'Are they still people of Guadeloupe?' Departmentalization, migration, and family dynamics

This essay studies the tensions and contradictions of the change in status from colony to departement d'outre-mer, especially as it affected Caribbean migrants in the hexagon. Athough they became citizens in 1848 with the abolition of slavery, in 1946 they were also henceforth, in theory, domiens rather than colonial subjects. Were these migrants welcomed like the black Americans who travelled to Paris, treated as equal citizens or marginalized because of race? Was their relationship with the pays natal transformed? How did their children who were born in the hexagon define themselves? And how does literature represent the 'new' order? Despite the promises of equality, racism and discrimination persist. Gissle Pineau shows in L'Exil selon Julia how three generations of a Guadeloupean family experience the resulting 'citoyennete inachevee', thus exposing the gap between the theory of equality and actual practice.