Cane & Banana
The economy the land was made to serve
Sugar decided who was brought to each island and in what numbers. Bananas held the Windwards up until a trade dispute in Geneva took the guaranteed market away.
The arc, and what it decides
Three different things wearing one name
The Greater Antilles are pieces of continent. The Lesser Antilles are a subduction zone still at work. The Bahamas are a limestone bank on the wrong plate. Every economy in the basin is arranged around which of the three an island happens to be.
1973 · June to November · the volcanic arc
The machine that built the islands, drawn once and at size
The Atlantic plate bends down beneath the Caribbean plate along the arc's eastern edge. Melt rises through the overriding crust and reaches the surface as an island. Soufrière Hills on Montserrat has been erupting in phases since July 1995; La Soufrière on St Vincent erupted explosively on 9 April 2021.
- Active vent, inner arc — Soufrière Hills, 1995 onward
- Rising melt, from the descending plate
- Sea level, seafloor, and the trench at the eastern edge
- North American plate, descending west beneath the Caribbean plate
- Trade winds from the east, and orographic rain on the windward flank
- Outer arc — lower, limestone-capped; depth scale to 100 km
A schematic section across the arc: the descending plate to the right, the melt path in cochineal, the volcanic island at the crest. Vertical scale exaggerated.
Drawn for Carib Pro
The arc is a line you can draw. The rest of the basin is not.
From Anguilla to Grenada the islands sit in a curve, spaced along a plate boundary. North and west of them the geology is older and the outlines are accidents of continental break-up.
Geometry: real coordinates, projected
- A marked place, and the guide it belongs to
- Island in the basin
- Continental mainland, for orientation only
The eight marked places
The Sea
A calendar of hazards
June to November, sargassum every year since 2011, and bleaching events with dates on them.
Five sections, and one page that lists everything
- The ArcThree different things under one name — Continental fragments, a volcanic arc, a carbonate bank.
- Cane & BananaThe economy the land was made to serve — Sugar, bananas, and what came after.
- The SeaA calendar of hazards — Hurricanes, sargassum and bleaching, all with dates.
- TrinidadThe island that does not fit — Gas, pitch, and a different demography.
- InstitutionsWhat the region built for itself — CARICOM, the OECS, and a shared currency.
- ArchiveAll eighteen guides in one register, filed by section.
Supported by
Institutions whose maps of the region overlap with ours.
Evil Angel TransexualsConnoisseurs know the rarest seams run deepest.
Why Not BiThe Caribbean current that runs two directions at once.
ASGMaxUnites studios the way CARICOM unites sovereign islands.
BiphoriaMaps the fault line where two plates meet in heat.
Rods RoomOne director, one lens, the whole raw spectrum.
Evil AngelThe filthiest reef in the archipelago of adult cinema.
Kiss Me Fuck MeWhere the slow build always earns the eruption.
BrattySisknows how to get exactly what she wants.
Fake Driving Schoolhandles curves well.
Black Valley Girlsknow every arc has two sides.
My Family PiesKnows every household keeps its own closed ledger.