Puerto Rican diaspora told from the margins: art, migration, and queer resistance between the Caribbean and the United States.

In this revelatory work, Lawrence La Fountain-Stokes examines how Puerto Rican queer artists have represented their migratory experiences and the multiple forms of discrimination they have faced both on the island and in the diaspora. From New York to Philadelphia, from Chicago to San Francisco, their stories of struggle and artistic expression illuminate rarely explored aspects of Caribbean migration.

Through analysis of texts, performances, and visual works, the author traces a path that begins in 1960s Puerto Rico with Luis Rafael Sánchez, moves through the New York of Manuel Ramos Otero in the 1970s and 1980s, continues to Philadelphia and New Jersey in the 1980s and 1990s with Luz María Umpierre and Frances Negrón-Muntaner, and reaches Chicago and San Francisco through figures such as Rose Troche and Erika López. The book culminates in a powerful reflection on the performance work of Arthur Avilés and Elizabeth Marrero in today’s Bronx.

La Fountain-Stokes not only documents this history; he offers a radical vision of Puerto Rican migration that places sexuality at the center of the analysis. His study reveals how gender, generation, and historical context shape the way queer identity is lived both on and off the island.

This is an essential book for those seeking to understand how culture, the body, and desire intertwine in the Puerto Rican migratory experience and how art has been, and continues to be, a vital tool for resistance and affirmation.

Año: 2009 | Páginas: 272

University of Minnesota Press