Juanita De Barros, Audra Diptee, David V. Trotman, eds. Beyond Fragmentation: A Pan-Caribbean Look at Slavery, Emancipation, and Colonialization. Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers, 2005. 360 pp. $28.95 (paper), ISBN 978-1-55876-358-6.
Reviewed by Christer Petley
Published on H-Caribbean (February, 2009)
Commissioned by Clare Newstead (Nottingham Trent University)
Pan-Caribbean Perspectives on the Past
The organizing theme of Beyond Fragmentation is promoting a pan-Caribbean approach to the study of the region’s past. In his preface to the volume, Franklin Knight reflects on his classic history of the Caribbean, in which he described the "fragmented nationalism" of the region. European colonization led to important divisions between Francophone, Hispanic, and Anglophone colonies. They had distinctive histories and these differences have persisted after decolonization. Fragmentation remains important, therefore, but as Knight emphasizes, the territories of the modern Caribbean also have much in common. The sugar revolution, the institution of slavery, and shared experiences of European colonialism have shaped the region. Most territories have also broken formal colonial links and share the experience of being small and relatively poor nations in a globalizing world. The editors of this volume seek to emphasize the importance of these shared Caribbean histories. They suggest that a pan-Caribbean approach to the study of the past should lead to "more than merely comparative analyses that transcend the linguistic divisions of the region" and that this will help historians to question "the very labels academics use to categorise the region" (p. xiii).
The book is divided into three sections. The first is on "Slavery and Emancipation," the second on the "Aftermath of Slavery," and the third on "Colonialism and Decolonisation." In each section, historians review recent historical publications. The editors have assembled an impressive list of contributors that includes some of the leading names in the field of Caribbean studies. There are chapters about scholarship on the French Caribbean by David Geggus, Matthew J. Smith, and Laurent Dubois. Gad Heuman, Bridget Brereton, and O. Nigel Bolland provide chapters on the Anglophone Caribbean, and Francisco A. Scarno, Aline Helg, and Blanca G. Silvestrini offer analyses of work on the Hispanic islands. The collection also includes chapters on the Dutch Caribbean by Alex van Stripriaan and Rosemarijn Hoefte. Many chapters are excellent works of synthesis, providing coherent analyses and overviews of current scholarly trends, and suggesting directions for the future.
In general, Beyond Fragmentation is better at providing an overview of the field of Caribbean history as it currently stands than at providing a blueprint for where it might go next. Given that this volume aims to promote a pan-Caribbean approach to rewriting the region’s past, it seems an odd choice to divide the volume into chapters that focus on the traditional areas of Francophone, Anglophone, and Hispanic research. Certainly, several contributors note the importance of rethinking Caribbean history, many of them focusing on the value of social history and the history of gender. Several also stress the importance of understanding areas of the region in a comparative framework. These are useful suggestions, but if we are to move "beyond fragmentation," historians will also need to begin producing genuine works of synthesis that bring together scholarship on different areas of the Caribbean region and more scholars will have to construct pan-Caribbean research projects. Some, such as Mimi Sheller and Sybille Fischer, have already made impressive strides in these directions.
As a number of contributions to Beyond Fragmentation demonstrate, continuities between slave and post-slave societies have occupied the attention of historians in recent years, and it is clear that Caribbean historians need to concentrate both on transformations over time during slavery and on the continuities created by residues of the system in the post-emancipation era. Recent work on Jamaica by Catherine Hall and Diana Paton has helped to shed important light on how these transformations were shaped by local struggles and by broader, transatlantic, political, and cultural networks. Taking the sort of regional approach that is promoted by this volume could also prove stimulating and provide useful new ways of understanding the region’s past, especially since emancipation happened at different times across the region. Pan-Caribbean perspectives could teach us a lot about intra-Caribbean networks of ideas about freedom, and more work on how emancipation in one part of the region affected debates and struggles in other places would be especially welcome.
In his astute contribution to this book, Dubois highlights two important imperatives for historians to ponder as they attempt to move "beyond fragmentation." He notes that the Francophone Caribbean has been shaped by changes emanating from the metropole, and that France too has been changed by the Caribbean. This observation echoes some of the concerns of pioneers of Caribbean historiography, like C. L. R. James and Eric Williams, who sought to understand the history of a region shaped by interactions and struggles on a broader colonial and transatlantic stage. Dubois also reminds us of the importance of combining the demands of scholarship with the need to provide histories that reflect the daily struggles of ordinary people in the past and which have meaning to Caribbean publics. Other contributors also argue or hint that we must continue to work on the politics of daily life.
Beyond Fragmentation, therefore, asks that historians of traditionally defined Caribbean regions move out of their scholarly furrows and look at the region as a whole, but it by no means suggests that they should lose sight of ordinary people or quotidian struggles in the process. Acting on these suggestions, scholars might begin to write exciting and usable histories that connect local histories with broader contexts. This is a challenging task, especially since we must also continue to maintain our focus on the Caribbean region’s formative connections with a wider world if we are to fully understand it and its place in global history.
If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the network, at: https://networks.h-net.org/h-caribbean.
Citation:
Christer Petley. Review of De Barros, Juanita; Diptee, Audra; Trotman, David V., eds., Beyond Fragmentation: A Pan-Caribbean Look at Slavery, Emancipation, and Colonialization.
H-Caribbean, H-Net Reviews.
February, 2009.
URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=23622
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. |