Old News: Caribbean Dispersion and Integration in Ana Lydia Vega’s Encancaranublado

Abstract

This article identifies links between journalistic intertextuality, stereotypes, and Caribbean integration in Encancaranublado y otros cuentos de naufragio (1982) by Ana Lydia Vega. In the anthology, Vega uses journalistic intertextuality, stereotypes, and other forms of crystallized language to establish a connection among the various Caribbean islands that is not typically represented in regional newspapers. This can be read as a commentary on the notion of imagined community (Anderson). Without aspiring to be a fiction of homogeneity, the anthology brings together a dispersed Caribbean region, which is, nevertheless, in the process of being integrated through a rewriting of the Caribbean confederation project.