In the wake of the 1959 Cuban
Revolution, a key state ideology developed: racism was a systemic
cultural issue that ceased to exist after the Revolution, and any
racism that did persist was a result of contained cases of individual
prejudice perpetuated by US influence. Even after the state
officially pronounced the end of racism within its borders, social
inequalities tied to racism, sexism, and homophobia endured, and,
during the economic liberalization of the 1990s, widespread economic
disparities began to reemerge.
Cuban
Underground Hip Hop
focuses on a group of self-described antiracist, revolutionary youth
who initiated a social movement (1996–2006) to educate and fight
against these inequalities through the use of arts-based political
activism intended to spur debate and enact social change. Their
“revolution” was manifest in altering individual and collective
consciousness by critiquing nearly all aspects of social and economic
life tied to colonial legacies. Using over a decade of research and
interviews with those directly involved, Tanya L. Saunders traces the
history of the movement from its inception and the national and
international debates that it spawned to the exodus of these
activists/artists from Cuba and the creative vacuum they left behind.
Shedding light on identity politics, race, sexuality, and gender in
Cuba and the Americas, Cuban Underground Hip Hop is a valuable case
study of a social movement that is a part of Cuba’s longer
historical process of decolonization.