Cubans in Guyana: Peripheral Economies Transact

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.13169/intejcubastud.11.1.0008
• Pages: 8-12
• Published date: 01 July 2019
• Date: 01 July 2019
• Author: Jeremy Jacob Peretz

InternatIonal Journal of Cuban StudIeS 11.1 Summer 2019

CUBANS IN GUYANA: PERIPHERAL

ECONOMIES TRANSACT

Jeremy Jacob Peretz1

University of California, Los Angeles, USA

Handwritten signs reading ‘Compra Ropa Aquí’ and ‘Hablamos Español’ are posted

in shop windows along Georgetown’s Regent Street, the main commercial thorough-

fare of Guyana’s capital city. Yet most Guyanese do not speak or read Spanish. Such

advertisements are not intended for Guyanese however, but to attract the attention of

the city’s main clothing shoppers, who happen to be Cuban nationals. Guyanese

people in and around Georgetown have become well aware – and generally apprecia-

tive of – the continuous influx of their Caribbean neighbours into their country and

its economies, with Cubans riding local minibuses, roaming streets, renting housing

and patronising eateries, bars and other establishments throughout the city.

Groups of Cubans toting overpacked luggage of all kinds are now an everyday –

all day – occurrence along Georgetown’s busy streets and road-side markets. Shops

geared towards Cuban consumers, with more than just Spanish-language signs,

have become increasingly common in Georgetown over the past decade and even

more so in the last few years. Some Cubans finding Guyana especially hospitable

have established their own shops catering to Cuban visitors and expatriates, or

more commonly, have been hired to staff Guyanese-owned shops specifically to

serve visiting Cubans who often do not find English, or Guyana’s Creolese lan-

guage, particularly conducive for their business transactions. Not all Cubans come

EDITORIAL

1 Jeremy Jacob Peretz is a Teaching Fellow and doctoral candidate in Culture and

Performance in the Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance at the University

of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). He is currently working on a dissertation project

exploring intersections of religious and racial politics in the Caribbean, with a focus

on Guyana. Jeremy is also a poet, and his critical and creative writing can be found

in African American Review, Anthropology and Humanism, Caribbean Quarterly,

Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology, Karib, Moko Magazine,

Obsidian, Postcolonial Text, Ufahamu, and elsewhere.