Abstract
Traveling Heavy is a unique book to consider for the sociology classroom. Part memoir, part ethnography, Ruth Behar takes readers on a journey that spans from Michigan to Florida, to Cuba, Spain, Mexico, and Poland. She touches on issues of family, genealogy, identity, and research, and she provides an intimate portrayal of her complicated, diasporic identity as an Ashkenzi Sephardi Cuban American. Delightful and personal photography appears throughout, spanning generations and geographies and providing readers occasional visual treats to supplement the text. The book consists of three parts, with 16 chapters total. Each chapter tells a different story, often in a different location, which at first glance makes the book seem to lack focus. Yet throughout, we see Behar’s search for place and identity. As she states, Behar is, indeed, an “anthropologist who specializes in homesickness” (p. 8), and in this book, immigrant meets traveler as she explores her identity and her world. The result is a stunning memoir of a Jewish Cuban immigrant scholar whose lens of the world tells the reader as much about the author as the places she inhabits.
The first section, “Family,” consists of nine chapters that provide a glimpse into Behar’s immediate and extended family relations. We ride along with Behar as she is forced from Cuba as a child, learns English, and navigates romance and identity as an immigrant teenager. We learn about the Sephardi side of her family, the tensions that arise from the disputed ownership of a cherished family heirloom, and the grief she receives from her family when she publishes an article about this family tension. Her longest chapter in this section, which feels slightly out of place from the general themes in the book, discusses her relationship with her son, focusing on a leg injury that he incurred as a high schooler and her own pain in watching him suffer. In the last two chapters, we get a small glimpse into her relationship with her parents and how culture and education complicate communication (which may be a good chapter to assign to first-generation undergraduate and graduate students).
Moving away from family relationships, Behar uses the second section to bring readers on her worldwide travels, for research and again a search for identity. It is in this section that we follow Behar as a young anthropologist in Spain and then in Mexico, exploring what it means to be an ethnographer who depends on the kindness of strangers. She grows as a scholar and as a woman in these explorations, finding her voice in her writing and getting her first taste of motherhood. We also see Behar grasp for her diasporic identity. She brings readers to the “First World Summit of Behars,” a quirky exploration of the pull of genealogy that unites members of the Sephardic diaspora. She ends with this section in Poland, where she unearths roots and a homeland she had not previously claimed.
In my view, Behar’s writing shines most in the third section, “Cuban Goodbyes,” which is an exploration of her home country. We see a longing for this imperfect homeland, with Behar grappling as an adult with her sense of belonging to and isolation from this island. The characters in these chapters are dynamic and enthralling: the young Danayda embarks on her own travels—a search for freedom as another Cuban Jew searching for a homeland in Israel. Behar’s lifelong friend, Cristy, anchors Behar to the island, praying always for her safe return. Behar closes the book with one of her most intimate reflections: she watches herself “traveling heavy” as she returns to Cuba throughout the years, bringing heavier luggage and heavier longing. She desires a place of her own in Cuba—which she cannot have as a technical foreigner. And so, she remains a perpetual immigrant, returning home to Michigan where she will, in comfort, dream and write about Cuba.
As a sociological text, this book is versatile. The most obvious use is in a class on immigration or diaspora studies. Undergraduate students would benefit from Behar’s reflections on her own sense of belonging and place, which personalizes the immigrant experience. While Behar’s reflections are particularly focused on Cuba and the Jewish diaspora, any class talking broadly about diasporic issues could benefit from her reflections. For example, Menjívar (2002) discusses how ethnicity, class, and national policies intersect in the lives of 1.5-generation Guatemalan immigrants to expand and block transnational ties to their homeland; Behar’s book provides an intimate reflection on the same sociological concepts in a different country context.
Aside from discussions on transnationalism, I am excited about the possibilities of using this text in a qualitative research methods course, as Behar talks frankly and eloquently about her life as an ethnographer. Although I am sure that she never intended for this book to be used as such, the insight she provides is subtle yet thought-provoking and could provide fascinating fodder for discussions on an academic career and the research process. As a resource for future academics navigating their institutions and vocation, Behar gives readers a taste of the stages of an anthropologist’s career, providing glimpses throughout of what it means to be an academic and an ethnographer. Readers see how family and personal issues can conflict and converge with this unique profession. In regard to research itself, Behar inadvertently provides keen insight into what effective ethnography is, reflecting on a wide variety of issues that correspond closely to discussions within graduate-level methods courses. For example, the chapter “The Day I Cried at Starbucks on Lincoln Road” discusses the consequences of using personal stories in her research; this may enhance conversation on research ethics and emotions. Her early attempts in ethnography and even her reflections on her evolving field note style (“From Those Who Don’t Forget You”) could supplement Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw’s (2001) Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes. Behar leads by example in creating rich characters in her writing, which could be used in a larger debate about social scientific writing and creativity. Even her ability to access field sites and people, and her decisions to study specific places, could enrich conversations discussed in Analyzing Social Settings (Lofland et al. 2006:10) about starting research “where you are” on the basis of “intellectual curiosity” and “access to settings and people.” Although this book could be easily read by undergraduate students, I believe that graduate students in particular—especially those who are embarking on international research—may find this an invaluable supplement as a reflection of the research process. Such students would surely find Behar’s text a literary response to common methodological questions.
Behar’s writing is certainly not traditional material for a sociological course, but I believe it could be creatively and powerfully used in many ways. Behar has masterfully brought sociological ideas into a text that is not often seen in the sociological classroom. I encourage instructors to think creatively about integrating selections from this text into sociology courses.