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Chapter 5 - Sugar

from Part I - Commodities

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 January 2023

By
Richard Rosa
Edited by
Fernando Degiovanni  and
Javier Uriarte
Fernando Degiovanni
Affiliation:
City University of New York
Javier Uriarte
Affiliation:
Stony Brook University, State University of New York
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Summary

This chapter focuses on sugar as a commodity underlining and overdetermining social, political, and aesthetic changes in the Caribbean from the 1870s to the 1930s. These global and regional changes included the consolidation of the gold-standard regime and its sudden dismissal, the apparition of corporate-based capitalism, the rearticulation of economics as a discipline through the marginalist “revolution,” the incorporation of former slaves and indentured service into a wage-labor force, and the beginning of the conversion of former plantations into hospitality sites. The resurgence of sugar as a dominant raw commodity gave a particular character to the region's absorption into global corporate capitalism. By focusing on both the material and the social dimension of sugar, the argument is made that this commodity helped negotiate the differences between literary and artistic innovations coming from European-influenced lettered elites and those coming from popular groups with strong Afro-Caribbean roots.

Keywords

sugarplantationscapitalismcolonialismfinancecorporationsCaribbeanm+K14aterial cultureracism
Type
Chapter
Information
Latin American Literature in Transition 1870–1930 , pp. 74 - 88
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

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References

Works Cited

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  • Sugar
  • Edited by Fernando Degiovanni, City University of New York, Javier Uriarte, Stony Brook University, State University of New York
  • Book: Latin American Literature in Transition 1870–1930
  • Online publication: 14 January 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108976367.006
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To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • Sugar
  • Edited by Fernando Degiovanni, City University of New York, Javier Uriarte, Stony Brook University, State University of New York
  • Book: Latin American Literature in Transition 1870–1930
  • Online publication: 14 January 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108976367.006
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Sugar
  • Edited by Fernando Degiovanni, City University of New York, Javier Uriarte, Stony Brook University, State University of New York
  • Book: Latin American Literature in Transition 1870–1930
  • Online publication: 14 January 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108976367.006
Available formats
×