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No tenemos viandas! Cultural ideas of scarcity and need

Marisa Wilson explores how Cuban irony in everyday life helps to balance practical self-interest with revolutionary ideals.

In this article, I address aspects of food scarcity in Cuba that go beyond physiological determinants. It is argued that certain strategies and concepts which are elements of daily life in Cuba, such as the use of irony, offer a means of reconciling frustrations with food scarcities with overarching values embedded in revolutionary Cuba. Outsiders' critiques of the food crisis in Cuba during the Special Period in Time of Peace need to take into account cultural ideas of scarcity that are predicated on a specific cultural balance between self-interest and collective morality.

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Beyond nutrition

It is widely recognized that the fall of the Soviet bloc marked a drastic fall in the availability of affordable goods from state-owned stores, kiosks and markets in Cuba. Yet issues of scarcity in rural Cuba are more complicated than those prescribed by simple quantitative evaluations of per capita nutritional requirements. In what follows I use ethnographic data acquired through participant observation to address cultural aspects of scarcity in a municipality of rural Cuba. In particular, I highlight how common uses of irony and jokes are used to balance individual desires for goods with collective ideals embedded in this revolutionary society. Following theoretical approaches from anthropology such as Douglas's (1975) relation between jokes and social structure and Chris Gregory's (1997) notion of the co-existence of contradictory value systems, I aim to offer a broader perspective on food security in rural Cuba than that provided in nutritional statistics.

The anthropological method relies on insights drawn from a long period of ethnography (at least one year), during which the anthropologist familiarizes him or herself with the daily experiences and challenges of life in a chosen area. The aim of this intensive immersion into the culture is to begin to understand implicit rules of social life that allow for the reproduction of a particular community. Much of the time, cultural rules are revealed through awkward experiences, which highlight discrepancies between assumptions held by the anthropologist and the knowledge of insiders. For instance, it was only after several months living with Cubans that I understood that an outsider or 'tourist' like myself who gives gifts to Cubans should do so behind closed doors; open acts of generosity between 'tourist' and Cuban are often seen (by both officials and locals) as jineterismo, a mercenary relationship where the Cuban is identified as a hustler.

My fieldwork was carried out over a 15-month period in 'Tuta,' a rural municipality located about 40 kilometers outside of Havana city (as with the Cubans mentioned below, I have changed the name of the municipality to maintain anonymity). As in most other rural areas of Cuba, the economy of Tuta is primarily agricultural, specializing in sugar cane, citrus and tobacco, dairy, porcine and poultry farming. There is and always has been some subsistence farming on small plots, though since 1959 and especially in recent years small-scale production is geared towards the state provisioning system (the Acopio) as well as export and tourist markets. Indeed, according to some officials I interviewed, most of what is produced in Tuta is either destined for the latter two markets or sold at higher prices in agricultural markets in Havana city.

Despite the diversion of foodstuffs from Tuta to outside markets, according to the official 'line,' the Acopio and rations symbolize equal distribution over private material gain. In the ideal revolutionary society, all material items are distributed equally by the state to the people through rations, set prices for farmers, wages and work incentives, and the proportion individuals receive corresponds to their dedication to society as represented by his or her labor contribution. The way food is distributed in Cuban society thus still adheres to the communist rule: "to each according to their contribution, from each according to their ability." Labor is valued insofar as work and time given by individuals is reciprocated for social property provided by the state. Those who work for the revolution are often referred to as 'fighters' (luchadores). We shall see below that the idea of a collective 'fight' (lucha) is tied to wider values embedded in Cuban society that Tutanos continue to uphold.

As one of the many groups of people in the world who subsist with less than the minimum nutritional requirements defined by FAO (the Food and Agriculture Association of the United Nations), Tutanos cope with crises such as shortages on a periodic basis. This is due not only to the persistent U.S. embargo but also to yearly cycles such as the hurricane season. The early 1990s Special Period was abnormally challenging according to many Tutanos' descriptions. Prices for goods skyrocketed yet the average salary remained at 300 Cuban pesos per month (about £7). Some Tutanos recalled that lard or vegetable oil, an essential for Cuban cooking, cost 100 pesos per liter during this period (in 2007 a liter cost about 10 pesos). Another staple, rice, cost 45 pesos per pound (the 2007 price was 3.5 pesos per pound). Accordingly, talk of dietary deficiencies during these years was common during fieldwork: "people lacked calcium and lost their fingernails … their hands showed signs." And those who had lost too much weight were identified as one who "is eating [electric] cable".

At first glance, these accounts are consistent with findings from the Central Institute for Economic Planning of the United Nations Development Programme, reporting a decrease in daily calorie and protein intake by 78% and 64% respectively (quoted by Suárez Salazar 2000: 292). Longer-term studies, such as that conducted by FAO (FAO-STAT 2006) also indicate a higher percentage of 'undernourishment' during the early and mid-1990s than in other countries in the region - although it should also be pointed out that Cuba's overall health indicators have been much higher than others during the past few decades. Despite their value, the above statistics - and the local stories which seem to validate them - tend to reduce all food consumption to physiological criteria. Nutritional 'facts' presented in such studies are based on the assumption that estimates of daily per capita intake can be accurately assessed by averages, a quantitative method which completely disregards the prevailing situation of unequal access. Moreover, pre-defined categories such as calorie and protein intake leave no room for qualitative - and socio-cultural - accounts of scarcity and hunger.

Food scarcities in Cuba since the 1990s have led not only to individual deprivation but also to new kinds of social reproduction, as illustrated by the innovative ways Tutanos 'invented' new versions of desired items when the latter were hard to find or afford. For instance, most households I visited cooked rice - a Cuban staple - with twice as much water so that "it would grow", giving the impression that one had more food on his or her plate. Others made up for the lack of meat by "boil[ing] grapefruit peels, fry[ing] them and call[ing] them steak!" or by "cut[ting] up plantain peels, fr[ying] them and [eating] them as if they were chicharrones [fried pork skins, a favorite food for many Latin Americans]". One woman told me that during this time "some people were caught and arrested for selling what they claimed to be pork steaks prepared with flour, but were actually fried pieces of frazada de piso (rag used for mopping floors)!" As demonstrated by these examples, Cubans faced with present food shortages try to maintain 'normal' lives in the face of crisis.

Local conceptualizations of scarcity in Tuta, which near official norms in certain contexts and depart from them in others, structure how people deal with crisis on an everyday level. I thus intend to show how outsider interpretations of economic crisis are often at odds with insider views of scarcity, using the example of the double-nature of Cuban jokes. While outsiders may regard Cuban irony as a direct attack upon the revolution, I demonstrate that Cuban joking is really an effort to balance demoralizing realities with moral norms to continue the 'fight' of the Cuban revolution. Indeed, ideas of scarcity in Tuta are embedded in the revolutionary value system, which emphasizes collective asceticism over individual desires.

Food and food provisioning are probably the most talked about subjects in Tuta, besides - perhaps - health. When I arbitrarily asked Claudia, what she thought to be the three most important things in Cuba, she responded, with incremental emphasis: "1. food, 2. Food and 3. FOOD!" Laughing, she added that each corresponds to 'breakfast, lunch and dinner.' I shall later the return to Claudia's joke.

Though women are most often the cooks of the family, men, women and children alike must engage in the 'fight for provisions.' When greeting another on the street, it is common to hear the response: "Estoy en la lucha…de provisiones"(I'm [engaged] in the fight for provisions) or just "Estoy en la lucha" (I'm in the fight). Like other expressions in Cuban Spanish, these phrases have more than one signifier: they are both politically-neutral ways of expressing exasperation with daily difficulties in getting food and a means of showing solidarity with the imagined Cuban community in accordance with the political goal of 'fighting' for a utopian future. Because of this dual purpose of language, such common phrases cannot simply be viewed as means to disguise discontent. Like Cuban expressions which incorporate 'the fight,' irony in Cuban jokes serves as both an outlet for subversion (see Yang 1989:51) and as a way to reconcile the state's inability to secure the well-being of all, on the one hand, with enduring revolutionary values (e.g. 'the fight'), on the other.

During fieldwork, I was surprised to find that even people considered to be very allied to the revolution - jefes (managers) of state enterprises, for example - told jokes that seemed at first quite anti-revolutionary. Ricardo, a jefe of a state dairy farm and a general secretary of his communist party work nucleus bewildered me in such a way. When I asked him a simple question: "What was the biggest hurricane before Ivan?" (remembering the destruction this tempest caused which postponed my second visit to Cuba in 2004), he responded: "The hurricane of 1959! We lost all our meat, we lost all our crops, the electricity went out, and it hasn't been the same since!" At this, friends and family sitting on the veranda of his sister-in-law's home burst into laughter and I joined in, though slightly confused. The year marking the success of the revolution was referred to as a moment of destruction rather than its usual depiction by locals and in official contexts as the 'triumph.' Another time, whilst watching the title sequence of the daily TeleNoticia Cubana (TNC; Cuban Televised News), a former communist leader, Miguel, asked me whether I knew what TNC' meant. He did so with a twinkle in his eye. I told him the right answer and he contradicted me: "No! It does not mean TeleNoticia Cubana, it means No tenemos viandas [we have no root vegetables]!" As viandas are a mainstay in the Cuban diet, this joke seemed to be a direct attack on the state's distribution system.

Jokes such as Ricardo's are more complicated than they seem to outsiders; they are not homogenous acts of resistance against the power structure. Actually, Cuban irony is a way for Tutanos to identify with that very structure, a point which is, in itself, ironic. One attempt to break down two aspects of this particular style of wit was recently made by Tanuma (2007), an anthropologist who conducted ethnographic fieldwork in Havana in 2003-4. She writes of her meeting in Japan with US anthropologist Sidney Mintz, who told her a 'classic Cuban joke.' It is very likely that this is the full version of Claudia's humorous comment about the "three most important things in Cuba" and for this reason it will be the central example for our analysis. "What are the three successes of the Cuban Revolution? - medicine, education and athletics. What are the three failures of the Cuban Revolution? - breakfast, lunch and dinner!" According to Tanuma's account, though 'outsiders' may correlate this joke with an unmitigated disapproval of revolutionary values, insiders do not; indeed, Tanuma argues that such a connection may breed disapproval or moral qualms in the insider realm.

Tanuma's argument, which differentiates insider from outsider versions of Cuban humor, is intriguing. But to demonstrate why insider irony is not the same as outsider irony, it is of primary importance to show how Cuban jokes are not just straightforward displays of resistance which attack the state's failure to ameliorate food shortages. Rather than focusing on contrasting perspectives of insiders and outsiders as does Tanuma, I concentrate instead on another dualism that occurs exclusively within the insider arena of language, and which is related to cultural notions of scarcity within Tutano society and the need for people to find a balance between the given structure of society and their particular version of it: between, for example, collective morality and individual interests. The jokes given above, especially the 'three successes and three failures' joke, sit on the fulcrum of these two orders; different interpretations weigh one side down more than the other. In Tanuma's account, the outsider's perspective is weighted towards the individualistic side - personal needs and desires for food security - while for Cuban insiders the scale teeters towards the collectivist side - social needs and values. But jokes are more complicated than this. While both sides are important, the individualist side must carry more weight for the joke to be effective. This does not mean, however, that the collectivist side is thrust completely into the air. Douglas writes about jokes as "total social situations" which:

"brin[g] into relation disparate elements in such a way that one accepted pattern is challenged by the appearance of another which in some way was hidden in the first. … this joke pattern … needs two elements, the juxtaposition of a control against that which is controlled, the juxtaposition being such that the latter triumphs. … a successful subversion of one form by another completes or ends the joke, for it changes the balance of power. ... The joke merely affords the opportunity for realizing that an accepted pattern has no necessity. … It is frivolous in that it produces no real alternative, only an exhilarating sense of freedom from form in general. … it is an image of the leveling of hierarchy, the triumph of intimacy over formality, of unofficial values over official ones." (Douglas 1975: 96-98).

By inverting the dominant and subordinate forms, the 'successes and failures' joke works to empower Tutanos who engage in the daily 'fight' for provisions. The subordinate form is represented by the weaknesses of the revolution, all of which relate to food scarcity, while the dominant form is that which is considered revolutionary: exalting the successes of the revolution: medicine, education and athletics. In every speech I have ever heard by Castro and other leaders of the revolution, one or all of these successes are highlighted, often to great lengths. Rituals such as speeches on commemorative days work to continuously remind individuals in society not only of its dominant structure, but also of its primary values and morals, its reason for being. Douglas contrasts such rites with 'ritual pollution,' or direct attacks on the value system which cause "abomination … which contradic[t] the basic categories of experience and in so doing threate[n] both the order of reason and the order of society" (Ibid. 106; my emphasis). As Douglas asserts, 'ritual pollution' is not the same as joking; the latter is instead a:

"temporary suspension of the social structure, or rather … a little disturbance in which the particular structuring of society becomes less relevant than another. … the strength of its attack is entirely restricted by the consensus on which it depends for recognition (Ibid.; my emphasis).

A short diversion from the topic of Cuban irony is necessary to examine this 'consensus' in the present context: the cultural values embedded in revolutionary Cuba.

Tanuma's definition of counter-revolutionary as one who "value[s] individual wealth more than social justice" (Tanuma 2007: 53) is a useful starting point; the definition of revolutionary is simply its opposite. Social justice in Cuba is treated as a revolutionary process, a long fight against all self-interested exploitation, a persistent claim that "un futuro mejor es possible" (a better future is possible). Consider an excerpt from Castro's address of April 1961, which could have been made recently by any high official:

"… the future we are building for our people, cost us what it costs, whatever the deprivation, we will now pursue, the people know how, they have dignity! ... the workers cannot be scared off with deprivation, this revolution has occurred precisely because of all the deprivations that workers underwent, all the humiliation to which the poor people were subjected! … deprivation today will be plenty tomorrow! Let the sacrifice of today's happiness be with us tomorrow, when it bears fruit!" (Castro 1961)

The spirit of self-sacrifice is inseparable from what Cuban sociologist Luis Suárez Salazar, among others, refers to as the "heroismo cotidiano" (daily heroism; Suárez Salazar 2000: 292) of all Cubans engaged in the 'fight for provisions' and other daily difficulties. This value of 'resisting' difficult conditions is not only endorsed by Fidel and the Cuban government, but is also present at the local level; indeed, it is a primary element of Cuban identity. This is illustrated by the difference in quality between what foreigners are served for lunch and the typical fare expected by Cubans. During a period of research for the Agrarian University of Havana, I chose to eat a nearly tasteless peso pizza for lunch with fellow Cuban students rather than dine at the special cafeteria reserved exclusively for foreign students where higher-quality foods were served. Upon taking my first bite, I looked up and saw that nearly all the Cuban students and professors, who were standing in the long line to enter the standard Cuban cafeteria, were staring at me. When I asked why, a friend told me: "They are surprised to see a foreigner eating low-quality pizza when you could have had something better at the cafeteria for foreigners. … You really must be Cuban!"

From the very beginning of the revolution to the present, the official way to win the 'war of the people,' the battle against imperialism symbolized most demonstratively by the U.S. embargo, is to 'resist' and to 'fight.' As Castro has repeatedly said, "luchar por una utopía es, en parte construirla" (to fight for a utopia is, in part, to construct it; quoted by Suárez Salazar 2000: 363). Local idioms I heard on a daily basis are counterparts to Castro's optimism: "mañana sera mejor" (tomorrow will be better); "un mundo mejor es possible" (a better world is possible); "no hay mal que por bien no venga" (with bad things come good things). Working hard, not losing faith and being persistent are central revolutionary values for all Cuban people. Indeed, the term 'luchador/a' (fighter) is perhaps one of the best compliments one can give another person. I often heard this expression used when someone was praising another, not specifically for his or her revolutionary merits, rather for being a 'good' person overall.

However, while 'good' people are considered luchadores both on the street and inside the house, this does not mean that Cubans do not recognize how hard their life is. In fact, perhaps the most common expression I heard on a daily basis was "no es facil'" (it's not easy), as other anthropologists have also noted for the Cuban context (see, for example, Holgado Fernández 2000). Despite strong revolutionary propaganda, all are aware (even the government (1)) of the contradiction between a moral drive to 'resist' and frustrations with the way the system is working on the ground. But the articulation b between positive and negative aspects of the revolution is not based on a 'rational' maximization of individual interests, as economists would argue. It is cultural. While most Tutanos complain daily about present scarcities (or, perhaps more frequently during the 2005-7 period, the inability to afford items that are available), many of the same people use revolutionary discourse in their valuations of people who deal best with the situation. Just facing daily life, even if begrudgingly, is a way many Cubans identify themselves as 'fighters': grievances are not merely expressions of resistance to the political system.

I now return to Cuban irony and, specifically, to the joke about the 'successes and failures' of the Cuban revolution. We have seen that the dominant and subordinate forms must oppose each other, but the contradiction that results is not 'axiomatic' (Gregory 1997: 9): in other words, this is not a stark contrast between pro-revolutionary and anti-revolutionary nor collectivism and individualism. Most Tutanos who have dealt with scarcities during the revolution do so, by varying degrees, to continue working towards the goals of the revolution, even if their use of 'the fight' means bending legal rules.

Rather than an axiomatic contradiction then, the joke form in Douglas's sense is what Gregory refers to as a "commonplace contradiction". According to Gregory:

"[c]ommonplace contradiction does not imply incommensurability. To get the measure of the human values behind these contradictions one must move from an analysis of the dominant culture to the analysis of the power relations between valuers." (Gregory 1997: 11)

In every society there exists a particular balance between two or more values, a "coexistence of rival cognitions" (Ibid. 10-11). Two opposing values can and do exist at the same time for any one group of people and even for each individual within the group. It depends upon the context and power relations between person(s) whether one is emphasized over the other.

As in Britain or the United States, where the interests of the individual consumer often take the place of national interests, the social contradiction between self-interest and collectivity takes on a particular meaning in the Cuban context. On the one hand, many Tutanos, especially those who consider themselves revolutionaries (even if not considered as such in official circles) see few if any inconsistencies between the ultimate goals of the revolution and recurring difficulties in obtaining food. On the other, there is a growing uneasiness about contradictions evident in how food and other things are distributed. I have heard many Cubans talk of the Special Period as a time when "we went hungry" in the context of not receiving one's fair share from the state. Indeed, it seems that the ideal of the state as provider is partly losing its symbolic significance as Tutanos align hunger with a feeling of abandonment or neglect.

Cuban irony is a way to balance such practical challenges to the ideal revolutionary society with emotive ideas about the need to continue the 'fight' for national autonomy. In spite of variations in the ways individuals choose to provision for their households, social institutions - often created by locals themselves, such as humor and etiquette - provide moral continuity and uphold the normative revolutionary order. Official and local valuations co-exist and people constantly switch from one to another (Gregory 1997: 245). Between two ends of the spectrum - on one side, following the rules, on the other, breaking them - exists a grey area instituted by the people themselves. Cubans must be bricoleurs, creating new stuff out of given cultural material.

Marisa Wilson is a doctoral candidate at the Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology , University of Oxford, UK. Other research articles include 'Food as a Good vs Food as a Commodity: Contradictions between State and Market in Tuta, Cuba', Journal of the Anthropological Society of Oxford (JASO) New Edition 1, 2009.

Copyright

Copyright for this work is held jointly between Marisa Wilson and the International Journal of Cuban Studies under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative 3.0 Licence
IJCS Volume 2 Issue 1 June 2009

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