Discussing
the significance of Esteban Morales's Race in Cuba: Essays on the Revolution
and Racial Inequality
7 pm,
Friday, May 17th, 2013
A Different Booklist
746 Bathurst Street
A Different Booklist
746 Bathurst Street
Keith Ellis
(Professor Emeritus, York University, renowned Cuba specialist and among many
other works author of the most complete English translation of the poems of
José Martí) & Isaac Saney (scholar on Cuba and Black Canadian history
and currently working on the book "From Soweto to Cuito Cuanavale: Cuba,
the War in Angola & Southern African Liberation') will discuss the
significance of Race in Cuba: Essays on the Revolution and Racial Inequality by
Esteban Morales Domínguez
Esteban
Morales is one of Cuba’s most prominent Afro-Cuban intellectuals and its
leading authority on the race question. Available for the first time in
English, the essays collected here describe the problem of racial inequality in
Cuba, provide evidence of its existence, constructively criticize efforts by
the Cuban political leadership to end discrimination, and point to a possible
way forward. Morales surveys the major advancements in race relations that
occurred as a result of the revolution, but does not ignore continuing signs of
inequality and discrimination. Instead, he argues that the revolution must be
an ongoing process and that to truly transform society it must continue to
confront the question of race in Cuba.
Cuba is now
engaged in broad and profound debate on race. Ellis & Saney will address
why Cuba has exercised such a profound hold and influence on the worldwide
Black struggle for equality, freedom and self-determination. Examining the more
than 54-year history of the Cuba Revolution (encompassing its successes and setbacks,
twists and turns), They will discuss the meaning and relevance of Cuba
for present-day struggles and imaginings of a world centred on social justice,
human dignity and genuine emancipation.
 |
| Esteban Morales Domínguez, AfroCuban intellectual |
Esteban Morales Domínguez (born in Matanzas, Cuba, 1942) has been an active participant in the Cuban revolutionary project for the past fifty years and is one of Cuba’s most prominent Afro-Cuban intellectuals. He is a member of the Cuban Academy of Sciences, has held numerous academic posts, and has been awarded three times by both the Cuban Academy of Sciences and the Ministry of Higher Education. He is the principal or co-author of fifteen books and has published more than a hundred theoretical articles; his 2007 book, Desafios de la problemáticas racial en Cuba (Challenges of the Racial Question in Cuba) was the first book-length academic publication on this subject by a scholar based in Cuba since the 1959 revolution.The revolutionaries, Morales understood, sought to establish a more just and egalitarian society. But Morales, an Afro-Cuban, knew that the complicated question of race could not be ignored, or simply willed away in a post-revolutionary context. Today, he is one of Cuba’s most prominent Afro-Cuban intellectuals and its leading authority on the race question.
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