Colonial Abandonment and Hurricane María: Puerto Rican Material Poetics as Survivance

Abstract

In the wake of Hurricane María, Puerto Ricans in the tropical archipelago and the diaspora engaged in various forms of community organizing to confront governmental and social abandonment. Building on long-term ethnographic research and poetic analysis focused on the work of Puerto Rican poet Ana Portnoy Brimmer, I analyze poets’ critical and creative material practices that confronted histories of colonialism and engaged in forms of survivance post María (Vizenor, 2008). I argue that survivance is poiesis – a creative engagement in and with the world.  Through writing and performing poems, Puerto Ricans contested state narratives about the effects of the hurricane, documented their material and diasporic suffering, and made their lives more livable through accessing necessities, such as food and water, building and reconnecting with community, and bearing witness to each other’s lived experiences. Puerto Rican life and experiences are always entangled with their environment and material world. Thus, for Puerto Ricans, survivance as poiesis is a continuous affirmation of life in the face of ongoing disasters and death through material poetic practices.