A Small Place-Kincaid

Jamaica Kincaid’s A Small Place explores the controversies of tourism as a result of colonialism and occupations. Though her tone might come across as condescending, she is using this tone draw on the uncomfortable feeling that privilege has afforded those of the Western world. Kincaid was able to unpack how colonialism is not a scar of the past, but one that has effects on countries around the world, connecting the world on a dichotomy of power that privileges some and ignores other.

Her issue with tourism is to point out that one’s pleasure, one’s privilege and ability to travel is unfortunately another person’s pain. A key component of her critique of tourism as a privilege space is her connection of one’s ability to find relief in times of personal distress. By drawing this connection of the personal struggle to the institution illustrates how persons fit within their own political institution and others political institutions, creating spaces for identities to develop with international repercussions.

Though Kincaid’s emphasis is on tourism, she raises question about how tourism isn’t just the movement of bodies into other “cultures” as a stress relief to ones hectic life, but it the reinforcement and perpetuation of ideologies from the privileged. In this case, because of colonialism and the systems that differ but have similar foundations, Western ideology of humanity (and those excluded from these standards) is the standard and has infused this standard for humanity through its various systems of oppressions. It is important to recognize how these standards of humanity are infused not only in the systems that have terrorized the residents and the land in the past, but how this standard of humanity after generations of violence has created conflicting feelings within the residents as well as others outside and within the country exploiting the vulnerable land. At one point, Kincaid asks, “ Is the Antiqua I see before me, self-ruled, a worse place than what it was when it was dominated by the bad minded English and all the bad-minded things they brought with them? How did Antigua get to such a state that I would ask myself this?” (41). This quote explores those contradictions and controversies of how one’s identity is constantly forming and reshaping in an attempt to adapt to the constant shifting of power structures that ignore the histories how said identity was made, the confusions about how one sees one’s self and one’s community. It raises points of not only how outsiders see one, but how one perceive themselves in relation to others.

Privilege clouds one’s perspective, allowing they to be the center of the world. Taking a vacation to an exotic island might be relaxation for one, but it comes at an expense for others. Kincaid said that wanting to relieve personal stress is part of being human, but have the access and resources to do so is what separates and connects us all together. I loved this work because Kincaid is not afraid to call out privilege for what it is and what it does to everyone around the world.