(2006) Hernández, S. "If God Were Black and from Loíza": Managing Identities

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"If God Were Black and from Loiza" Managing Identities in a Puerto Rican Seaside Town

by Samiri Hern?ndez Hiraldo

Translated by Mariana Ortega-Brena

Loiza, a municipality on the northeast coast of Puerto Rico, is principally known for its majority black population, its strong African tradition (expressed primarily through the community celebration of Santiago Ap?stol), and its slow, limited development. In recent years it has attracted media attention because of its high crime rate and local efforts to develop tourism within a

highly competitive tourist industry. The efforts of loice?os to improve their social and economic condition can be productively viewed in terms of the for

mation of identity, which involves complex relationships between local, national, transnational, religious, and cultural identities and those based on skin color and ethnic background and relationships of power that drive identity

formation on a daily basis.

Keywords: identity, culture, development, Africanness, Puerto Rico

Known for its preponderantly black population and its strong African roots, the Puerto Rican town of Loiza, located on the northeast coast of the

island, is also notorious for its slow development, which many Puerto Ricans attribute to the local population's backward and superstitious mind-set. In fact, many say that the town is full of brujos (witches). In the past few years, Loiza has attracted media attention for its high crime rate and the controversy surrounding the development of local tourism. Rather than focus on the potential veracity of these standard depictions or their origin, I intend to look at the management of identity in daily interactions and the role of identity in efforts to improve the town's socioeconomic and religious conditions.

Samiri Hern?ndez Hiraldo received her Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Michigan in 2000. She is currently a research fellow of the Program for the Analysis of Religion among

Latinos. This paper is based on material collected in Loiza during 12 months of fieldwork between 1996 and 2003. The author thanks the residents of Loiza, her assistants, Eva Villal?n, Zulem Echevarr?a, and Sundra Arroyo, her family and friends in Puerto Rico, and her colleagues at the University of Michigan. Mariana Ortega-Bre?a is a freelance editor and translator based in Ithaca, NY She specializes in academic writing, particularly in the areas of humanities and social sciences. LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES, Issue 146, Vol. 33 No. 1, January 2006 66-82 DOI: 10.1177/0094582X05283516 ? 2006 Latin American Perspectives

66


Hern?ndez Hiraldo / "IF GOD WERE BLACK AND FROM LO?ZA" 67

Although local experience in Loiza cannot be reduced to a single topic, I sug gest that identity is a very significant factor and that its management? whether conscious or not?strategically employs an intricate net of relations between diverse identities and competing socioeconomic, political, and reli gious agendas. In this sense, my approach echoes that of Schilder (1994) in his study of the Mundang of Cameroon, Kipp (1993) in her study of the Karo in Indonesia, and Burdick (1998) in his examination of popular Christianity in Brazil.

My analysis is informed by Connolly's (1993: 64) definition of identity as a set of socially recognized differences. Butler (1993:12) has already pointed out, with regard to gender identity, that direct individual agency is the para doxical result of following the requirements of social sch?mas. My approach is similar to that in Lorentzen's Chiapas study (2001: 91) in taking into con sideration the complexity of internal local dynamics and Butler's (1993: 2) and Connolly's notions of power relations and their importance in the fluctu ating process of identity. I am also influenced by Flores's (2000: 20) recent work on Puerto Rican and Latino identity in the United States. Flores regards local popular culture as a system of interactions, a process that transgresses the limits and spheres of cultural practice, and argues that it is the researcher's task to capture the interplay between these limits and spheres. Only then can

we rescue popular local culture from an archaic and residual role in modern

global society.

THE OFFICIAL CONSTRUCTION OF AFRICAN AND LOICE?O IDENTITY

The importance of such study can be assessed by considering the existing research on Loiza, particularly on its African and black traditions, and on the history of Puerto Rican slavery. As D?vila (1997: 93) points out, popular dis course has officially identified Loiza as a prime example of African and black traditions at their most folkloric. Ra?ces (Roots), a 2001 production of the

Banco Popular1 focusing on the Afro-Puerto Rican musical forms of bomba and plena, pays particular attention to Loiza and introduces it as the town with the country's largest cimarr?n and free black populations. The Puerto Rican archaeologist Ricardo Alegr?a has suggested that Loiza has retained its

traditional character because until recently there was only one road to the town. When I distributed a questionnaire to my anthropology students at the

University of Puerto Rico during the 1997 autumn term, they established a direct connection between being from Loiza and being a black person of African and slave descent with strong traditional roots and limited resources.


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68 LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES

Studies of Loiza's black heritage fall within the scope of the research on Puerto Rico's African tradition that resulted from the systematic governmen tal effort during the 1950s to promote an official idea of Puerto Rican national culture. This concept, which had been gradually developed over the years (Duany, 2002: 21), was based on the harmonious coexistence of the Spanish, indigenous, and African legacies, and today every Puerto Rican child learns it in school (D?vila, 1997: 4-5). The j?baro, usually characterized as a light skinned, sun-tanned male from the mountainous interior and mostly associ ated with the popular Spanish heritage, became another element in the arche typal construction of puertorrique?idad. It was around this time that the Instituto de Cultura Puertorrique?a (Institute of Puerto Rican Culture?ICP)

was established to endorse the official agenda. Ricardo Alegr?a became the institution's first director, and cultural centers were built across the nation (D?vila, 1997: 79).

In a sense, this initiative was part of a plan of accelerated industrial devel opment that started in the 1940s under the aegis of the Partido Popular Democr?tico (Popular Democratic party?PPD) and led to the establishment of the Estado Libre Asociado (Free Associated State?ELA) of Puerto Rico. According to Duany (2002: 281), this cultural agenda was conceived as a response to the United States's rationale regarding the occupation?that Puerto Ricans were incapable of self-government and lacked a definite cultural identity. It reflected concerns with regard to the new relation of dependency and the purported threat that this posed to the Puerto Rican essence and self-determination, an argument supported by the left and the proindependence movement (Scarano, 1993: 724-726).

As elsewhere (Hern?ndez Hiraldo, 2001:108), I suggest that Afro-Puerto Rican research can be divided into a number of tendencies. One of these rec

ognizes the island's African and black heritage (Babin, 1973; Zen?n, 1974; Centro de Estudios de la Realidad Puertorrique?a, 1992). A second suggests that Puerto Rican racism has been mild (Blanco, 1985 [1942]), while a third seeks to demonstrate the marginalization of the African tradition (Buitrago, 1982:103-106; Morris, 1995: 103; D?vila, 1997: 43, 71-73; Guerra, 1998:

233). Some research highlights the African heritage and suggests that it is more fundamental than the others (Gonz?lez, 1993), and, finally, there are those who claim that Puerto Ricans are "really, really black" (Torres, 1998).

Loiza and, in particular, its barrios Median?a Alta and Median?a Baja have been the subject of linguistic studies (Mauleon Benitez, 1974), research on the fiesta of Santiago Ap?stol, which originated in Median?a Alta (Alegr?a, 1954; Zaragoza, 1995), and studies of witchcraft (Vidal, 1989). There have

been attempts to demonstrate that cultural practices in Loiza are African in origin (Steward et al., 1956) and that the people are relatively indifferent to


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their heritage because of Protestant influence (LaRuffa, 1966). Of one thing we can be sure: Loiza's sizable black population is not exclusively linked to

the sugar industry's use of African slaves. Also, loice?os took up other occu

pations, while shifting from peasants to proletariat (Giusti, 1994). The official national discourse on Puerto Rican identity has substantially

shaped academic attitudes toward Loiza. However, there has been a recent move toward the recognition of alternative narratives of Puerto Rican experi ence within a national framework that takes into consideration the island's current political status (Duany, 2002: 23). In this regard, it is impossible to ignore Craig's (1982) observation that the Caribbean experience has been forced into a rigid set of sch?mas and Trouillot's (1992: 36) assertion that these depictions are mostly located within the experience of the Western

world. For this reason, rather than focus on the notion of Puerto Rican iden

tity, I want to look at how a particular Puerto Rican group experiences iden tity. Along with Guerra (1998) and Morris (1995), I assume that national identity is as competitive a factor as color, ethnicity, local traditions, commu nitarian loyalty, and even personal uniqueness, but it is important to bear in

mind D?vila's (1997) and Duany's (2002) view that Puerto Rican national identity is constructed (for Duany, in a transnational context).

IDENTITY AND DAILY INTERACTION

Most of the Loiza residents I talked with were proud to be the focus of touristic and academic attention. This is particularly true in Las Cuevas, a

community of some 800 persons near the town center. Some residents

thought I was there to examine "more of the same thing": their folklore and archaeology. ("Anthropology" is commonly thought of as synonymous with "archaeology," mainly because of Alegria's excavations.) To make my research interests clear I had to compare myself to a social worker, someone

who usually addresses general social and economic conditions, but this account did not explain my interest in interacting with the local community.

A good number of residents appeared to have a rather defensive attitude toward the research, which they hoped would discredit stereotypes. A very revealing incident took place when I suspended my research for some

months (from December 1997 to March 1998) in order to look for funding. A police raid had taken place a few days after I left Loiza, and it had been rumored that I was a police agent. When the truth was discovered, there was

embarrassment?"Ah, but here in Las Cuevas we still think we are better than

others, and then people rightly think less of us"?and I received a substantial number of collective and individual apologies. People were interested in


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participating in my research in order to provide a positive image of Las Cuevas and Loiza.

Countless hours of conversation and daily interaction revealed the varied and complex ways in which people from Loiza managed identity. In order to test my intentions, residents at first emphasized negative aspects such as lack of trust, the high crime rate, and drug abuse. In a practice reminiscent of the strategies of the Hispanic market in the United States (D?vila, 2001: 41-42), the people of Las Cuevas critically engaged with these and other typifications such as conformism, laziness, and dependency. Generally, they sought to

preserve their self-esteem without becoming directly involved in conflict. They often pointed to the backward and superstitious mentality of the people of Median?a Alta, mocked their way of speaking, and even referred to them as "almost from another world." This attitude of the people of Median?a Alta

was seen as a big part of the cause of Loiza's slow progress. They also described the residents of Median?a Alta as "way black" or

"blacker," employing for themselves a variety of color or racial classification described for the San Juan barrio of Gandul (Duany, 2002: 236) and for Arembepe, Brazil (Kottak, 1992: 68-69).2 According to Guerra (1998: 233),

the use of these terms reinforces social/racial hierarchies that serve to negate classification as black. However, more than half of Loiza's inhabitants (57.9 percent) classified themselves as black in the 2000 census. Whereas Kottak (1992: 68-69) has argued that the variety of racial terms used in Brazil indi cates the minimal importance of racial differences relative to social ones, Duany (2002: 20, 246) has pointed out for Loiza that a fluid classification system is not indicative of a lack of prejudice against blacks or other racialized people. During my stay in Loiza I witnessed verbal and physical confrontations between gangs, teenagers, and children over skin color, body features, and place of origin in schools and even church meetings.

At the same time, I also witnessed affirmations of blackness, such as the sermons I heard at the local mission, which belongs to the Iglesia Fuente de Agua Viva, a Protestant church that was founded in the 1980s and is the fastest-growing and most prosperous on the island. It has been strongly criti cized by other Protestant churches for its emphasis on material prosperity and an alleged similarity with new age ideas. The main church, whose con gregation is mainly light-skinned, has focused on Afro-Caribbean elements in recent years, despite criticism that too much emphasis on Afro-Caribbean traditions is an obstacle to Loiza's prosperity.

As is common in Puerto Rico, residents of Las Cuevas, especially the elderly, said that the town had become increasingly polluted by modernity and licentiousness and identified a link between the past and a healthy life style. The lack of respect, discipline, and moral values widely ascribed to


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youth were significantly attributed to outside influences. Some people wished that Loiza could have remained isolated from the rest of Puerto Rico as it was for many years. Many, however, underscored the hospitality, communal

ethos, and family life that are still experienced in this town in contrast to many other parts of the island. The case of the Iglesia de Dios Pentecostal illustrates the importance of these factors. As in the case of the rural Sri Lan

kan communities studied by Brow (1996), the congregation attributed a per ceived reduction in recent years in the manifestations of the Holy Spirit and an increase in devilish ones to the lack of unity and family life and an increase in materialism in the congregation and the town as a whole. The local empha sis on family life was contrasted with the individualist, consumerist, and ego tistical mentality in other parts of the island. Some residents also compared the kind of "natural life" still possible in Loiza with the polluted environment elsewhere.

INDIGENOUS AND AFRICAN TRADITIONS

According to historical sources and the archaeological evidence collected from Alegr?a's excavations, the caves for which Las Cuevas is named housed an indigenous settlement at the time of Spanish colonization. Some people of Las Cuevas have embraced this information with zeal, focusing on Loiza's proud indigenous roots to the detriment of its African traditions. Many Las Cuevas residents have a tendency to represent themselves as different from and even superior to other Loiza neighborhoods, particularly Median?a Alta. This response is understandable given the privileged and romantic view of indigenous culture in Puerto Rico (Buitrago, 1982: 103-106; Duany, 2002:

Chap. 11) and is similar to the situation in other Caribbean and Central Amer ican countries such as Guyana (Moore, 1999), Nicaragua, and Honduras

(Helms, 1977). Here, however, the emphasis on indigenous heritage is largely due to local animosity toward Cano vanas, a neighboring town originally sprung from Loiza.

Because of its rapid (though socially uneven) economic development, Loiza was officially acknowledged as the island's seventh-largest town in 1719. In 1910 a group of landowners and local administrators decided to

move the political and parish headquarters to the barrio of Can?vanas, 8 kilo meters away and closer to the island's center. Can?vanas was a prosperous town with a large white population descended from Spanish and Irish immi grants,3 while Loiza had become economically stagnant because of its dis tance from the main market and lack of transportation. The old administrative center acquired the name "Loiza Aldea," and as the relocation increased


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Can?vanas's prosperity Loiza Aldea continued on a downward trajectory. By the 1940s any interest in returning the administrative headquarters to its orig inal site in order to regain control of the town and ameliorate its general con dition had been lost. Years later the struggle had turned into an effort to acquire municipal stability independent of Can?vanas. The separation of Loiza and Can?vanas, sanctioned by the governor's Junta de Planificaci?n

(Planning Committee), became official in 1971, although it did not take place until 1973, after the 1972 elections. The agreement favored Can?vanas and left Loiza in the worst financial situation in the country, the island of Culebra excepted. Loiza residents accepted the separation in exchange for the

promise of state government help and the development of tourism in the area. A good example of governmental attitudes toward Loiza can be found in a

document in which, in an attempt to justify the separation and its conditions (which allotted less land, infrastructure, resources, services, and employ

ment opportunities to Loiza despite its larger population), the Junta de Planificaci?n concluded that the two towns were socially and culturally dif ferent. Their respective residents reportedly also held this opinion. Can?vanas was described as more economically developed and close to the metropolitan area and its inhabitants as self-sufficient, distanced from tradi

tion, independent, practical, more individualistic, and puritanical (because of the local growth of Protestantism). Loiza residents were described as subor dinated to the social group (which was presented as cohesive, integrated, homogeneous, and isolated) and inclined toward a bohemian lifestyle, alco hol, carnal pleasures, and free love (Junta de Planificaci?n, 1968: 21-22). In this case there is no doubt that diverse identities indicate differences and

hierarchies of value and power. During the process of separation, which was opposed by many Can?vanas

residents because of the great loss of natural resources it entailed, Loiza had the support of the Partido Nuevo Progresista (New Progressive party?PNP).

This recently founded party fiercely opposed the ruling populist PPD and the Partido Independentista Puertorrique?o (Puerto Rican Independence party?PIP), which sought to emblematize Puerto Rican autonomy and autochthonous culture. I suggest that in its support of Loiza the PNP was seeking to go beyond the PPD's populist discourse by associating itself with one of the most ethnically and culturally marginalized sectors of society. (Some residents were encouraged by the PNP's support of permanent associ ation with the United States, which had recently embarked on a battle against racism and in favor of civil rights.) Its timely support came during a time

when the town and its folkloric traditions in particular were receiving consid erable media attention (El Mundo, July 13, 1968), and, prompted by this interest, the ICP began to develop a new folklorist approach to Puerto Rican


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culture (D?vila, 1997: 64-69). The results of the PNP's support of Loiza became apparent shortly after the separation, when the town's first mayor, a member of the PNP, launched a series of charges regarding the PPD's alleged racism (El Mundo, January 28, 1973). PNP's aid won the party the majority of the votes in the locality, but Loiza's support of it was also significantly related to the large following the PPD had in Can?vanas?consistent with an earlier tradition in which Can?vanas backed the Republicans whereas Loiza supported the Socialists. The differences between the two localities, which the separation has only exacerbated, lead me to suggest that Loiza's struggle for municipal independence and stability reflected its residents' desire to assert its identity as a basis for the acquisition of resources and services.

The case of Loiza and Can?vanas recalls the previously mentioned and

very similar situation of two Sri Lankan communities whose conflicts and prejudices were based on the consequences of unequal development (Brow, 1996). The residents of Las Cuevas pointed out that the people of Can?vanas

had always thought of themselves as blanquitos and better than their Loiza neighbors. I often heard that in previous decades local dances had had one dance floor for canovan?nses and another for loice?os, and there were also

complaints that physicians favored the former, forcing loice?os to depend on home remedies, healers, and even witches. In the light of these perceived slights, the people of Las Cuevas had the feeling that the residents of

Can?vanas had taken possession of the indigenous heritage as if it belonged to them only. The Can?vanas entrance gate boasts a large statue of an indige nous couple, and the inhabitants refer to themselves as "the Indians of Can?vanas." A woman from Las Cuevas who identified herself as "racially mixed, educated, with a critical and courageous mind," and the opposite of familiar Loiza stereotypes explained the situation as follows: "They are so intent on blackening us that they forget about our indigenous heritage." At the same time, Loiza's inhabitants resent the fact that many people think that they still live in boh?os, and there is a general rejection of the name "Loiza Aldea" because the word aldea (village) is associated with a primitive lifestyle. Dur ing the fiesta of Santiago Ap?stol, costumed children dressed up as genuine aborigines represented indigenous identity, and the use of children empha sized the tender and spiritual notion of the indigenous tradition.4

African identity was also represented in the Las Cuevas fiesta and sought the same affirmative effect, mostly through folkloric, abstract and symbolic elements. This was consistent with the refusal of most loice?os to deal with the subject of slavery and with D?vila's (2001: 121) remark that, in the con text of the Hispanic market, Latino blacks are not considered representative of a generic latinidad. Still, according to Zaragoza (1995: 55-56), there is great social, political, and psychological interpretive potential in this folkloric


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and abstract/symbolic disposition. The vejigante, a batlike figure with a mask made out of coconut and very colorful clothing, is an example. Despite the fact that it embodies the evil that the saint must fight, the vejigante has become the most representative figure of the fiesta, a national and interna tional success. In the aforementioned Ra?ces video, the Loiza artist Samuel

Lind suggests that the vejigantes stand for the free spirit of Loiza's African roots. When I talked to him in his studio, he pointed out the need for the pro cess that Jensen, in his study of Brazilian Catholicism ( 1999), has termed "re

Africanization." According to Lind, the African elements should be high lighted as evidence of the cultural uniqueness of loice?os. At the same time, he pointed to the importance of maintaining the visibility of other cultural elements both in the fiesta and in his own work, since these represented the traditions that Loiza shared with the rest of Puerto Rican culture and society.

THE MARKETING OF CULTURE

The municipal government's interest in Loiza has related to its goal of pro moting the town as a "capital of tradition" in the hope that the development of tourism will rescue it from financial crisis, unemployment, and even a high crime rate.5 This is possible because in Puerto Rico, according to D?vila (1997), culture?especially j?baro culture?sells. Emphasizing the African component without ignoring the other traditions is considered more effective than trying to highlight it on its own (D?vila, 1997: 71). The island's cultural

market grew in significance during the general crisis of the 1970s; as Scarano (1993: 815-816) points out, many Puerto Ricans earned their livelihood through the informal economy, including pursuits related to popular culture or folklore. Folklorization had opened the door to the recognition of the Afri can tradition, and the town's folklore had been portrayed in the media as both a source of pride and a means of survival (El Mundo, July 13, 1968).

In the last several years the popularity?and even exoticization?of Loiza's folklore has reached a new high. In 1997 the advertising firm Corpo rate Communications, Inc., hired to attract new clients to a mall in the affluent

mostly white town of Guaynabo, organized an exhibit featuring several towns whose fiestas, like that of Santiago Ap?stol, showcased African tradi tions. The fiesta of Santiago has become emblematic of loice?o identity and the locality's cultural tradition. The figure of Santiago has been added to the

municipality's emblem, and a vejigante mask is part of the large welcoming sign at the entrance to the town. The local government's interest has sup ported an increase in the length of the fiesta, which used to last three days and now lasts ten. This requires a large production team to coordinate the diverse


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attractions and the support of local and international businesses and the media.

However, the local government has faced challenges regarding its approach to the development of tourism. Its plans for tourist facilities in the area of Pi?ones have met with serious opposition from competitors such as Isla Verde, a tourist area in the town of Carolina, near San Juan. Local and national environmentalists constitute another rival faction, and groups favor

ing the development of tourism such as Emancipaci?n de Loiza (Emancipa tion of Loiza) have called them racist. The Asociaci?n de Residentes de Pi?ones (Resident Association of Pi?ones) and other communities perceive the development of tourism in the area as a threat to their cultural heritage and economic survival (many own stalls in the market and make their living sell ing local handicrafts). Emancipaci?n de Loiza has accused the national gov ernment of subjecting the town, more than any other municipality, to an in

depth fiscal investigation every time a development project is submitted (El Nuevo D?a, March 23, 2002).

Las Cuevas residents argued that Loiza suffered from a kind of govern mental discrimination: it was easier for them to receive money for cultural

purposes than for basic services such as a medical building. A Las Cuevas resident who identified himself as a proindependence community leader had returned after 15 years from New York, where he had experienced discrimi nation and worked in the construction business even though he had a degree as a social worker. He insisted that this municipal administration was culti

vating loice?o culture in order to divert attention from the discriminatory practices of the ruling party, to which it belongs. The mayor, sitting under a large photograph of Governor Pedro Rosell?, indicated that Loiza could not continue to be victimized and had to move forward, with the support of the PNP. The increase in the private sector's economic influence due to the PNP government's privatization efforts since the early nineties and a surge in the

popularity of issues pertaining to racism have caused the Loiza government to play the race card to obtain state funding and, according to many, conceal its corruption.

Many residents of Las Cuevas and other communities I visited maintained that the construction of high-cost residences and tourist facilities had been prioritized over housing for the poor and the locals. At least during my stay in Loiza, five out of six construction projects were directed toward the develop ment of high-cost tourism while many Las Cuevas families lived in poor, sometimes unfinished residences. Problems with the water supply are added to other tribulations, which include damaged residential areas and ecosys tems by the extraction of sand for purposes of development. Residents also suffer because of the disagreeable odors produced by the stagnant water and


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the nearby sewage treatment plant, which treats other municipalities' sewage and was recently constructed without the town's prior knowledge and consent. Despite all of this, during my last visit to Loiza in 2003 some resi dents expressed hope for Mayor Ferdin's plan to attract high-cost tourism in order to increase the municipal budget and create jobs and low-cost housing. Others attributed the recent low-cost housing construction and restoration efforts to governor Sila M. Calder?n's PPD administration, whose Special Communities program had financed work in poor residential areas.

The town's cultural center has offered a complementary or alternative way of bettering Loiza's situation. Its main goal is to provide the town's young people and their families with a basic knowledge of their culture and heritage in order to increase their self-esteem. The center's view of self-esteem as related to progress is similar to that of many Latino programs in the United States (D?vila, 2001: 239) and involves a series of projects and activities such as history seminars, handicrafts workshops, vocational guidance, and com

munity service. Its director, Laura Mel?ndez, was grateful for the center's rel ative freedom to preserve Loiza as a museum of African heritage. At the same

time, she recognizes that this freedom is a double-edged sword. Some of the support for the fiesta of Santiago Ap?stol comes from the

nonresident or absentee loice?os who are honored on one of the days of the fiesta. There is also a group called the Friends of Loiza that includes people who have never lived in the town, some of whom participate fully in the fiesta while others' contributions are marginal. This last group includes parents who get involved in response to their children's interest and are seeking to provide them with healthier entertainment options than drug selling. There are those who criticize the fiesta but still enjoy the general rejoicing from their balconies and receive visits from friends and family, some of whom travel from the United States expressly for the occasion. Others oppose the celebrations because of the opportunities they provide for criminal activity. The municipal government and the state police have adopted strict security measures, and some of these, such as the stopping of vehicles at the town's

entrance, have become routine in Loiza given the increased crime rates of the

past few years. This, in turn, has created controversy of its own. Some people support these measures, while others are concerned that so much police pres ence will give an exaggerated impression of the amount of crime in the local ity. Some Baptist and Pentecostal congregations engage in fasting and prayer

during the celebrations in an effort to prevent crime and protect themselves from the forces of evil that are associated with the fiesta's African elements.

A largely Catholic group has expressed a desire for the fiesta to focus on "decent" and "serious" aspects, but the fact that the fiesta is not necessarily linked with Catholic ritual allows them to participate freely.



RELIGION AND TRADITION

Padre Antonio, a light-skinned Trinitarian priest who served the Esp?ritu Santo y San Patricio parish from 1973 to 1997, attempted to revive local Catholicism by having the church "cleansed" of witchcraft, spirits, and santer?a, and Santiago is associated with the Yoruba deities Shango and

Ogun. As part of his cleansing campaign, he has reminded his congregation that St. Patrick has been the real patron of Loiza since the seventeenth cen tury. Recalling the efforts of Catholic leaders in Miami to distinguish between the Virgin of Charity and the Yoruba santer?a goddess Ochun (Tweed, 1999: 142), he has described the fiesta of St. Patrick as "religious" (or "spiritual") and that of Santiago as "traditional." At the same time, he clearly considered Catholicism Puerto Rico's "national" and "traditional"

religion. Loiza began celebrating the feast of St. Patrick in 1980, and it has become an annual event that emphasizes the Spanish and j?baro cultural ele ments. It receives the support of governmental institutions and the local administration, who see it as an opportunity to please the town and attract tourism. In an attempt to legitimize St. Patrick without ignoring the town's identity, he commissioned the artist Samuel Lind to paint the saint with dark skin. The painting, which can still be seen in the parish, contrasts with depictions of Santiago, who is always portrayed as white.

It is impossible to overlook the fact that the founding of the Median?a Alta parish of Santiago Ap?stol took place in the same year (1971) that the parish of Comerio was abandoned because of charges that the mass was being used to spread subversive leftist propaganda through j?baro music (Diaz-Stevens, 1993). Considering the accelerated growth of the Baptist and Pentecostal churches at the time, I suggest that Catholic support for the establishment of the parish of Santiago Ap?stol was a response to the critical need to earn local sympathy that could then be channeled toward a religious revival. Given that the Median?a Alta residents considered themselves extremely marginalized and discriminated against by the urban downtown Catholic community, there is no question but that the church sought to go beyond the PNP's initiatives.

According to some members of the Santiago Ap?stol parish and other Median?a Alta residents, favoritism was apparent during the restoration of

the Esp?ritu Santo y San Patricio parish in the 1940s and 1950s, which even tually allowed the parish to regain administrative powers at the beginning of the 1970s.

The founding of the Santiago Ap?stol parish situated the residents of Median?a Alta on a par with the rest of the local and national urban Catholic community, but it also entailed the silencing of some local traditions. Emi grants from Loiza have established themselves in New Haven, Connecticut,


Jose Ralat

Jose Ralat

Jose Ralat


where the fiesta of Santiago Ap?stol is now a resounding success with both Latinos (including Puerto Ricans who travel to participate in the celebra tions) and others. The New Haven fiesta highlights the tradition's African elements and has become a great incentive for sociopolitical activity, far

more than in Loiza. Members of its organizing committee (Fiestas de Loiza en Connecticut en Honor al Ap?stol Santiago?FLECHAS) have undertaken community projects and supported agendas and political candidates. This has generated conflict with racial and ethnic overtones, particularly between Catholics who support the organization and Pentecostals.

STRATEGIC SELF-IDENTIFICATION

The management of identity undertaken by Loiza inhabitants both in daily interaction and as part of the general effort to develop the town clearly points to what Scherer (2001:153), writing about Chinese-Cuban cultural revital ization, calls "strategic Orientalism": a dialectical framework situated between the Orientalist view provided by official discourse and the appropri ation and alteration of that view by recent generations of Chinese-Cubans. Scherer uses this perspective to criticize Edward Said's (1979) Orientalism, which adopts an essentialist view of East and West, posits that Orientalism is a purely Western product and ignores the participation of Orientals them selves (which Morris [1995] considers crucial). Here I have also drawn atten tion to internal power dynamics and the multilineal management of identity, given the presence of various types of identity (e.g. color, ethno-cultural

background, local, communal, national, religious, and traditional) and the various interactions between identities and competing social, political, and religious agendas. I have attempted to address the kind of complexity that Burdick (1998: viii) has found in Brazil, where, while some claim color-based discrimination, others use this as an incentive or tool to succeed. Such com

plexity is clearly encountered in processes in which identities (such as color and ethnicity, on the one hand, and religion and tradition, on the other) are strategically disassembled and reassembled. Such processes are intrinsically contradictory. One example is the increasing popularity of Afro-Caribbean or Afro-Rican elements (both folkloric and modern) in contemporary Puerto Rican culture alongside the fact that, in the 2000 census, almost 81 percent of the island's population classified themselves as white and only 8 percent as

black. Kinsbruner (1996:4) has commented on the lack of academic and popular

attention to issues of race, prejudice, and African heritage in Puerto Rico.


Jose Ralat


The experience of the Loiza population described here highlights the fact that its identity problem is of long standing but certain particulars have contrib uted to increased interest in making identity management more open and direct, among them the recent national interest in African heritage, the possi bility of promoting the town as a "capital of tradition," and the past and cur rent local, national, and transnational struggles for recognition and resources. Perhaps the best critical way to describe this process is with the

words of a young loice?o: "If God were black and from Loiza the story would be different."6

NOTES

1. The populist Banco Popular was founded in 1893. 2. The four most common classifications among 703 census participants were trigue?o (col

ored), negro (black), blanquita (little white female), and jabao (brownish white). 3. This information can be found in the material distributed by the municipality and was con

firmed by primary sources. 4. A classic example of this view is the commercial for Maz?la oil, which was very popular

during the 1970s and 1980s. In it natives raise the product skyward while radiant light and harmo nious music accompany the words "Maz?la corn, gold from God." This contrasts with the also famous Yaucono coffee ad in which the protagonist is a fat, backside-wriggling, black woman in

maid's garb. 5. According to municipal records, 68 percent of Loiza's population lived in poverty?9 per

cent more than in the country as a whole. The unemployment rate had increased from 19 percent in 1980 to 33 percent in 1990, the highest in all of Puerto Rico. About two-thirds of local house holds depended partly or entirely on federal aid. Seventy-one percent of Las Cuevas households reported a monthly income of $900 or less.

6. The song "Si Dios Fuera Negro" (If God Were Black), written by the black Puerto Rican musician Roberto Angler?, was inspired by the discrimination he experienced in the air force during the Korean War.

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Article Contentsp. 66p. 67p. 68p. 69p. 70p. 71p. 72p. 73p. 74p. 75p. 76p. 77p. 78p. 79p. 80p. 81p. 82

Issue Table of ContentsLatin American Perspectives, Vol. 33, No. 1, Struggle and Change in Puerto Rico: Expecting Democracy (Jan., 2006), pp. 1-115Front MatterCommentaryThe World Tribunal and Its Recommendations [pp. 3-8]

Introduction: Struggle and Change in Puerto Rico: Expecting Democracy [pp. 9-22]The Making of a Colonial Welfare State: U.S. Social Insurance and Public Assistance in Puerto Rico [pp. 23-41]Buscando ambiente: Hegemony and Subaltern Tactics of Survival in Puerto Rico's Land Distribution Program [pp. 42-65]"If God Were Black and from Loza": Managing Identities in a Puerto Rican Seaside Town [pp. 66-82]Social Struggle against the U.S. Navy in Vieques, Puerto Rico: Two Movements in History [pp. 83-101]"Peace Is More than the End of Bombing": The Second Stage of the Vieques Struggle [pp. 102-115]Back Matter

Documents

(2006) Hernández, S. "If God Were Black and from Loíza": Managing Identities