Jana K. Lipman. 2009. Guantanamo: A Working-Class History Between Empire and Revolution

Jana K. Lipman. 2009. Guantanamo: A Working-Class History between Empire and Revolution. Berkeley: University of California Press. 325 pp. ISBN 978-0-520-25540-1. The citizens of the city of Guantanamo must deeply resent the fact that the only way most people outside Cuba have ever heard the name of their home-town is through the U.S. prison camp on the base in the bay which bears the same name. By taking an approach that looks at the history of the Cubans who have worked on that base, this book takes us deep into the history of the Eastern Cuba, an area that has been sadly neglected, even by historians on the island and thereby gives us a much more rounded idea of Guantanamo. It is also refreshing to see a book which treats social class as the principle division in society and clearly places other divisions and oppressions in the context of a hierarchical class society.