NWIG (Dec 2008)
The Ever-Studied Isle
Abstract
[First paragraph] Cuba Transnational. Damián J. Fern ández (ed.). Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2005. xvii + 216 pp. (Cloth US$ 65.00) Cuba’s Aborted Reform: Socioeconomic Effects, International Comparisons, and Transition Policies. Carme lo Mesa-Lago & Jorge F. Pére z-Lópe z. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2005. xx + 223 pp. (Cloth US$ 59.95) Cuba, the United States, and the Post-Cold War World: The International Dimensions of the Washington-Havana Relationship. Moris Morley & Chris McGillion (eds.). Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2005. xi + 286 pp. (Cloth US$ 65.00) There are perhaps few countries other than France for which the ratio of academic word per population is higher than Cuba. Notwithstanding its symbolic significance over the past fifty years, it is important to remember that we are talking of a small island of something over ten million souls exporting sand and sugar. Even the Cuban diaspora has benefited from this arguably undeserved notoriety, and hardly a week goes by without yet another exile memoir. Over the past two weeks (this is being written in mid-August 2006), the attention meter once again jumped as Fidel’s illness and the temporary (?) transfer of power was documented by the global media. Given all this attention, new books on Cuba face a daunting challenge: to say something new about a place that has been much studied, but which, in many ways, has remained the same for the past half century. Is there something we don’t yet know?
