The indispensability of former West African people to the Caribbean culture

The indispensability of former West African people to the Caribbean culture PDF Author: Lena Groß
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3656652031
Category : Foreign Language Study
Languages : en
Pages : 19

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2014 in the subject Didactics for the subject English - Literature, Works, grade: 1,0, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, language: English, abstract: A central theme in Caribbean literature is the absence of regional or national identity (Povey 275). Also Edward Kamau Brathwaite, one of the major voices in the Caribbean literary canon, focuses on transcending and healing the fragmented culture of the dispossessed people, mainly the descendants of West African slaves, living in the Caribbean region. In his poetry, he reexamines the history of the black diaspora in search for cultural wholeness in present-day Caribbean life. Brathwaite’s aim thereby is to offer a corrective to these people’s problems of dispossession of history and of language. In his first major work The Arrivants, Brathwaite’s overall goal is to enact a trajectory from the slave experience in the Caribbean colonies to Africa and back again to the islands, and thereby explore the African roots as well as the contemporary situation of the African diaspora in the Caribbean. Thus, he is able to illustrate some important African values, considered to be long-lost, in today’s Caribbean society and moreover, he is able to portray the affiliation of these black people to the Caribbean culture. Accordingly, based on Edward Brathwaite’s poetry volume The Arrivants, the importance of West African people to the Caribbean culture and especially their imported African elements, such as language, dance, song, and ritual-artistic expressions, will be outlined in this paper to depict their strong influence in the Caribbean and to support their strong survival identities. Therefore, first of all, the social and cultural history as well as the languages of the Caribbean are described to help the reader better understand the contemporary historical background to which Brathwaite’s poetry refers. Subsequently, a brief overview of The Arrivants is given, to later on go into more detail by interpreting two of its poems, namely New World A-Coming and Caliban. In these poems, Brathwaite points out the brutal reality of historical deprivation in the New World and thus, the search of identity of African slaves for almost 300 years. But against this background, he later on emphasizes the desire for self-determination and the resistance of these black people, their newly developed African rituals and hence, their great influence on all aspects of Caribbean culture.

The indispensability of former West African people to the Caribbean culture

The indispensability of former West African people to the Caribbean culture PDF Author: Lena Groß
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3656652031
Category : Foreign Language Study
Languages : en
Pages : 19

Get Book Here

Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2014 in the subject Didactics for the subject English - Literature, Works, grade: 1,0, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, language: English, abstract: A central theme in Caribbean literature is the absence of regional or national identity (Povey 275). Also Edward Kamau Brathwaite, one of the major voices in the Caribbean literary canon, focuses on transcending and healing the fragmented culture of the dispossessed people, mainly the descendants of West African slaves, living in the Caribbean region. In his poetry, he reexamines the history of the black diaspora in search for cultural wholeness in present-day Caribbean life. Brathwaite’s aim thereby is to offer a corrective to these people’s problems of dispossession of history and of language. In his first major work The Arrivants, Brathwaite’s overall goal is to enact a trajectory from the slave experience in the Caribbean colonies to Africa and back again to the islands, and thereby explore the African roots as well as the contemporary situation of the African diaspora in the Caribbean. Thus, he is able to illustrate some important African values, considered to be long-lost, in today’s Caribbean society and moreover, he is able to portray the affiliation of these black people to the Caribbean culture. Accordingly, based on Edward Brathwaite’s poetry volume The Arrivants, the importance of West African people to the Caribbean culture and especially their imported African elements, such as language, dance, song, and ritual-artistic expressions, will be outlined in this paper to depict their strong influence in the Caribbean and to support their strong survival identities. Therefore, first of all, the social and cultural history as well as the languages of the Caribbean are described to help the reader better understand the contemporary historical background to which Brathwaite’s poetry refers. Subsequently, a brief overview of The Arrivants is given, to later on go into more detail by interpreting two of its poems, namely New World A-Coming and Caliban. In these poems, Brathwaite points out the brutal reality of historical deprivation in the New World and thus, the search of identity of African slaves for almost 300 years. But against this background, he later on emphasizes the desire for self-determination and the resistance of these black people, their newly developed African rituals and hence, their great influence on all aspects of Caribbean culture.

The First Black Slave Society

The First Black Slave Society PDF Author: Hilary Beckles
Publisher:
ISBN: 9789766405854
Category : Barbadians
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Book describes the brutal Black slave society and plantation system of Barbados and explains how this slave chattel model was perfected by the British and exported to Jamaica and South Carolina for profit. There is special emphasis on the role of the concept of white supremacy in shaping social structure and economic relations that allowed slavery to continue. The book concludes with information on how slavery was finally outlawed in Barbados, in spite of white resistance.

Central Africa in the Caribbean

Central Africa in the Caribbean PDF Author: Maureen Warner-Lewis
Publisher: University of the West Indies Press
ISBN: 9789766401184
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 436

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Book Description
A sweeping, multidisciplinary study that analyzes and identifies some of the main lineaments of the Central African cultural legacy in the Caribbean. This long-awaited study is based on more than three decades of research and analysis. Scholars will be fascinated with the transatlantic comparative data. The author identifies Central African cultural forms in those areas settled in Africa by the Koongo, Mbundu, and Ovimbunde. (The modern-day locations of these three ethnic groups are present-day Congo, Zaire and Angola.) The book illuminates Caribbean thought and practice by comparison with Central African worldview and custom. The work is based on extensive primary and secondary sources, oral interviews, letters and diaries, folktales, proverbs and songs. In its multidisciplinary approach and depth, it highlights the debate concerning the origin and transformation of cultural forms in the Caribbean against a larger background of African culture, economy, colonialism, slavery, emancipation and independence. With its Central African focus, the book is a pioneering perspective on Caribbean cultural forms. A noted linguist, the author uses her knowledge of the most functional languages

Anansi's Journey

Anansi's Journey PDF Author: Emily Zobel Marshall
Publisher: University of West Indies Press
ISBN: 9789766402617
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 215

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Book Description
The historic Hope lands located on the Liguanea Plain in the southeastern parish of St Andrew, Jamaica, and once the site of one of the island?s earliest sugar estates, has had a long history of human settlements dating back to approximately 600 CE, the era of the indigenous Tainos. It was not until 1655, however, with the English invasion and seizure of Jamaica from the Spanish, that the Hope landscape developed into a thriving rural agrarian settlement. Generous land grants were made to the invading officers and later to immigrants from Britain and North America and from other Caribbean islands. Major Richard Hope came in possession of over 2,600 acres in the Liguanea Plain. Major Hope, unlike many of his counterparts by the 1660s, managed to establish a small sugar plantation, which developed by the mid-1700s into one of the island?s largest, most productive and technologically advanced slave sugar estates. In the 1770s the estate became the property of the Duke of Chandos and his family until 1848, when the estate was dismantled. Over 600 acres were sold to the Kingston and Liguanea Water Works Company and the remaining 1,700 acres were leased to the owner of the adjoining Papine and Mona estates. Poor accounting and border surveillance enabled several persons to possess the land, which was later sanctioned by the Limitations of Actions Law. With the government?s acquisition of the entire property in 1909, the Hope estate underwent remarkable changes in the twentieth century. By 1960 the Hope landscape was radically transformed from a sugar estate worked by hundreds of enslaved black people to a premiere urban centre of commercial, residential and educational land use.

The Dutch Overseas Empire, 1600–1800

The Dutch Overseas Empire, 1600–1800 PDF Author: Pieter C. Emmer
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108428371
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 481

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Book Description
This pioneering history of the Dutch Empire provides a new comprehensive overview of Dutch colonial expansion from a comparative and global perspective. It also offers a fascinating window into the early modern societies of Asia, Africa and the Americas through their interactions.

Critical Perspectives on Caribbean Literature and Culture

Critical Perspectives on Caribbean Literature and Culture PDF Author: Dorsía Smith
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
ISBN: 1443827649
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
Critical Perspectives on Caribbean Literature and Culture is a collection of a dozen essays by Caribbean scholars living in the Caribbean and around the world. Each of the three sections of the book explores the Caribbean as a diasporic space through the lenses of literary and cultural systems. “Negotiating Borders: Women, Sexuality, and Identity” examines the creolized identities of Caribbean societies, gender roles of women, impact of sexual tourism, and censorship of Latino gays and lesbians. The essayists in this section note that much work still needs to be done in academia to give voice to repressed Caribbean populations. “Creating Spaces of Caribbean Artistic Expression: Multiple Representations” focuses on how music, identity, art, and language depict the diversity of the Caribbean experience. In this section, the essayists examine how the process of creation extends to new cultural expressions. “Deconstructing the Diaspora: Caribbean Writers as Political Activists” takes into account the tension between oppressor and oppressed, a pressing issue for many Caribbean authors, and focuses on the role of writers in reconstructing Caribbean culture, politics, and history. In pursuit of a more comprehensive West Indian view, this publication provides a novel perspective on Caribbean literary, cultural, and historical experience. The essays featured complement each other in their representation of the multiplicitous Caribbean region with all its claims and anxieties. They cover a wide range of writers and diverse cross-cultural encounters within the Caribbean region and reflect on issues such as Caribbean identity, migration, and artistic form of expression. This publication cuts across geographies, cultures, and disciplines, enriching Caribbean scholarship by recognizing the Caribbean’s tradition of resistance and courage.

Martha Brae's Two Histories

Martha Brae's Two Histories PDF Author: Jean Besson
Publisher: UNC Press Books
ISBN: 9780807854099
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 436

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Book Description
Based on historical research and more than thirty years of anthropological fieldwork, this wide-ranging study underlines the importance of Caribbean cultures for anthropology, which has generally marginalized Europe's oldest colonial sphere. Located at

Caliban's Reason

Caliban's Reason PDF Author: Paget Henry
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135958807
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description
Paget introduces the general reader to Afro-Caribbean philosophy in this ground-breaking work. Since Afro-Caribbean thought is inherently hybrid in nature, he traces the roots of this discourse in traditional African thought and in the Christian and Enlightenment traditions of Western Europe.

Culture and Identity in African and Caribbean Theatre

Culture and Identity in African and Caribbean Theatre PDF Author: Osita Okagbue
Publisher: Adonis & Abbey Publishers Ltd
ISBN: 1912234262
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 277

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Book Description
What connects Africa and the Caribbean is trans-Atlantic slavery which transported numerous sons and daughters of Africa to the plantations of the New World in the service of Western European capitalism. Because of this shared experience of trans-Atlantic slavery and European colonialism, issues of culture and identity are major concerns for African and Caribbean playwrights. Slavery and colonialism had involved systematic acts of cultural denigration, de-humanisation and loss of freedom, which left imprints on the collective psyches of the colonised Africans and enslaved peoples of African descent in the Caribbean. Both experiences brought intense cultural and psychic dislocations which still impact in various ways on the lives of Africans and peoples of African descent around the world. African and Caribbean playwrights try to help their peoples regain their dignities by affirming their cultures, histories and identities. The book focuses on the similarities and differences between Caribbean theatre and the theatre of sub-Saharan Africa, showing how identities and cultures are negotiated and affirmed in each case.

Atlantic Africa and the Spanish Caribbean, 1570-1640

Atlantic Africa and the Spanish Caribbean, 1570-1640 PDF Author: David Wheat
Publisher: UNC Press Books
ISBN: 1469623803
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 353

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Book Description
This work resituates the Spanish Caribbean as an extension of the Luso-African Atlantic world from the late sixteenth to the mid-seventeenth century, when the union of the Spanish and Portuguese crowns facilitated a surge in the transatlantic slave trade. After the catastrophic decline of Amerindian populations on the islands, two major African provenance zones, first Upper Guinea and then Angola, contributed forced migrant populations with distinct experiences to the Caribbean. They played a dynamic role in the social formation of early Spanish colonial society in the fortified port cities of Cartagena de Indias, Havana, Santo Domingo, and Panama City and their semirural hinterlands. David Wheat is the first scholar to establish this early phase of the "Africanization" of the Spanish Caribbean two centuries before the rise of large-scale sugar plantations. With African migrants and their descendants comprising demographic majorities in core areas of Spanish settlement, Luso-Africans, Afro-Iberians, Latinized Africans, and free people of color acted more as colonists or settlers than as plantation slaves. These ethnically mixed and economically diversified societies constituted a region of overlapping Iberian and African worlds, while they made possible Spain's colonization of the Caribbean.