Islands at the Crossroads: Migration, Seafaring, and Interaction in the Caribbean
A long sequence of social, cultural, and political processes characterizes an ever-dynamic Caribbean history. The Caribbean Basin is home to numerous linguistic and cultural traditions and fluid interactions that often map imperfectly onto former colonial and national traditions. Although much of this contact occurred within the confines of local cultural communities, regions, or islands, they nevertheless also include exchanges between islands, and in some cases, with the surrounding continents. recent research in the pragmatics of seafaring and trade suggests that in many cases long-distance intercultural interactions are crucial elements in shaping the social and cultural dynamics of the local populations.The contributors to "Islands at the Crossroads" include scholars from the Caribbean, the United States, and Europe who look beyond cultural boundaries and colonial frontiers to explore the complex and layered ways in which both distant and more intimate sociocultural, political, and economic interactions have shaped Caribbean societies from seven thousand years ago to recent times.ContributorsDouglas V. Armstrong / Mary Jane Berman / Arie Boomert / Alistair J. Bright / Richard T. Callaghan / L. Antonio Curet / Mark W. Hauser / Corinne L. Hofman / Menno L. P. Hoogland / Kenneth G. Kelly / Sebastiaan Knippenberg / Ingrid Newquist / Isabel C. Rivera-Collazo / Reniel Rodriquez Ramos / Alice V. M. Samson / Peter E. Siegel / Christian Williamson"
Microsatellite based analysis of the genetic structure and diversity of Capsicum chinense in the Neotropics
Capsicum chinense Jacq., one of the five domesticated species of pepper grown in the New World, is a major contributor to both local and international markets and the economy of the Caribbean islands. The planning and implementation of germplasm conservation and breeding programs for the sustainable use of C. chinense genetic resources are hampered by the poor understanding of the genetic structure and diversity of C. chinense in the region. In the present study, the genetic structure, diversity and relatedness of C. chinense germplasm collections within the Caribbean basin and South America were assessed using nuclear microsatellite markers. C. chinense accessions (102) representing seven geographical regions were genotyped using nine polymorphic nuclear microsatellite markers along with 16 accessions representing four other species of Capsicum. The results revealed that the highest genetic diversity (He = 0.58) was found in the Amazon region supporting the postulated center of diversity of C. chinense as the Amazon basin. The cluster analysis resulted in two distinct genetic clusters corresponding to Upper Amazon and Lower Amazon regions, suggesting two independent domestication events or two putative centers of diversity in these regions respectively. The cluster analysis further revealed that populations in Central America and the Caribbean may have been primarily derived from progenitors from Upper Amazon region and later diverged through geographical isolation. Conservation and germplasm collection programs should therefore target these genetically distinct clusters and satellite populations, towards supporting breeding programs to harness heterosis.
Yun Ch’i-ho’s Alienation by Way of Inclusion: A Korean International Student and Christian Reform in the “New” South, 1888–1893
This article explores Yun Ch’i-ho’s studies and social life at Vanderbilt University and Emory College between 1888 and 1893, and the expectations surrounding white Methodists’ investment in his mission to bring Christian and national reform to Korea. Yun’s diary entries document the tensions that existed between late nineteenth-century articulations of white supremacy and, conversely, missionaries’ idealized framing of Christianity as a universally accessible means for uplift, which any race or nation could pursue equally. Yun offers a unique perspective on the era’s global politics of racial identification and on what the alliances and institutional relationships that missionary work necessitated meant personally.