Harpelle focuses on Caribbean migrants and their adaptation to life in a Hispanic society, particularly in Limón, where cultures and economies often clashed. Dealing with such issues as Garveyism, Afro-Christian religious beliefs, and class divisions within the West Indian community, The West Indians of Costa Rica sheds light on a community that has been ignored by most historians and on events that define the parameters of the modern Afro-Costa Rican identity, revealing the complexity of a community in transition. Harpelle shows that the men and women who ventured to Costa Rica in search of opportunities in the banana industry arrived as West Indian sojourners but became Afro-Costa Ricans. The West Indians of Costa Rica is a story about choices: who made them, when, how, and what the consequences were.

Ronald N. Harpelle is a historian and filmmaker. He is the author of The West Indians of Costa Rica and has written extensively about the West Indian diaspora in Central America. He is the co-author, with Bruce Muirhead, of IDRC: 40 Years of Ideas, Innovation, and Impact (WLU Press, forthcoming fall 2010). Harpelle and Muirhead's research on IDRC appears in Citoyens du Monde/Citizens of the World, a six-part educational documentary series on Canada's role in International Development. Ron Harpelle is also the director of In Security, a documentary film about barbed wire and boundaries and the co-director of Banana Split, a documentary about Canada’s favourite fruit.

Bruce Muirhead is a professor in the Department of History at the University of Waterloo and the associate dean, Graduate Studies and Research. He is also a senior fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI). He has written extensively on post?Second World War Canadian commercial, economic, and political history.

Ronald N. Harpelle's profile page

"A major contribution. Harpelle presents a clear narrative of the development of the region as an extension of the Afro-Antillean British Caribbean. His research and presentation of the important Limon following of Garveyism and the UNIA, a topic never developed before now, is one of the book's strongest points." Steven Palmer, University of Iowa
"A significant contribution to scholarship. In the most complete investigation available to date, Harpelle considerably furthers our understanding of the history of the West Indian community in Costa Rica." James Handy, Department of History, University of Saskatchewan

"In the most complete investigation available to date, Harpelle considerably furthers our understanding of the history of the West Indian community in Costa Rica." James Handy, Department of History, University of Saskatchewan "A major contribution. Harpelle presents a clear narrative of the development of the region as an extension of the Afro-Antillean British Caribbean. His research and presentation of the important Limon following of Garveyism and the UNIA, a topic never developed before now, is one of the book's strongest points." Steven Palmer, University of Iowa

"A major contribution. Harpelle presents a clear narrative of the development of the region as an extension of the Afro-Antillean British Caribbean. His research and presentation of the important Limon following of Garveyism and the UNIA, a topic never developed before now, is one of the book's strongest points." Steven Palmer, University of Iowa "A significant contribution to scholarship. In the most complete investigation available to date, Harpelle considerably furthers our understanding of the history of the West Indian community in Costa Rica." James Handy, Department of History, University of Saskatchewan