Island Environmentalism and the Arts: A Postgrad Course in San Juan, Puerto Rico

By Safina Center Fellow Priya Parrotta

Building in Viejo San Juan. ©Priya Parrotta

When people ask me where I grew up, I usually respond that I came of age in two places: Washington, DC and San Juan, Puerto Rico. Born into a family with immediate roots in India and Italy, I’ve spent most of my life in a circular migration between these two cities—very often nurturing idealistic dreams about what each could be.

In DC, a lurid political occupation is currently taking place. I, and countless others, desperately await the day when millions of people will take to the city’s streets, occupy Washington’s large and imperial boulevards, and fill these spaces with signs and songs. We await boycotts and massive acts of non-cooperation in numbers that cannot be repressed. We hope for the emergence of a deeper solidarity with one another and with the Earth—a solidarity that can counter not only the activities of the current, overgrown babies in office, but also the deeper dynamics which reinforce and justify their power. With bated breath, activists throughout the DC area wish, and work, for these changes to come.

In my other hometown, San Juan—a place no less affected by politics in Washington—a small group of students and I have taken to the streets in a different way.

For the past month, I have been teaching a module for graduate students in the University of Puerto Rico’s doctoral programme in Caribbean Studies, titled ‘Island Environmentalism and the Arts.’ It is part of a longer course called ‘Language and Power,’ which explores the ways in which language has been used to both cement and resist colonial dynamics in the Caribbean. While the longer course focuses upon spoken languages, my module focuses in particular upon the capacity of music and visual arts to confront environmental injustice. It celebrates the power we all have to creatively imagine more harmonious relationships between humans and more-than-humans on tropical islands.

Like many tropical islands around the world, Puerto Rico’s natural beauties and assets have, for centuries, been exploited and appropriated for commercial purposes. At the so-called ‘dawn of modernity,’ the island was looted by conquistadors who brought with them not only weapons of war and insatiable greed, but also an ideology of conquest that led to profound violence against both women and the natural world. Later, with the entrenchment of the plantation economy, land and labor were exploited to produce consumer commodities such as sugar for Europe’s colonial metropolises. And most recently, the tourist economy has produced a ‘gaze’ which regards tropical nature as something to be marketed and consumed, rather than honored.

These systems of environmental degradation persist, alongside soulful and creative practices of resistance which have emerged in the face of these challenges. ‘Island Environmentalism and the Arts’ sought to negotiate these two threads of environmental history (conquest and resistance), and come to a deeper, historically-informed understanding of how to be in a loving, reciprocal relationship with plants and nonhuman animals.

Every Saturday over the course of the past month, my students and I have met in different locations in San Juan. We would begin each three-hour session with a ‘walking tour’ of the area. This would be followed by at least two hours of discussion about how the presence, or absence, or appropriation of nature in each of these locations helps us better understand environmental politics in the Caribbean. We also discussed what it means to be a true environmental artist: to resist the commercial pressures which are all too often part of the creative arts industries, and instead create work that at every turn affirms the values of dialogue, peace and environmental wisdom.

The first week, we met in Viejo San Juan, the historic quarter of the city. A UNESCO World Heritage Site, Viejo San Juan is beloved for its artistic and cultural vibrancy, but is also one of San Juan’s most frequently visited tourist districts. Wandering the cobblestone streets, we observed the presence of tropical nature in art galleries and souvenir shops, neglected façades and interior courtyards, cafés and open-air markets. The presence of this (mostly curated) nature opened up a conversation about the differences between environmental art for commercial purposes, and environmental art for spiritual depth and social change.

The following week, we met in the Jardín Botanico (Botanical Garden), an urban forest which brims with biodiversity and offers a much-needed refuge from the noise and bustle of the surrounding city. Nourished by this space, we discussed the colonial history of tropical plants, and the connections between environmental stewardship and different forms of sovereignty. This then led to an effervescent conversation about what a global, cross-island movement for true environmental sustainability would consist of, and stand for. From embracing local, plant-based food systems, to reviving ancient systems of inter-island navigation, to looking beyond anthropocentric forms of patriotism, we drafted a list of possibilities, smiling and laughing along the way.

The third week, we explored Plaza las Américas, the largest mall in the Caribbean and the second largest in Latin America. In this space, which was both deeply familiar and deeply uncomfortable, we looked for the presence of tropical nature in advertising. We then discussed the ways in which the consumer economy, and consumer culture, have shaped mainstream assumptions about leisure, recreation, and a life well-lived. As ever, we considered the role of true creativity in articulating soulful and sustainable alternatives to these very problematic assumptions and dynamics.

The final week, we returned to Viejo San Juan. We explored the differences between the types of citizenship and political identity which are espoused by the world’s wealthy, and the sort of planetary consciousness which can be nurtured on the shores of tropical islands. We looked at the profoundly revolutionary implications of embracing and honoring island environments. We discussed the ways in which our assumptions about arts and culture inform the political realities in which we live. And we left with a clearer idea of what it means to be an island-based artist for environmental justice.

In the following weeks, the students will work independently on creative projects inspired by this module. It is my hope that, in some way, their projects can enter into the island’s public sphere. I hope, too, that their work can testify to the magic that is found in finding, and expressing, one’s true and sincere yearning(s) for harmony, reciprocity, and peace.