| Abstract: | Throughout its history as a nation, Panama has emphasised its Spanish roots. Having become a postcolonial state, Panama now exploits its multiculturalism for the purpose of attracting tourists. In this context, Afro-Antilleans in the Archipelago of Bocas del Toro – historically marginalised and considered temporary migrants – are developing gendered and racialised identities for tourist consumption, in response to the state's tourism promotion and in pursuit of a complex cultural politics. Tourism provides an occasion for Afro-Antilleans to reposition themselves within the Panamanian nation, vis-à-vis the state and other ethnic groups. ‘Panamanian’ Afro-Antillean identities are also transnational, African and Caribbean; these constructions of difference in the touristic context are inevitably contradictory, at once national and diasporic. This paper explores these complexities and their complex origins: nationalism, regional and trans-Atlantic migration, and tourism. It concludes that so-called globalisation, in this setting, results in a proliferation of conflicting differences rather than in homogenisation. |
