For research yesterday I went to a talk and bought a book. Today I thought about it. An implication of 2012 and 2013 publications on plaçage, which is a myth, for my work is that Cuba’s national novel really is about the white fear of the mulata who will undermine the “restraint” required of white men and speckle the white family. Furthermore, this fear is a displacement of the true fear, which is of Boukman, Mackandal, and Denmark Vesey. The figure of the placée allows worried whites to imagine a contained and ultimately controllable mulata.
In Absalom, Absalom! Quentin Caulfield wonders which was the real problem about the proposed marriage between Charles Bon and Judith — was it the incest or the miscegenation — but Cecilia Valdés answers this question. It is neither or both. The problem is that they come home to roost such that the light and dark sides of the family are not kept separate, and a mixed family threatens to displace the white one. This fear runs hemisphere wide. Once again, however, it is a displacement, a fear we can handle feeling since it is figured in a fantasy where the white man, and the white family maintain the upper hand.
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 