Trinidad and Tobago are on the South American Plate: sedimentary rock  oil reserves

9. Rimland States • Belize • Low-lying, limestone  Sugarcane, citrus • The Guianas • Rolling hills of the Guiana Shield • Rain forest  Timber • Eg. The Tropical Rainforest in Suriname • Crystalline rock  poor soil; metal extraction

10. Climate and Vegetation • Warm all year • Abundant rainfall  can support tropical forests • Antilliean islands: removed for plantation • Rimland: intact • Seasonality is defined by changes in rainfall • When is the rainy season? • Islands: July ~ November ( Hurricane) • The Guianas: January ~ March ( Shift of ITCZ to the north in winter)

12. Hurricanes • Forms off the coast of West Africa • Picks up moisture and speed as they move across the Atlantic • Westward-moving low-pressure disturbances • 75 mph ~ 100 mph • July ~ November • Affects Lesser Antilles, Greater Antilles, Central America, Mexico, southern North America

14. Biome – wet zones • Tropical forests • Remains exclusively in the rimland • Palm savannas • Tropical savanna (Aw) zones • Adapted to agriculture • Eg. Hispaniola, Cuba • Coastal mangrove swamps • Leeward shores • Not suited to human settlements, but vital marine habitant • Cleared to create open beaches  exposed to increased erosion Mangrove tree

15. Biome - arid zones • Thorn-scrub brush, cactus • Netherlands Antilles (Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao), Anguilla, the Cayman Islands • Not adequate to agriculture; salt, goat • Since 1960s, developed as world-class resorts

16. Environmental issues – Ecosystem • For nearly five centuries, an area has been so completely reworked through colonization and global trade • Extinction of Caribbean plants and animal • Extreme human modification of environment

17. Environmental issues - Deforestation • Covered in tropical rain forests prior to the arrival of European • Forests were cleared • to make a room for sugarcane • to provide the fuel to turn the cane juice into sugar • to provide lumber for housing, fences, and ships • The newly exposed tropical soils easily eroded, and thus land becomes unproductive

18. Environmental degradation and poverty in Haiti • What was once considered France’s richest colony now has a per capita income of $460 • Colonial period: deforestation for sugarcane production • Independence (1804): slave uprising • U.S. occupation (1915-34): economic dependency • Duvalier dictatorships (1957-86): social inequities • Early 1990s: economic sanctions

19. Environmental degradation and poverty in Haiti Dominican Republic Haiti 70% subsistence farming  Reliance on biofuels

20. Managing the Rimland forests • Belize • eg. Coca Cola Corporation attempted to purchase the land for juice concentrate in 1980s • First jaguar reserve in the Americas • Guyana • Boa Vista to Georgetown • Governments: Highway construction • Conservationists: National park

22. Protecting environment is not a luxury but a question of economic livelihood

23. Population and Settlement

24. Densely settled islands and rimland frontiers

26. Fertility decline • Cuba • Education of women • Availability of birth control and abortion • Barbados • Out-migration of young Barbadians overseas • Preference for smaller families

27. Rise of HIV/AIDS • On average, 2% of the Caribbean population between the ages of 15 and 49 has HIV/AIDS • Relationship between HIV/AIDS transmission, international tourism, and prostitution • Highest rates (between age 15-49) are in • Haiti (5%) • Bahamas (4%) • The Dominican Republic (3%) • Guyana (3%)

28. Caribbean diaspora • Economic flight of Caribbean peoples across the globe • Driven by regions’ limited economic opportunities • Began in the 1950s • Emigrated to other Caribbean islands, North America, and Europe

30. Caribbean diaspora • Former colony • Barbadians (Britain), • Surinamese ( Netherlands) • Puerto Rican ( U.S.) • Economic opportunities & proximity • Jamaican ( U.S.) • Cuban ( U.S.) • Dominican ( U.S., Puerto Rico) • Haitian ( Dominican Republic, U.S., Canada, French Guiana)

31. Settlement patterns • Reflects the plantation legacy • Plantation agriculture in the arable lowlands • Subsistence farming in marginal lands • Villages of freed or runaway slaves in remote areas of the interior • Cities that serve the administrative and social needs of the colonizers – few and small • Ancestors of former slaves work their small plots and seek seasonal wage-labor on estates  matriarchal social structure

32. Houseyards in the Lesser Antilles • Owned by a woman, her extended family of married children lives here • Rural subsistence • Economic survival • Matriarchal social structure

33. Major cities are • Santo Domingo • Havana • Port-au-Prince • San Juan Caribbean cities • Since the 1960s, rural-to-urban migration • best explained by an erosion of rural jobs • 60% urban • Cuba (75%), Haiti (35%)

34. Caribbean cities • Vulnerable to raids by European powers and pirates  walled and fortified • Santo Domingo (1496) • Havana: was essential port city for Spanish empire due to the strategic location • Transforming from ports for agricultural exports to tourism-oriented cities Old Havana

35. Cultural Coherence and Diversity

36. Cultural imprint of colonialism • Neo-Africa in the Americas • Creolization

37. Cultural imprint of colonialism • More intense demographic collapse of Amerindian populations (3 millions) within 50 years after the arrival of Columbus in 1492 • Plantation-based agriculture dependent on forced (Africa) and indentured (Asia) labor • Need to understand the term Plantation America

38. Plantation America Antigua (1823)

39. Plantation America • Cultural region that extends from midway up the coast of Brazil through the Guianas and the Caribbean into the southeastern U.S. • Ruled by a European elite; dependent on an African labor force; coastal • Mono-crop production (a single commodity) • Engendered specific social/economic relations

40. Plantation America – forced labor 1451-1870 • 10 million African landed in the America • More than half of these slaves were sent to the Caribbean

41. Plantation America – indentured labor • By the mid 19th century, labor shortages due to the abolition of slavery • Governments sought indentured labor from South and Southeast Asia • Workers contracted to labor on estates for a set period of time • Legacy of indentured arrangements • Suriname: 1/3 South Asian descent, 16% Javanese • Guyana: 50% South Asian ancestry • Eg. 2001 president election • Trinidad and Tobago: 40% South Asian ancestry

42. Neo-Africa in the Americas – Maroon societies • The Caribbean is the area with the greatest concentration of African transfers in the Americas • Maroons (communities of runaway slaves) have formed during the colonial period • eg. The maroons of Jamaica in the forested mountains of the islands’ interior • eg. Bush Negros of Surinamese in the interior rain forest

43. Neo-Africa in the Americas – African religions • Transfer of African religious and magical systems to the Caribbean • Voodoo in Haiti, Santeria in Cuba, Obeah in Jamaica • Diffused in other regions by immigrants • Santeria in Florida, New York • Obeah in Panama, Los Angeles

44. African religious influences in the Americas

45. Neo-Africa in the Americas – Creolization • Blending of African, European, and even some Amerindian cultural elements into the unique sociocultural systems found in the Caribbean • Garifuna (Black Carib) • Descendants of African slaves who speak an Amerindian language • Unions between Africans and Carib Indians on St. Vincent • Relocated in Belize and Honduras

46. Neo-Africa in the Americas - Creolization - Language • Dominant languages are European • Spanish (24m), French (8m), English (6m), Dutch(0.5m) • However, many of these languages have been creolized • Papiamento in Netherlands Antilles • French Creole or patois in Haiti • Creole • European vocabulary + African syntax, semantics

48. Neo-Africa in the Americas - Creolization - Music • Reflects a combination of African rhythms with European forms of melody and verse • Reggae(Jamaica) • Bob Marley • Calypso(Trinidad) • Merengue(Dominican, Haiti) • Rumba(Cuba), Salsa • Celia Cruz Calypso

49. Geopolitical Framework

50. Colonialism • Neocolonialism • Independence