Blacks in Latin America

A

Regional Differences

In countries such as Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico, African immigrants were a minority having to deal with a vital and dynamic form of European society and culture. The African communities survived, and in some instances proliferated, but they did so against the stiff and relentless competition of the majority, or “high,” culture. Aspects of the African ethnic subculture were eventually adopted by the mainstream. Nonetheless, in such societies, the African character of the African American culture is less pronounced than in societies where Africans formed the majority of the inhabitants.

In the essentially plantation societies of the Caribbean islands, people of African ancestry retained considerable control over their daily lives, despite the efforts of the politically dominant minority group to restrain and coerce them. The lack of cultural homogeneity as well as the paucity of the plantation elites provided an almost unique opportunity for the African masses to fashion their own society and influence the “high” culture.

Caribbean people speak variants of the standard European languages, which uniformly reflect West African speech patterns regardless of whether the spoken language is English, Spanish, French, or Dutch. The French spoken in Haiti constitutes a language of its own. In Curaçao, Aruba, and Bonaire, Papiamento, a blend of Dutch, Spanish, and Portuguese, is one of the official languages. Nor are these creole languages confined to the poorer, unschooled classes. Creole has now been accorded greater respect in the literature and political life of the islands.

B

Cultural Modifications

Official acceptance modifies some forms of culture. The carnival is an example. Until the 19th century, the annual celebration of carnival was confined to the black population; the upper classes deplored carnival and tried to destroy it as a public festival. By the early 20th century, however, it had attracted all classes and races, and currently it has official government support in the Bahamas, Cuba, Trinidad and Tobago, and Brazil. Although carnival has become respectable, and its festivities are open to all races and classes, the chief participants of these carnivals are still black. The same remains true for other folk festivals such as the Jonkonnu in Jamaica.

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In some cases, however, the transition from low to high culture obscured the African origin, as in Argentina where the tango was developed from dual African ancestry. One source is undoubtedly the Spanish fandango, but the fandango is really Moorish. The other source is a black dance called the candombe, the feature attraction of Afro-Argentine festivals during and after the period of slavery. Latin American music has always been deeply influenced by the vibrant rhythms and melodies that blacks brought with them from their African homeland. This is particularly true of Brazil; in fact, the first real music school in that country was founded by a black priest. Brazilian music is thoroughly imbued with African themes, and illustrious composers such as Heitor Villa-Lobos have long found inspiration in the black musical heritage. Many Caribbean musical styles have become widely known, including the mambo from Cuba, salsa from Puerto Rico, reggae from Jamaica, and calypso from Trinidad.

C

Religious Practices

When it came to religion, African immigrants to Latin America and the Caribbean not only retained some of their original beliefs but also borrowed and modified religious rituals from the various European Christian churches they encountered there. Religious affiliation, however, is no longer restricted by race or color. A number of Christian groups such as the Seventh-day Adventists, Pentecostals, and Churches of God are predominantly black. On the other hand, religious sects of African origin—such as Vodun or Vodou in Haiti; Shango in Trinidad and Tobago, Venezuela, and Brazil; Santería in Cuba and Puerto Rico; Kumina, Myal, Revivalist, and Rastafarianism in Jamaica; and Umbanda, Macounda, and others in Brazil—are no longer only black.

D

Black Literature

African Americans have left a deep impression on the lore and literature of the New World. In some parts of Latin America, such as Brazil, popular tales and legends are to a great extent of African origin. Themes dealing with slavery have always been popular with black writers. Some, such as the Brazilian poet Luis Gama, were also active in the abolitionist movement. Antônio de Castro Alves was identified as the “poet of the slaves” for his treatment of slavery in his writings. João da Cruz e Sousa, the son of emancipated slaves, is considered one of Brazil’s greatest poets.

As nationalism has intensified during the 20th century, even more attention has been paid to African origins. The Haitian poet Jacques Roumain stressed the value of his native (African) culture, while expressing the pride and bitterness of his black ancestry. Nicolás Guillén, one of Cuba’s most eminent poets, wrote some of his best works as “black” poetry based on the rhythms of Afro-Cuban music. The novels, poetry, dance, and mime of Latin America and the Caribbean area have all incorporated African speech patterns, styles, or concepts and have tried to express the spirit of the black cultural heritage. In the Nobel Prize-winning poetry of Derek Walcott and the autobiographical short stories of Jamaica Kincaid, an effort is made to reconcile the differences between the writers’ native West Indian and adoptive white milieus. See also Caribbean Literature; Latin American Literature.

VI

Politics

The Maroon settlements in the days of slavery were attempts to form black states; they were, in effect, states within states. Haiti, where slaves led by Jean-Jacques Dessalines captured the governing apparatus in 1804, was only the second independent country in the western hemisphere (the first being the United States) and the first one ruled by blacks. As such, it became a symbol of black independence and a catalyst for black nationalism. Blacks in many other countries participated in politics within the prevailing political structures, but in some nations such activities were restricted. In Cuba, for example, a law forbade the organization of political parties based on race or color after 1911, and the military efforts of the Afro-Cuban leaders Pedro Ivonet and Evaristo Estenoz to reverse that decision ended in disaster in 1912. Government troops killed 3000 Afro-Cubans in Oriente Province, putting an end to black political resistance in Cuba. In Brazil, the Frente Negra Brazileira (Brazilian Black Front), founded in São Paulo in 1931, served as the national political voice of Afro-Brazilians, but faded along with other political parties during the Vargas dictatorship of the 1930s and 1940s. In the British, French, and Dutch Caribbean, blacks have participated in politics for more than a century, and today hold local political power. Governments controlled by people of African ancestry have been in power in the Netherlands Antilles, Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados, Saint Lucia, Grenada, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Dominica, Antigua, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and Jamaica. The Marxist government of Cuba has declared Cubans an Afro-Latin American people and has formed close ties with Angola, Ethiopia, and other African states.

Other Caribbean countries have also established contacts with the free nations of Africa, both directly and through United Nations agencies and other international organizations. Caribbean-African cooperation, however, has more frequently been based on shared ideology than it has on race or color.