From Haiti to Cuba: The United States and the West Indies in the Nineteenth Century
American Studies Association Annual Meeting, November 11-14, 2004, Atlanta, GA

This proposed panel for the 2004 ASA "Crossroads of Culture" will explore the cultural, economic, and political relationships between the West Indies and the United States during the nineteenth century. Scholarship on this relationship has traditionally concentrated on the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in light of European colonialism; by querying the continued influence these two regions exerted on each other through trade, immigration, and politics throughout the nineteenth century, this panel seeks to present an interdisciplinary perspective on the regions' connected and complementary colonial and national legacies. Papers might address such questions as: What was the effect of the Haitian Revolution on United States culture and politics at the beginning of the nineteenth century? Why did antebellum US authors turn to the West Indies in their literary works, and what can that tell us about issues commonly considered "national," such as slavery or women's suffrage? Conversely, what did the United States look like from the vantage point of the West Indies, and how was it represented in literature produced in the West Indies?

Email a one-page paper abstract and a brief c.v. as attachments to Justine Murison, via email or postal mail (below). Deadline: January 5, 2004.