The dangers of metaphor

I attended a highly informative talk last week given by Lou Pérez, a University of North Carolina Professor of History and specialist on 20th century Cuba. In a week with so much activity revolving around Cuba, the United States and the hemisphere, he managed to skirt current events and instead delve into the historic relationship between these two countries, drawing extensively from his book published in August of 2008, Cuba in the American Imagination: Metaphor and Imperial Ethos.

His investigation illuminates an important aspect of U.S.-Cuba relations, namely the role of U.S. imperialism wrapped in the guise of moral responsibility. For instance, the language that prevailed in the halls of Congress and in U.S. daily newspapers leading up to 1898 (the year when the United States entered into the Spanish-American War in “defense” of Cuba) included words like “neighbor” and “on our doorstep.” The close proximity of the island inspired neighborhood metaphors, which later gave way to damsel in distress metaphors. What could Uncle Sam do but intervene on behalf of the woman pleading for help outside his door? Soon the gallant United States was rushing in to ward off brutish Spain.

From there, the imagery of Cuba and, by extension, the conception of the island in the American imagination, only spiraled deeper into fantasy. Once the United States had power over Cuba post-war, political cartoons began to portray Uncle Sam as father to an unruly child Cuba, bathing him of the dirt that caked his dark body, teaching him to ride a bike (but not yet allowing him to ride on his own), and otherwise implanting in American minds the idea that Cuba had to be taken care of and that it was a U.S. duty, as a moral and responsible neighbor and keeper, to give that care.

Although Pérez focuses on the end of the 19th century and then on the 20th, his reflections on metaphor are not inapplicable today. For years the United States has considered itself responsible for quarantining the “disease” that is the Cuban revolution. And today, Fidel and Raúl both loudly refuse to accept any “carrot-and-stick” approach to relations that the Obama administration might take.

These metaphors obscure the reality of the situation, just as they did at the turn of the 20th century. The conception of “disease” misses the point that the Cuban revolution has been a permanent fixture for 50 years, and that a “quarantine” has done nothing to eliminate it. The “carrot-and-stick” imagery ignores the reasonableness of reciprocity in improving a relationship that has been only hostile for years.

Policymakers and the attentive public beware.