A Small Place by Jamaica Kinkaid

Economy, Government, Corruption and oppression 

In Jamaica Kincaid’s A Small Place she describes Antigua as an oppressed island. The island is ruled by the prime minister who has a monopoly on the banks (who only give out loans for cars, which he sells) as evidenced by this quote: “You will be surprised, then, to see that most likely the person driving this brand-new car filled with the wrong gas lives in house that, in comparison, is far beneath the status of the car; and if you were to ask why you would be told that the banks are encouraged by the government to make loans available for cars, but loans for houses not so easily available; and if you ask again why, you will be told that the two main car dealer ships in Antigua are owned in part or outright by ministers in government.” (7). Also, educations, healthcare and sanitation are scarce as the government does not invest in these. As a tourist one would not internalise this, but people suffer and people have to deal with constant pressings and struggles which the government does not help with. For example, the government never invested in infrastructure or repairs, if something broke, it would probably be repairing indefinitely.

When comparing to Puerto Rico we can come close when we see how many public funds have been misused and in turn been stolen from the people. Recent corruption in the electric energy agency which bought low grade petroleum which in turn hurt the inhabitants by inhaling pollutants. We have been constantly oppressed with higher taxes and with legislatures that go against the citizens, in this regard we can relate.

Ignorance is bliss

For tourists in Antigua, everything seems to be resolved by assigning the word “quaint” or “different” to their surroundings. When the tourist experiences the sunny weather he doesn’t question if there is extreme draught in the island, he just keeps on going. If the people all drive nice cars, it probably means that the government helps them out. It talks about how life is easy for those who are not invested and how locals hate the tourists because they have the ability to distance themselves from their realities whereas they cannot. This quote exemplifies this thought: “An ugly thing, that is what you are when you become tourist, an ugly, empty thing, stupid thing, piece of rubbish pausing here and there to gaze at this and taste that, and it will never occur to you that the people who inhabit the place in which you have just paused cannot stand you, that behind their closed doors they laugh at your strangeness” (18) and also: “they envy your ability to turn their own banality and boredom into source of pleasure for yourself.”(19)

In Puerto Rico there is a similar situation with tourism as people who come to the island believe that everything is in a great state when they visit the touristy areas and are only advised to go to certain areas or parts of the island (presentable areas). But, they don’t bother to understand why a protest might be going on at the university or at a beach near their hotel. Controversy is not of their concern, only the time they spend on the island to relax themselves is of their concern.

Colonization

“And so everywhere they went they turned it into England; and every body they met they turned English. But no place could ever really be England, and nobody who did not look exactly like them would ever be English, so you can imagine the destruction of people and land that came from that.”(24)  Jamaica Kinkaid has a strong opinion on the English rule over Antigua. Their oppression towards the Antiguan people was of a horrible nature with slavery, racism, exploitation of riches and so on. “Let me just show you how you looked to us. You came. You

took things that were not yours, and you did not even, for appearances' sake, ask first. You could have said, "May have this, please?" and even though it would have been clear to everybody that a yes or no from us would have been of no consequence you might have looked so much better.” (35)

In Puerto rico the issue of colonization has been similar as when the US came we were exploited in the sugar cane fields, our families were drafted for war, medical experiments were made on our people (from which many died), our natural resources have been used as target practice (active mines still remain in vieques, which could explode and do even more damage to the ecosystem), and so on. Not withstanding, we can also see the theme of inferiority as such we are given the status of ELA, but we are not completely independent. This leads to ideologies that make the people believe that it’s impossible to live without our ties to the US, even with all the suffering and injustices that they have caused. A recent example of their lack of responsibility for the “territory” they obtained is with our current debt and not allowing us to restructure it to thrive.

Here are some pictures from my day in Antigua: