So close yet so far: Puerto Rico and Antigua

“A Small Place” by Jamaica Kincaid is a book that talks about the past and present days of Antigua. While reading it, it reminded me a lot about our own country, Puerto Rico. Both places have a lot in common: both are a tourist destination, are islands surrounded by similar ones, at a point both where a colony, both have trouble of identity, and external and internal racism. Jamaica Kincaid was born in Antigua as Elaine Potter Richardson, but later in her life she changed her name because her family disapproved her writing. This is something that makes us think that maybe her family where still afraid about the retribution that the English could do because of her words or maybe they have a colonized mind.

Something that Jamaica despises about the tourist that came to visit Antigua is their attitude of ignorance toward the history of her country. The way the tourist enjoy the island, the way they use the water unaware of her scarcity or to where the contents of their lavatory will end, and also the ignorance of the tourist toward the poverty that her country is suffering are some of the things that Jamaica repudiates and scream out loud in her book. Similarly some of us, Puerto Ricans, feel the same way when tourist come to visit our island or even worse when we go to United States of America and they don’t know where we are located on the world map, even though we are colony of the United States since 1898. Puerto Rico is a country that had been a colony over 520 years; fist a Spanish one and actually a North American. This is one of the main reasons why Puerto Ricans have identity problems, also like the citizens of Antigua felt when they were an English colony. After reading some pages of Jamaica’s book immediately I put myself in the situation as a tourist, and the first place that came to my mind was Dominican Republic. The way so many of us act in those all inclusive hotels, ignorant of our surroundings, the poverty of their country, and the unpaved roads that some of them had to walk miles to get there to serve us, are some things that just thinking about them now makes me sick. Another thing that Jamaica Kincaid mention in her book and relate to us is the external and internal racism. The citizens of Antigua suffer both types of racism, an example of external is the one clearly visible to everyone, the tourist and locals in the Mill Reef Club and the constant humiliation made by the dentist-doctor to the Antigua’s citizens. An example of internal racism is the continuous subordination the locals, the “minority”, felt with the English; like when the Queen came to visit. Here in Puerto Rico maybe the external racism is not that clear to some of us, but still present in some small towns like Loiza, that is a hometown for a lot of black people; even though this island is compose of a mix of cultures and ethnicities. On the other hand Puerto Ricans feel subordination towards the U.S people: either in sports or in the daily life.  Jamaica Kincaid speaks furiously of the corruption of the government and the passivity of her people. But her real anger is toward the English who colonized Antigua, and the only way she can express her anger is writing about this theme, so that in some way she could feel free.

           

References: 

• http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/cal/summary/v025/25.3gauch.html
• http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/smallplace/summary.html
• http://postcolonialstudies.emory.edu/jamaica-kincaid/
• http://www.centrocultural.coop/blogs/nuestramericanos/2009/10/27/el-caso-de-puerto-rico-de-colonia-a-estado-libre-asociado-parte-i/