Alumni Travel Reading Lists 2024: Afro-Cuban Arts & Culture in Havana

Anthony DePalma writes from his long experience as a journalist in Cuba. He brings to life a neighborhood across the harbor from Old Havana to illustrate what he sees as the optimism Cubans demonstrate even in the face of daily challenges. De Palma interviews artists and activists in the post Fidel Castro Cuba.

This is available as a Criterion Collection film--currently on the Criterion Channel, and on Apple TV. You can find information on IMDB (comes with lots of pop-up adds.) Also available for download at the Internet Archives .

An intellectual leaves the Cuban Revolution and ‘underdevelopment’ behind only to find himself at odds with the ambiguities of his new life in the ‘developed’ world.

In July 2015, Abe Kogan walked through the streets of Havana photographing what he saw as a city captured in time. Kogan's black-and-white photographs are portraits of the daily lives of the Habaneros.

More recent photography depicting the lives of Havana's residents

Cluster and Hernández draw on oral histories and cultural artifacts for their history of Havana. These stories of the citizens of Havana cover the accomplishments, adventures, and the qualities of the city, its culture and politics. .

Carlos Manuel Álvarez uses the crónica form--a genre unique to Latin American writing that blends reportage, narrative nonfiction, and novelistic techniques. Alvarez focuses on Cuba during the time diplomatic relations were re-established with the United States and following the death of Fidel Castro. Noted literary journal, Granta, awarded Alvarez the "Best of Young Spanish-Language Novelists."

A history of musical exchange and deiplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States from 2008 through 2020.

A comprehensive guide to Film in Cuba

In "Performing Afro-Cuba," Kristina Wirtz examines Cuba's colonial past and African heritage through material culture and manifestation in musical performance. Wirtz analyzes a variety of performances and offers an interpretation of performance as enacting "diverse revolutionary ideals, religious notions, and racial identity politics."

Fernandes shares the many ways artists, activists, and ordinary Cubans have strategized to survive and succeed in a post-Soviet world. From living without internet, to tuning into distant air waves for hip hop and other musical trends. Fernandes looks at youth culture, social movements such as feminism, new Cuban cinema, public art, the Afro-Cuban movement, rumba and hip hop, to highlight the variety of cultures and creative activity in Cuba.

Fernando Ortiz (1881-1969) is an influential Latin American author of the twentieth century. He was a critical figure in developing the field of Afro-diasporic studies. This collection, one of just a few of his writings to be published in English, has been prepared and translated by ethnomusicologist Robin Moore. Thanks to Moore, we now have these essays on Afro-Cuban expressive culture, music and dance available in English.

This book explores Cuban dance music both from the musical and historical perspective. It relates Cuba's music to other Caribbean music, including salsa and Latin Jazz.

"...this book explores shared ritual traditions between the Anlo-Ewe people of West Africa and their descendants, the Arará of Cuba, who were brought to the island in the Atlantic slave trade." From the publisher.

Poems from thirty-six poets from Cuba writing in the second half of the twentieth century.

Only the Road / Solo el Camino, as of its publication, was the most complete bilingual anthology of Cuban poetry available for English language readers..

"The stories gathered in this anthology reflect the many complex challenges Havana's citizens have had to endure as a result of their country's political isolation--from the hardships of the 'Special Period,' to the pitfalls of Cuba's schizophrenic currency system, to the indignities of becoming a cheap tourist destination for well-heeled Westerners". From the publisher

Experimental fiction from Cuban women artists, writers, and thinkers

Twenty-one stories from the 20th century arranged by region