Being Black in Cuba

13March2024

Last week in my African diaspora communications class we looked at select movies that dealt with the African diaspora rather fictional or nonfictional. I decided to get a temporary subscription to KweliTV to watch "Black and Cuba" written and produced by Dr. Robin J. Hayes. First I want to say that I was not familiar with KweliTV but now I want to promote that fact that they have so many cultured selections to choose from that I may make my subscription permanent. Learning about and exploring the African diaspora and Black revolution has opened my eyes to other media. I really enjoyed this low-budget documentary so I want to give my review and opinion in hopes you may explore KweliTV and the documentary "Black and Cuba."

Cuba takes pride in claiming that racism does not exist in their country. They claim to promote unity among people regardless of class or ethnic background. This documentary explores the land where racism is supposedly non-existent and finds that although racism, in itself, seems to not exist, racial inequality and profiling are still prominent with the Afro Cuban descendants.

Black and Cuba, is a documentary written, directed, and produced by Dr. Robin J. Hayes and Progressive Pupil. This documentary looks at the afterlife of the revolution in Cuba, specifically in Havana and Santiago de Cuba. The documentary was edited by Michelle Chang and cinematography was performed by Ashley Panzera.

My Views

This documentary follows a diverse group of Yale students, mainly African Americans that come together to go on an adventure to Cuba. At the beginning of the documentary, the viewer gets a sense that this group of students felt like they did not belong at this university. They show all the pictures of the prestigious past Yale graduates with pictures hanging on wall, and most of them were white past presidents or fortune 500 company CEOs.

The documentary starts with interviews by the students’ years post their journey, giving insight into how the idea of visiting Cuba became their reality. Included in this pre-story part of the documentary was also an interview with and commentary by Jonathan Holloway, Professor of African American Studies at Yale. He spoke of how the students bonded over these feeling of alienation in their whitewashed world at Yale, and formed a reading group to discuss books on the movement against racism throughout the African diaspora. It was because of the reading group that the students got the idea to take a field trip to Cuba in 2002. They wanted to see firsthand if the revolution was still alive and real and if Cuba was really racism free.

There was a lot of information given at the beginning of the movie so that the viewers could understand the full story of how difficult it was for them to get the funding to go to Cuba, and how difficult it was to go to Cuba being an American. Although the story was interesting, the technical lighting was not very good, and the video looked like it was made with a home camera.

Dr. Hayes was one of the travelers in the documentary. It was evident through many of their discussions that the group was driven to find a way to improve their own communities and find ways to fight the existing racial inequality that was alive and well in the United States. They were looking for answers in the place where racism was supposedly nonexistent. I believe the thesis of this film tries to answer the question of how the chosen few can take their own knowledge and make it available to everyone instead of leaving it only for the privileged.  

The documentary goes on to highlight certain facts about Yale itself. As mentioned earlier, many important people in our political arena came from Yale, even Clarence Thomas, just to name a few. Yale was founded in 1701 but did not admit their first African American student until 1850. It is history like this that keeps the viewers’ attention throughout the entire documentary and why I think it appeals to the audience that has given it great reviews. There are little known facts of history throughout the film. These students are relatable because they felt the need to develop their own support community, so they formed a reading group to discuss issues associated with the African diaspora. In this film, emphasis is heavily put upon the African diaspora, which was described as a group of people connected by Africa but dispersed from their homeland by means outside of their control.

This documentary explores the unfortunate truth that the US is the only country in the world that still enforces economic embargos and restrictions on Cuba. When the students first arrive in Cuba, the first thing they notice is that there are no US national food chains and no Billboards advertising US products in Cuba. However, there are billboards full of Cuban propaganda and Cuban cuisine.

Finally at this point of the documentary, there is footage of Cuba shown. The film presents pictures of real Cuban people, living everyday life. The cinematography improves when filming in Cuba. The video is clear, and the colors are vivid. The students were on a quest to find inspiration for the ideas they were reading about related to working to build black communities and racial equality. They went to Cuba hoping to find a link to their present from Cuba’s past.

While in Cuba, the students were able to film beautiful sites within Cuba, as well as the people of Cuba. They were able to have real interviews with the people that live there to get a true picture of everyday life as a Cuban. The largest slave import was in the Caribbean where over one million Africans were kidnapped and forced into slavery. Some Cuban slaves were able to escape and lived in maroon societies. The documentary takes you on a field trip to visit the site of the maroon society. The experience they had was relayed in such a way that even as a viewer you could feel the tenseness and spiritual nature of the site and understand what they were feeling as they talked about being unified with nature.

There were images of the Carnival Museum in Santiago de Cuba. This film will keep your interest because the longer you watch it, the more you want to know about the forbidden land. The film speaks about Imperialism and Socialism. The streets of Havana and everyday life in Santiago are seen through their eyes; from hip-hop performances and block parties to up close, personal, truthful encounters with Afro Cubans.

In this film, the students learn that although Cuba declared racism illegal after 1959 when Fidel Castro took over, their Afro Cuban tour guide and others they met during their stay, describe experiences of racial profiling, employment discrimination and police misconduct. However, even though that kind of ruined their preconception that Cuba was a racism free zone, they also saw the positive benefits of the socialist system where all Cubans have access to free and good healthcare, a quality public education, and jobs. This part of the socialist society was better than many of the urban communities in the democracy of the United States. The documentary speaks of unemployment being at a level of 2% and it focuses on the fact that most everyone is literate. As they move through the city and talk to multiple people, in summary it is felt that illiteracy is by choice. So, in contrast to the Afro Cubans that experienced racial profiling due to their dark skin, there were others that thought of themselves just as Cuban even though they were of African descent and from their perspective, racism did not exist. This contrast is talked about in detail within the documentary.

The film goes on to talk about how Cuban leaders would come to the United States and visit with our Black revolutionary leaders, such as Malcolm X and Fred Hampton. The film goes into detail about how Cuba has even given political asylum to many of our African American activists such as Robert F. Williams, and Assatta Shakur to name a few. This documentary even as footage of Fidel Castro and Ernesto Che’ Guevar and their work on the revolution. There are moments in the film where you can see this history and hear bits and pieces of interviews with them. All throughout the documentary, you will hear bits of information from the three narrators from the Harlem Chorus. They will give definitions of things and explain things that are seen to tie it back into the thesis of the students’ visit. The film talks about many of our leaders that embraced parts of Socialism because of what they knew and saw in Cuba.

The students soon realize that their preconceived ideas about Cuba having economic balance, was far from perfect. However, they could still see that revolution and change could be possible in their own communities. In this documentary, the travelers make connections between Cuban and American perspectives on human rights, race, and revolution. This documentary also sheds light on the positive part of Socialism and Communism. They also find African diaspora in the singing, dance, and food as they engage with the community.

My Concluding Thoughts

So, although the documentary appears to be a low budget film, it is packed with wonderful vital information to help the viewer to understand the inner workings of Cuba and the relationship with the United States. A person can tell it is a student film. Although I wish the pre-trip footage and history lesson were a little shorter and that they had spent more time filming in Cuba, it is still interesting and a movie I would recommend people to watch. Sometimes it was hard to follow at the beginning, but the narration does help tie it all together. The length of the film, approximately 1 hour and 23 minutes, is not too long and because of all the real footage included, even in the history lesson, it makes it an interesting watch. This film does show similarities between the Cuban experience and the African American experience. This film shows how our history intersects and overlaps.

Black and Cuba brings to light a very sensitive issue, but it’s an issue that we need to have more conversations about and that is the commonality we have with people in the Caribbean due to our linked ancestry because of the African diaspora. I think the film gave an accurate depiction of the contradictions in Cuba concerning race and showed how complex it can be. The film was not some romantic view of Cuba, it was a look at the reality of what Imperialism and Colonialism caused for a continent of people.