A group of about 40 people from the CCSU community attended a presentation by Tomás Fernández Robaina on the Limitations and Advances in the Fight Against Black Discrimination in Cuba.
Professor Robaina’s presentation covered the changes in thinking in Cuba in recent years around the question of racism in Cuba. Among the points that the professor made was that the question of whether or not racism is still alive within the Cuban Revolution. It is one that is being addressed with renewed vigor, particularly by youth.
Robaina spoke about how culture, music (including hip-hop), dance and folk art was being used to explore what it meant to be “Cuban” of one “racial” group or another. Cuban, like most nations in the Americas (including the United States) has a diverse “racial” background and these differences have been used to divide. The Cuban Revolution opened up the path breaking this down once and for all, a path still being walked.
Special thanks are due to the organizers of the event: the Department of Geography, the Center for Public Policy and Social Research, the Latin American, Latino and Caribbean Center, CCSU Department of Geography and the Greater Hartford Coalition on Cuba.
Too often talk about Cuba occupies opposite poles: one pole seeing Cuba as den of evil and oppression which refuses to acknowledge the important historical gains that were achieve starting in 1959. The other has a starry-eyed view of the island as a “workers’ paradise,” and ignores the hard work that goes into mobilizing the population to overcome centuries of oppression and domination by foreign powers (including the United States).
I hope that this will open up an ongoing discussion on campus.
– Peter Krala