This dissertation shows that during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) diverse Cubans organized to support the Spanish Second Republic, overcoming differences to coalesce around a movement they defined as antifascism. Hundreds of Cuban volunteers--more than from any other Latin American country--traveled to Spain to fight for the Republic in both the International Brigades and the regular Republican forces, to provide medical care, and to serve in other support roles; children, women, and men back home worked together to raise substantial monetary and material aid for Spanish children during the war; and longstanding groups on the island including black associations, Freemasons, anarchists, and the Communist Party leveraged organizational and publishing resources to raise awareness, garner support, fund, and otherwise assist the cause. The dissertation studies Cuban antifascist individuals, campaigns, organizations, and networks operating transnationally to help the Spanish Republic, contextualizing these efforts in Cuba's internal struggles of the 1930s. It argues that both transnational solidarity and domestic concerns defined Cuban antifascism. First, Cubans confronting crises of democracy at home and in Spain believed fascism threatened them directly. Citing examples in Ethiopia, China, Europe, and Latin America, Cuban antifascists--like many others--feared a worldwide menace posed by fascism's spread. Second, despite their recent anticolonial struggle against Spain, Cubans cared deeply about its fate for reasons of personal, familial, and cultural affinity. They interpreted the Republic as a "new" Spain representative of liberation and the Nationalists as seeking return to the "old" Spain of colonial oppression. Third, pro-Republican Cubans defined antifascism in Cuban terms. People of many different backgrounds and views united around a definition of antifascism closely related to their shared domestic political goals: freedom from strongman governance, independence from neocolonial control, and attainment of economic and social justice. Radical, moderate, and even largely nonpolitical individuals and groups in Cuba found in antifascism and support for the Spanish Republic a rallying cry with broad appeal that allowed them to strengthen solidarity at home and abroad. Cubans defined antifascism in both negative and positive terms, as a movement against fascism but also toward unity, democracy, sovereignty, and justice.

Over the past few decades, the Civil Rights Movement has undergone a profound re-examination that has helped to reconceptualize its origins, development, regional boundaries, leadership, protest strategies, and effects. The study of the black freedom struggle in Miami will contribute to this intellectual movement by exploring how immigration, ethnic difference, tourism, and the construction of race shaped the fight for the liberation of African Americans during the early twentieth century and fashioned its distinctive character following World War II. While an ever-increasing body of scholarship on civil rights activism in Florida has helped to debunk popular notions of Florida as an ostensibly atypical southern state, exposing its deeply racist character, the struggle for racial justice in South Florida still requires more attention. Although recent studies have enhanced our understanding of the virulent racism confronted by African Americans in a state that has traditionally enjoyed a reputation as being more moderate with regard to race than the rest of the South, only very few studies have focused on the less publicized, yet significant, battles that occurred in heterogeneous cities like Miami, which never comfortably fit within the paradigm of the Deep South experience as it is broadly understood. The city provides an important case study that sheds new light on unresolved questions regarding the "southernness" of Florida by looking at the impact of the convergence of cultural practices from the American South, the Caribbean, and Latin America on the nature and development of race relations during the first half of the twentieth century. While the development of the struggle for freedom illuminates many of Florida's Deep South traits, my research will also demonstrate that the city of Miami offers a counterpoint to the rest of the state because post-WWII meteoric tourist growth and rapid demographic change fostered a peculiar racial climate that was neither southern nor northern before Cuban migration gathered momentum. White civic elites were determined to secure the city's paradise image and burgeoning reputation as the "Gateway to the Americas," which ultimately mitigated the modern Civil Rights Movement.

Research Doctorate - Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / This thesis explores the ways in which Cuban identity is expressed, understood, maintained and recreated by Cuban migrants in Sydney and the wider Australian society. Initially, the analysis focuses on some of the most visible ethnic markers used by people outside the Cuban community to recreate Cubanness: politics, through the promotion of Cuba as a ‘socialist paradise’ by leftist Australian organizations and solidarity groups with Cuba; and music and dance, taking as an example the salsa boom in Sydney, and the advertising of Cuba as an exotic tourist destination in Australia. Throughout the work an argument is developed that the very different demographic configuration of Cubans in Australia has fostered a singular praxis of maintaining their identity. In doing so the study examines why politics does not play a primary role in the recreation of Cubanness in Australia, in contrast to numerically larger and higher profile Cuban settlements. Rather, Cubanness in Sydney has centred more in preserving eating habits, memories of Cuba as a place, listening and dancing to Cuban music, and other practices kept in the domestic space. This is achieved through the Cuban migrants’ strategic borrowings from other migrant communities, from food products to people and institutions, such as the Catholic Church being used to maintain the traditional worship of the Virgin of Charity. Finally, the study explores how migrants and outsiders understand the identity of Cubanness in Sydney, and considers the contribution of some major theories of ethnicity and identity to understanding this phenomenon.

Research Doctorate - Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / This thesis explores the ways in which Cuban identity is expressed, understood, maintained and recreated by Cuban migrants in Sydney and the wider Australian society. Initially, the analysis focuses on some of the most visible ethnic markers used by people outside the Cuban community to recreate Cubanness: politics, through the promotion of Cuba as a ‘socialist paradise’ by leftist Australian organizations and solidarity groups with Cuba; and music and dance, taking as an example the salsa boom in Sydney, and the advertising of Cuba as an exotic tourist destination in Australia. Throughout the work an argument is developed that the very different demographic configuration of Cubans in Australia has fostered a singular praxis of maintaining their identity. In doing so the study examines why politics does not play a primary role in the recreation of Cubanness in Australia, in contrast to numerically larger and higher profile Cuban settlements. Rather, Cubanness in Sydney has centred more in preserving eating habits, memories of Cuba as a place, listening and dancing to Cuban music, and other practices kept in the domestic space. This is achieved through the Cuban migrants’ strategic borrowings from other migrant communities, from food products to people and institutions, such as the Catholic Church being used to maintain the traditional worship of the Virgin of Charity. Finally, the study explores how migrants and outsiders understand the identity of Cubanness in Sydney, and considers the contribution of some major theories of ethnicity and identity to understanding this phenomenon.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Akron, 1984. / Bibliography: p. 307-330.

El objetivo de esta investigación es buscar y analizar las causas que han mantenido la discriminación racial dentro de Cuba después de 1959. En mi investigación pretendo examinar cómo la Revolución Cubana no eliminó la continuidad histórica de discriminación racial heredada del pasado. En mi análisis quiero verificar cómo el estereotipo y la imagen política del afrocubano que ha sido formada tras los cambios sociales ocurridos después del 1959, no es más que el resultado de una falacia política montada en nombre de la igualdad. Muchas de las políticas adoptadas por el estado se hicieron en pos de eliminar la mayoría de los vestigios y rasgos de la discriminación, pero la principal estrategia radicó en manipular la memoria histórica de los afrocubanos haciendo alusión al periodo esclavista para crear un compromiso partidista. En realidad, se camufló el verdadero objetivo de estas políticas. Si bien se borraron las leyes discriminatorias del sistema jurídico, no ocurrió de la misma manera del pensamiento de los individuos ya que muchas políticas adoptadas a través de los años, contribuyeron a su persistencia. Otro aspecto importante es hacer referencia a la emigración de la población blanca y el impacto económico de este proceso en la constitución racial de la población de la isla. La diferencia de los niveles de vida entre blancos y afrocubanos después de casi sesenta años arroja índices de desigualdad y ratifica que la discriminación se ha identificado bajo las nuevas demandas políticas. Paralelamente, la lucha por la igualdad racial en la revolución se convirtió en agenda alternativa al sistema segregacionista que caracterizaba a los Estados Unidos a finales en la década de los cincuenta, pero aunque esta competencia le trajo cambios positivos a los afrocubanos, al tomar un nuevo tipo de identidad, hizo diferencias. La nueva sociedad cubana ofrecía oportunidades a cambio de lealtad. En la actualidad, los cubanos de cualquier raza son caracterizados por su fidelidad para el gobierno, el color de la raza cubana es por afiliación política y no por la pigmentación de la piel. En mi tesis quiero demostrar que el mito existente detrás del igualitarismo no es más que una primitiva propaganda que perdura desde la época de la era de la Guerra Fría. Citando a autores como Fernando Ortiz, Manuel Moreno Fraginals, Carlos Mesa-Lago, Mark Sawyer, entre otros, analizaré los diferentes espacios sociales de los afrocubanos para demostrar que ellos siguen siendo el sector más quebrantado de la sociedad. El lector encontrará libros muy fundamentales en cuanto a la raza cubana, pero también encontrará citas de periódicos, páginas de la internet, y otros medios, que ayudan a incorporar un pensamiento inmediato y actual que se mueve en los medios de comunicación que demuestre que el racismo solo se puede combatir dentro de una sociedad civil en discusión y no por decretos, haciéndolo un asunto social, no cultural ni político.

This thesis examines the lives of Cuban refugees who entered Atlanta, Georgia between 1950 and 1980. It explores early trans-national ties between the two areas. and how Cuban refugees relied on this relationship when they left the island. It shows the process they went through from finding aid and shelter to becoming a strong active community. It explains the role religious institutions had in settling refugees and shows how the state had to work to become equipped to provide resources to a large influx of Spanish-speakers. Through this thesis one will learn of the beginnings of an important Latino community in Atlanta and how its formation prepared the city for larger immigrant groups that would arrive later.

This study investigated the body image constructions of Afro-Latinx Caribbean women who identify as Domincan, Puetro-Rican, and/or Cuban. Fifteen women participated in the research study aiming to investigate how race, gender, culture and the intersection of the three influences the conceptualization of body image for this specific population of women. A mixed methodology approach was implemented. The primary research method was analysis of qualitative data via CQR. Interviews were accompanied by four quantitative measures in order to further inform the qualitative data. The measures specifically investigated cultural values (Marianismo Belief Scale), racial identity (Multidimensional Model of Black Identity), acculturation (Stephenson Multigroup Acculturation Scale), and body image satisfaction (Stunkard Figure Rating Scale). The scales informed the data by providing information about the participant’s adherence to traditional cultural values and its intersection with gender (marianismo), the salience of their racial identity, the degree to acculturation, and ideal body image. Four domains emerged from the data, which shed light on the conceptualization and experience of body image for this group of women. The results have implications for the multicultural awareness for counselors working with Afro-Latinx Caribbean women, in addition to the psychological awareness of this group within the psychological body image research, and the many gaps which continue to need exploration.

This work deals with the immigration of Cubans to the Czech Republic, their life in the Czech Republic and especially their social and cultural adaptation to the Czech milieu. The aim is to find out the reasons why Cuban migrants leave their country of origin and why they come to the Czech Republic. It goes on to describe the way how the individual respondents integrate to the Czech milieu, what helps them to adapt and what is difficult for them. The subject of the research are the Cuban migrants in Prague who came to the Czech Republic (Czechoslovakia) before the 1989 and keep coming up to the present day.

Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of History, 2008. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 26-31).