Recharting the Caribbean: Land, Law, and Citizenship in the British Virgin IslandsIf, as many cultural critics have asserted, the world is becoming more like the Caribbean, then the task of charting what we mean by "the Caribbean" is an urgent one. This careful study of the British Virgin Islands (BVI) calls attention to the ways in which ideas about nature and choice have come to justify a social order in which half the population is deemed not to belong and is denied legal rights. The BVI, one of Britain's few remaining colonial possessions, has become an important destination point for Caribbean migrants and a center for international financial services. Bill Maurer traces how the BVI came to be defined, legally and popularly, as a territorial entity, and how BVIslanders came to define themselves as a "people" sharing a "culture." He argues that law has been central to the construction of ethnic, racial, and cultural differences that create boundaries between peoples and places and that facilitate the exploitation of labor, the exclusion of people from the political process, and the globalization of capital. Recharting the Caribbean will be important reading for anthropologist, legal scholars, and historians of colonial discourse. Bill Maurer is Assistant Professor of Anthropology, University of California at Irvine. |
Contents
Making | 35 |
The Muting of Distinction and the Making | 67 |
Stereotypes and | 101 |
Copyright | |
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Anegada anthropologists Antigua argued belong Besson British Nationality Act British Virgin Islands BVI's BVIslanders Cadastral Survey Caribbean century chapter chief minister citizens citizenship claim constitute construction contribution culture Dependent Territories descent groups discourse disputes distinction Dominican Republic economic elected emigrated entity equality ethnic family land fee simple Gender genealogical grid gin Islands global Guyana Guyanese immigrants Harrigan and Varlack hierarchy idea identity immi Indies individual inequalities interests Jost Van Dyke jurisdictional space kinship labor law and order Leeward Islands Colony Legislative Council legislature liberal living ment modern nature nonbelonger O'Neal offshore financial Ordinance paternity Penn people's person political race racial Road Town Santo Domingo social society status stereotypes story tax haven Thomas tion tive Tortola Tortolians tourist U.S. Virgin Islands United Kingdom University Press Virgin Gorda Virgin Islands Party West Indian women