Taking root
Description
Edouard Glissant’s proposed theory of Relation addresses the complicated reality of the Caribbean that assimilation and other single-rooted ideas of identity simplify and ignore. The use of landscape in French Caribbean narrative supports the need to search for identity not in a single origin, but in these rhizomatic relations. This paper explores multiple ways in which landscape has informed French Caribbean identity and identities across the islands of Martinique, Haiti, and Guadeloupe. Further, in comparing the ways in which Césaire and Roumain establish ties between landscape and identity to Condé’s divergent representations of water, flora and fauna, this paper considers how the French Caribbean narrative reflects the need to shift from the focus on a single-rooted identity to supporting the coexistence of multiple identities.