The human factors of cubanidad

Abstract

<p>Originally delivered as a lecture at the University of Havana in 1939 and first published in 1940, this text is a classic of Latin American anthropology and a key statement on racial and cultural mixture in the Americas. Following the tradition of the Latin American essays of national interpretation, Fernando Ortiz discusses the social and cultural bases of Cuban nationhood. He distinguishes <em>cubanidad—</em>Cuba's unique culture—from <em>cubanía—</em>the consciousness and attachment to that culture—and argues that the latter first emerged among Black and poor Cubans. As for cubanidad, he defines it as both the process and the ever-changing results of the mixture of uprooted cultural elements coming from different world areas, especially Europe and Africa. He interprets Cuban culture as a permanent flow, located in "the complex process of its very formation, disintegrative and integrative." Ortiz describes cubanidad through the metaphor of the <em>ajiaco</em>, a stew that never stops cooking because the multifarious ingredients that compose it are constantly renewed, mixing with each other and dissolving into a broth. The text discusses the cultural contributions of the different groups that moved to Cuba and interprets Cuban history as based on violent processes of migration, exploitation, and conflict.</p>

The Cuban factors of humanity: Reproductive biology, historical ontology and the metapragmatics of race

“…To begin to clarify my position, let me briefly explain the decidedly frivolous and illegitimate title of this essay. Frivolous and illegitimate because I stole it from one of my former students, Joa˜o Felipe Gonc¸alves, who, together with Duff Morton, has produced the first English translation of Ortiz's signature essay, 'Los factores humanos de la cubanidad' (Ortiz, 2014). At one point, Joa˜o phoned me to see if I could help clarify something in the text and he misspoke, calling it: 'Los factores cubanos de la humanidad'.…”

Ethnographic stews: Decennial reflections

“…As a formidable part of Cuban anthropology, Ortiz's scholarship and legacy has remained in the peripheries of anthropology's global history. HAU has previously published Ortizʼs essay, "The human factors of cubanidad" (Ortiz 2014), with an introduction by João Felipe Gonçalves (2014) which situates Ortizʼs work in the context of Latin American anthropology, and anthropological theory more generally. In this special issue, a host of international scholars from both sides of the Atlantic, and from a variety of disciplinary backgrounds and national traditions, explore the applicability and limitations of the wide range of work by Ortiz, and particularly of the concept of "transculturation," an early example of what later would be known as "theory from the South"-one written specifically against "acculturation" theories coming from the "North."…”