Struggles around freedom: Asian — Latin-American relations in the Coolie exportation to Cuba, 1850-1860

• In Event: Hybrid and Borderland Identities

Abstract

In 1853 Nicolas Tanco Armero, a new-Grenadian conservative, educated both in the United States and France, had a forced exile to Cuba. A change in the political regime in New Grenadian (1851), generated a deep resentment towards the new liberal government, due to their messianic attack on freedom, order and Christian civilization. In Havana, Nicolás built relationships with sugar cane refineries, whom sent him to Hong Kong in order to export indentured Chinese laborers to the Caribbean island, an English practice commonly used since the decade of the 40’s in the Asian meridional region. In the aftermath of the Anglo Chinese war (1839), the provinces of Canton, Xiamen, Macao, experienced dramatic socio-economic turmoil which advantageously favored the “coolies’ merchants” interests—among them Tanco was noteworthy — beneficed for the servitude offer and the high demand in European colonies and ex-colonies.
From the perspective of a transnational and “micro-history movement”, a plausible correlation is evident that connects New Grenadian, with Cuba and China in the mid-nineteenth century. The following will analyze the cultural foundations that support the production of a social representation. Both sociological and psychological aspects developed for Nicolás Tanco through his experiences, ultimately shaping and explaining the vision, perception and impression, generated through his contact with the “Asian races”. The Tanco-Chinese, (Tanco-chino in Spanish have a pejorative sense) as he was nicknamed in New Grenadian, embodied notions of freedom, extremely important in the context of abolitionism and free-trade, that complicated our social comprehension of Asiatic serfdom in Latin America

Author

• Hernando Cepeda, Assistant professor