VII. Identity: root or rhizome?

What unifies Caribbean culture is not easy to decipher. The diversity that shapes the Creole identity is often problematic. As the mangrove of the title suggests, (a mangrove is a bayou or a forest in a swamp) diversity seems to be a mess, a swamp where roots and branches show no beginning nor end. The mangrove is a very well chosen metaphor expressing the difficulty to disentangle the true Creole identity from the lies, the myths, the made-up past and the confusing present. It is also an interesting metaphor because it defines a new type of identity. Whereas identity is usually symbolized by a single root (like a carrot) which refers to one easily identified past as in the case of the European identity, the Caribbean identity relies on a web of roots (like those of a potato) that does not refer to one single culture inherited from the past, but refers instead to a multiplicity of cultures that the present still weaves together. A rhizome identity allows no single origin made up in a distant past but testifies of a new understanding of identity which allows for change in the present.

ARTICLE LINK:	Girvan, "Reinterpreting the Caribbean"
	Hall, "Negotiating Caribbean Identities"
	Garner, “Search for Identity”

Crossing the Mangrove is all about the rhizome identity. As the community of Rivière-au-Sel strives to understand Francis Sanchez's identity by trying to put the pieces of his past together, one realizes that Sanchez exists in spite of an uncertain past through the relationships he has woven with the community during his stay in Guadeloupe . On a larger scale, the Creole or Caribbean identity is not to be found in its past so much as in the relationships each Creole weaves in the present. Thanks to Condé's writing, the mangrove-like Caribbean identity becomes less confuse and, refusing to exist in the shadow of the root-identity that denies its existence, asserts itself as a rhizome-identity.

ACTIVITY LINK: Crossing the Mangrove (excerpt)