Afro-Cuban Religiosity, Revolution, and National Identity

Both personal and intellectual curiosity drove Christine Ayorinde to explore the role of Afro-Cuban religions in the construction of Cuban national identity from the colonial period to the present. Puzzled by why her Nigerian relatives had abandoned traditional religions for more contemporary non-African ones, as well as Islam, she turned to Cuba. There she found African-derived religions had survived to a greater extent, in spite of periodic waves of repression. Of particular interest to her was the dynamism of Afro-Cuban religions in the face of a Marxist-Leninist revolution that promoted materialist atheism.As a result of her intellectual and personal quest, she spent more than three years in Cuba exploring both published and unpublished sources, as well as interviewing practitioners of a variety of Afro-Cuban religions from diverse ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds, as well as political persuasions. Some had recently adopted such beliefs, while others were born into them. In addition, she interviewed scholars, journalists, and government and party officials, as well as representatives of other religions and research centers. These she used selectively, emphasizing a handful. Throughout, her intention was to better understand not only the intricacies of religious survival and adaptation but also the construction of national identity.She explores the development of Afro-Cuban religions in the context of a Spanish Catholic colony that was something of a socioeconomic and political backwater until the rapid growth of the sugar economy prompted the importation of large numbers of Africans as slaves in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The result was religious syncretism, according to Ayorinde, who does not examine the substantial general literature on this topic and its place in the construction of cultural and national identities. Nor does she plumb the literature on national identity formation, thereby leaving unexplained its constituent elements and processes.The author does explore the views of independence leader José Martí and anthropologist Fernando Ortiz, among others, on the evolution of cubanía and the African contribution to it, taking a critical stance with respect to much of the latter’s work. Ayorinde also provides an overview of the prerevolutionary period in an effort to provide the historical context out of which the 1959 revolution emerged and the status of Afro-Cuban religions throughout. This effort would have been strengthened had she paid more attention to Afro-Cubans’ contributions to political movements in the early twentieth century, which would have furthered our understanding of the construction of Cuban national identity. The schematic nature of Ayorinde’s overview is reflected in her statement that Fulgencio Batista “overthrew Machado in 1933” (p. 52). This glosses over the role of Afro-Cubans in the popular uprising that accomplished this feat, as well as the breadth of the debates concerning the construction of national identity that were rife in this period.Her treatment of the more recent revolutionary period focuses on the evolution of the Castro government’s attitudes toward Afro-Cuban and other religions. She details the initial attempt to modernize Cuban society by suppressing traditional beliefs and practices regarded as obstacles in the creation of a new, more rational, citizen, as well as the gradual abandonment of that policy, reflecting the government’s desire to celebrate the country’s African roots as part of its national identity and international projection. Ayorinde argues that in the late 1980s there was an apertura that allowed more space for religious practice, including the Afro-Cuban religions that have flourished in their role of providing supportive communities and psychological surcease, particularly in periods of great stress. Afro-Cuban and other religions were already inserting themselves into public spaces well before the late 1980s — stimulated, to a considerable degree, by internal developments.The work also examines the survival of racism in revolutionary Cuba and the role of Afro-Cuban religions in assuaging it, as well as new mechanisms to challenge it. Ayor-inde views Afro-Cuban religions and Afro-Cubans as potentially dynamic factors in the current Cuban context, which suggests that they will play an important role in future developments within the island. What she did not accomplish, however, was establishing the role of Afro-Cuban religions in the construction of Cuban national identity. Rather, she explored the very interesting history of the Cubanization of African religions in all its complexity, with some references to the evolution of Cuban cultural identity

Aesthetics · Context (archaeology) · Identity (music) · Islam · Political science · Politics · Religiosity · Sociology · Cuban History and Society · Gender Studies · History · Latin American and Latino Studies · Law