The Politics of Music in Caribbean Narratives After 1959

The Politics of Music in Caribbean Narratives after 1959

Description

La guaracha del macho Camacho. De donde son los cantantes. Sirena Selena vestida de pena. Concierto barroco. The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love.

“Music is present in all of my work,” said Alejo Carpentier in 1969, and a look at some of Caribbean literature’s canonical novel titles shows that the statement could be generalized to describe the field as a whole in the late-twentieth century. This course explores that musical presence, examining in particular the roles music has played in the development of the novel in the Caribbean. The questions we will consider include: What are the implications of taking music forms as models for creative expression? Can music ever serve as more than a metaphor in the novel or other non-musical narrative forms? Is it possible to “write” music into a work of fiction?

But we won’t limit ourselves to formal concerns: introducing postcolonial theory and critical race theory, we will ask more pointed questions regarding the use music forms, both native (the son, the guaracha, the bolero) and non-native (the sonata, jazz, hip-hop) in fiction. We will explore the ways Caribbean writers use music to challenge assumptions about European and North American cultural superiority, on one hand, and perpetuate stereotypes of African-Americans and Caribbean blacks, on the other. We will see how authors handle the stereotype of the “musical latino” and how Afro-Latinos use music to forge diasporic connections and, paradoxically, unique cultural identities.

Though the course will primarily focus on the novel, we will consider pieces of poetry and short fiction that reflect similar interdisciplinary concerns. We will read critical texts from Kamau Brathwaite, Édouard Glissant, Juan Flores, Frances Aparicio, and others, that try to make sense of the meaning of music in literature and culture. And, of course, we will listen to a great deal of music. Since much of the literature we will study, like much of the music it mimics, builds on diverse, transcultural sources, comparative study and work that considers transnational contexts will be encouraged. All texts will be made available in both English and their original languages.

Texts

Cabrera Infante, Guillermo. Tres tristes tigres

Condé, Maryse. Les derniers rois mages

Díaz, Junot. This is How You Lose Her

Glissant, Édouard. Tout-monde

Hijuelos, Oscar. The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love

Lamming, George. The Emigrants

Santos-Febres, Mayra. Sirena Selena vestida de pena

Course reader including selections from Frances Aparicio, Kamau Brathwaite, Juan Flores, Édouard Glissant, Ana Lydia Vega, René Wellek, and others.