Gabriela Clove And Cinnamon

Daniel Rowe
History 381
Professor Haskett
2/25/2010
Latin America’s Change After Independence
Throughout the course of the eighteenth century, Latin America was a place full of conflict and change. After the colonial era and following many of the countries independence movements, the continent as a whole was seen as a new frontier of opportunity and expansion. As we have seen in severalinstances through our course readings, many countries new found sovereignty meant a move towards progress and modernization. The novel assigned to us by Jorge Amado, Gabriela Clove and Cinnamon particularly captivates these ideas as well as explores complicated relationships and cultural Brazilian themes. This essay will explore the theme of progress shown through the novel that is indicative of ourhistorical study of this time period of Latin America, as well as to indentify how cultural elements such as gender and politics are good indicators of social progress. Gender will be analyzed from the novel as well as to contrast it to the book: Women through Women's Eyes: Latin American Women in Nineteenth-Century Travel Accounts by June Hahner.
Although the book is set in 1925, there can bemany similarities drawn to the patterns of change characterized in the late eighteenth century. The novel takes place in the Brazilian city of Ilheus, the cornerstone of progress in the region and a prime example of a city in the grasp a movement towards drastic technological and industrial change. This is established early on in the description of the city:
“New streets had been opened,automobiles brought in, mansions built, roads constructed, newspapers published, clubs organized – Ilhéus was transformed. But the ways men think and feel evolve more slowly. Thus it has always been in every society.” (Amado, 2)
But the book goes much further than to just establish the theme of a city in the midst of a modernization movement, and also delves into how the changes in politics and societybring conflicts in between the “old ways” being challenged by “new ways”. The “old ways” are known by this establish Latin American theme of machismo and by the notion that “might is right”. The old leaders that in the books case are the colonels enact this in the form of violence, which shows power. Their power hungry egos lead them to try and attain and maintain as much political power aspossible, while at the same time preserve their possession of women. These behaviors are exemplified by authority figures in Ilhéus and although it is believed to be changing the lack of civilized politics, show that despite its much publicized and undeniable progress, it is still plagued by its old and violent customs. There is a perfect in text example of how progress clashes with the old culturalvalues, when two of the Colonels comment on the fact that change is around the corner:
“That’s right Colonel. Everything you’ve said is right as far as it goes. But it’s right by the conditions and needs of an earlier time. We spend our lives working hard, and we don’t realize that time is going by and that things are changing”
Then, the more conservative Colonel who doesn’t realize it, contrastswith the statement:
“What does Ilhéus want beyond what we’re giving it? What more is there to do? To tell the truth I don’t see these new needs.”
Having introduced this idea of progress, it is now essential to understand how the individual characters either enact it or don’t. Although there is a large line up of diverse characters, to follow my argument I realized that I could categorize all ofthe characters into two groups: those that stay close to the “old ways” and those supporting change. Colonel Ramiro Bastos is the leader of the “old ways”, and the arrival of the progressively thinking Mundinho Falcâo, who is all about executing new ways of doing things. The sandbar represents the primary conflict against this progress literally and symbolically. It prevents the city from...