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Puerto Rico in the American Century: A History since 1898

2009; Duke University Press; Volume: 89; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1215/00182168-2008-078

1527-1900

José O. Solá,

Latin American and Latino Studies

César J. Ayala and Rafael Bernabe’s book explores the nature, structure, and relationship of the relationship between Puerto Rico and United States. The authors differ with Henry Luce’s proclamation in 1941 in Life magazine about the coming of the American Century and the rise of the United States as a global power after 1945. Ayala and Bernabe argue instead that the American Century began in 1898. By situating the rise of the United States to global power at the beginning of the twentieth century, Ayala and Bernabe push the reader to rethink the role the United States has played in shaping the nations and territories of Latin America and the Caribbean.The target audience of the book is not specialists but rather the general public. However, the book has value for scholars and students of Caribbean, Latin America, or Latino studies, as well. Ayala and Bernabe introduce the reader to major themes in Puerto Rico’s history, different interpretations (both old and current) regarding events, individuals, movements, literature, the role of the United States, national culture, and migrations to New York. The book’s vast number of characters (political and labor leaders, military, academics, economists, and cultural figures) can at times be challenging to those not familiar to the history of the island. Yet Ayala and Bernabe are able to link these characters within a larger historical perspective, namely that of an Atlantic history, where Puerto Rico’s history and the lives of these islanders are not isolated from outside intellectual, political, economic, and cultural movements. Although Ayala and Bernabe use what I would refer to as traditional Puerto Rican historical narrative (writing the history of the island through the lens of dominant figures such as Luis Muñoz Rivera, Luis Muñoz Marín, José Celso Barbosa, Santiago Iglesias, Carlos Romero Barceló, César Andreu Iglesias, Luisa Capetillo, Antonio Pedreira, Luis Palés Matos, and Pedro Albizu Campos), the authors also introduce other influential actors such as Nilita Vientós Gastón and Alfredo Collado Martell, who rarely are mentioned in general works. By including these characters, Ayala and Bernabe present the history of the island through different voices and perspectives.The authors divide the twentieth century into the periods before and after World War II and discuss these from a political-economic perspective, also incorporating cultural policies and counterpolicies, literary debates, and the role that migration played in shaping Puerto Rico’s history, as well as the emerging and growing Puerto Rican community in the United States. Ayala and Bernabe depict the Puerto Rican diaspora, especially the community in New York, as a historical site where the island’s history is reconstructed, where individuals looking for work, escaping oppression, or seeking political alliances, ideas, or education formulate new interpretations of their Puerto Rican identity.Puerto Rico in the American Century is not only an excellent introduction to the island for the nonexpert but it is also of value to scholars who are searching for new topics to research on Puerto Rican history and the Puerto Rican diaspora, as the authors explain the major historiographical and scholarly debates in Puerto Rico. Ayala and Bernabe provide us with an account of the history of Puerto Rico and its diaspora where the people are in a constant struggle to define who they are while both battling and accommodating international and local market forces as well as issues related to citizenship, colonial policies, literary movements, migration, and transnational identities. This book is an excellent contribution to the general history of Puerto Rico during the twentieth century.