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In this book, Raquel Otheguy argues that Afro-descended teachers and activists were central to the development of a national education system in Cuba and influenced the trajectory of public school systems in the broader Americas.

Exploring a variety of topics including European colonialism, migration, citizenship, sex tourism, music, literature, and art, contributors demonstrate that alternate views of Haitian and Dominican history and identity have existed long before the present day. From a moving section on passport petitions that reveals the familial, friendship, and communal networks across Hispaniola in the nineteenth century to a discussion of the shared music traditions that unite the island today, this volume speaks of an island and people bound together in a myriad of ways.

Mayes seeks to discern whether contemporary Dominican identity is a product of the Trujillo regime--and, therefore, only a legacy of authoritarian rule--or is representative of a nationalism unique to an island divided into two countries long engaged with each other in ways that are sometimes cooperative and at other times conflicted. Her answers enrich and enliven an ongoing debate.