1. Slavery and Creolization, Education and Indigenous Cultures
The Caribbean Area:
Slavery and Creolization, Education and Indigenous Cultures

2. Caribbean Disaspora Cultures
What color is Friday’s skin?  Not yellow, because the aborigines were eliminated. Africans get associated with Cannibalism Can Friday speak? Does Caliban only know how to curse?
Slavery  Colonial Education
Creolization (in people and language)
Caribbean Disaspora Cultures

3. Outline The Caribbean: Definitions & History of colonization
Creolization: Definitions
English language & of people
Race Relations  Conflicts and Displacement;
Caribbean Poetry and Music at a Glance:
Caribbean poetry; Derek Walcott & dub poetry
Popular culture: Different ways; Calypso, (Raggae & Rap)
Our Course: Thematic Continuity, Geographic Expansion

4. Definition (1): the Caribbean –3 groups
1. the Bahamas to the North East of Cuba 
the Greater Antilles
the
Lesser
Antilles

5. Definition (2): the Caribbean
“discovered” by Columbus in late 15th c., Spanish colonization, followed by the British, French and Dutch.
“names:
West Indies (Anglophone) –a misnomer (also East Indians);
the Antilles (Francophone)
the Caribbean as a term encompassing both
Composed of immigrants only:
the aboriginal communities [Amerindians-- Arawaks, Caribs, etc.] exterminated;
Immigrants from Africa, Asia and Europe.

6. Image of the Caribbean
Jan van de Straet’s engraving “America”--the new world as a woman

7. History of Colonization in the Caribbean Area
Columbus’s “discovery” of the West Indies
16th-18th centuries --Colonial period: 
also a period of wars among colonial nations and pirates, and conflicts between the white masters, black slaves and mulatto.
Rebellion (1) –the Maroons
e.g. Abeng – (from a West Africa); used primarily as a signaling device; served as a vital means of communication when the Maroons were at war with the British (e.g.)
e.g. in Sugar Cane Alley

8. Ways of rebellion (2): petit marronage (小走私) in francophone islands
pretend sickness, steal, or even poison their masters.
with music, dance, religion (voodon), or simply their different ways of living;
examples: the school children’s tales of zombies; the songs the laborers sing—at the field, after Madouze dies-- in Sugar Cane Alley;
open rebellion

9. History of Colonization in the Caribbean Area
Britain and USA abolished slave trade; complete abolition of slavery in British colonies
1845 East Indian indentured laborers in Trinidad; Chinese indenture in French colonies (e.g. Wide Sargasso Sea)

10. History of Colonization in the Caribbean Area
  seen as Slums of the Empire.
Negritude; Back to Africa movement
(e.g. MARCUS GARVEY)
Madouze’s account in SGA
riots & strikes in and afterwards

11. History of Colonization in the Caribbean Area
Since the 50’s
Colonization in reverse: West Indian migration to England  restrictions imposed
Independence movements:
The Federation of the West Indies
independence  Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago;1966  Barbados and Guyana;

12. American Imperialism in the Caribbean Area (Cf
American Imperialism in the Caribbean Area (Cf. Bob Marley site
Economic
the area becomes the tourists’ heaven and a cheap labor factory (capital, technology and management shipped to the area to use the labor power without leaving the profits there.)
Cultural domination –
music styles – the emergence of raggae (e.g.)

13. History of Colonization in the Caribbean Area
Neo-Colonialism of the U.S.A.
military intervention (e.g. "Caribbean Basin Initative"– bribing Jamaica and the rest of the Caribbean to support the armed confrontation in Grenada and the war in El Salvador. 

14. Creolization (1): Dictionary Definition
A. language: mixture of languages, esp. in Southern US and the Caribbean area.
B. People
1). Orignal meaning: Native, local,”pure”;
2). Native-born whites;
3). Hybrid (mixed-blood)

15. Definition (2): Creolization in the Caribbean
People --
Europeans born in the Caribbean,
mulatto
Language –
the mixture of English and African tribal languages into some special kinds of native languages (Patois, such as French Patois, Jamaican Patois).   E
e.g. Beijan: The English used in Barbados-- closest to standard English (e.g. 1); Jamaican creole,
"postcreole continuum“-- parallels the social hierarchy to some degrees (--those speaking in creole are looked down upon). 
Postcolonial usage of creole  dub poetry—
the empire strikes back

16. Color System in the Caribbean Society
“Dying to raise their color all of them” (199) (e.g. “Bright Thursday”)
The color triangle: white
brown
dark

17. Race Relations: multiple division
Post-emancipation period – conflicts
between different races (e.g. the English vs. the French),
between plantation owners and small farmers,
between the newly rich and the declining aristocrats.
Discriminated: mulatto and creole.
In the contemporary Caribbean area and diaspora: the Bajan vs. the Jamaican, all against Haitian, etc.

18. Consequences of creolization
racial conflicts;
split sense of identity – in between Europe and Africa
diverse and dynamic culture (Walcott on music and language)

19. Caribbean poetry (introd.)
The people’s resistance to colonialism: some examples of Caribbean Poetry
Caribbean poetry (introd.)
Derek Walcott (e.g.) –combination of Western culture and creolized culture and island landscape
“I happen to have been born in an English and a Creole place, and love both languages. …”
“ I who am poisoned with the blood of both, Where shall I turn, divided to the vein?”
"A Far Cry From Africa“ Derek Walcott, 1957

20. Dub poetry: forerunner of hip-hop
The people’s resistance to colonialism: some examples of Caribbean Poetry
Dub poetry: forerunner of hip-hop
an extension of reggae culture (“new raggae”)
a form of performance poetry having its roots in popular Jamaican culture, and more particularly in reggae and Rastafarianism. 
The movement has served to bring poetry back to the people

21. Dub poetry
openness to pop culture and esp. to music (reggae and calypso); appeal of public performance; acceptance of social responsibility poetry has a “function” (poetry vs fiction as a middle-class genre)
amateur poetic practice in the WI (e.g. Jamaican creole )
e.g. Edward Braithwaite,

22. Kamau Brathwaite “Wings of a Dove”
About a Rasta Man
“Brother Man the Rasta man, beard full of lichens地衣 brain full of lice watched the mice ”
After smoking his pipe of his gangja, he speaks of his people in ‘Bablylon town’
“So beat dem drums dem, spread
dem wings dem, watch dem fly
dem, soar dem high dem,
clear in the glory of the Lord.
Watch dem ship dem come to town dem
full o' silk dem full o' food dem
an' dem 'plane dem come to groun' dem
full o' flash dem full o' cash dem
silk dem food dem shoe dem wine dem
that dem drink dem an' consume dem
praisin' the glory of the Lord.

23. Kamau Brathwaite “Wings of a Dove”
So beat dem burn dem, learn
dem that dem got dem nothin'
but dem bright bright baubles
that will burst dem when the flame dem
from on high dem raze an' roar dem
an' de poor dem rise an' rage dem
in de glory of the Lord.
 Bob Marley, a Rasta

24. Mikey Smith “Black and White” Different implications of “black”
Michael Smith;
Image source

25. “Colonization in Reverse”
What a joyful news, Miss Mattie;
Ah feel like me heart gwine burs--
Jamaica people colonizin
Englan in reverse
By de hundred, by de tousan
From country an from town,
By de ship-load, by the plane-load,
Jamaica is Englan boun.

26. “Colonization in Reverse” (2)
Dem a pout out a Jamaica;
Everybody future plan
Is fi get a big-time job
An settle in de motherlan
What a islan! What a people!
Man an woman, ole and young
Jussa pack dem bag an baggage
An tun history upside dung!
--Louis Bennett (e.g.)

27. Mutabaruka
“dis poem”
starts with middle passage, but extends to all kinds of racism all over the world.

28. Functions of a trickster—for survival and revenge
The people’s resistance to colonialism: some examples of Popular Culture (1) Trickster Tradition
Anancy stories (spider)—from West Africa—the experience of the Middle Passage in animal forms (42)
The “Monkey Business”—the monkey as a gentleman-like animal—a symbol of the (pseudo-)colonizer—undressing unmasking the (pseudo-)colonizer
Functions of a trickster—for survival and revenge

29. The people’s resistance to colonialism: some examples of Popular Culture
Calypso: originated in the songs of African slaves who worked in the plantation fields of Trinidad. Forbidden to talk to each other, they used calypso to communicate feelings and information.
e.g. Work songs in Sugar Cane Alley.
e.g. "Dan is the Man".

30. "Dan is the Man" In education, he is
taught to be “a block-headed mule”
with his world filled with nonsensical nursery rimes.
How about the education in the film Sugar Cane Alley?

31. Thematic Continuation in our course
Area
Cultures, race & gender
colonization
diaspora
Indian
Subcon-tinent
Religions gender (purdah, sati, marriage), caste system, partition  children and education
--UK. Departure
--Hollywood
--South Africa, the Caribbean, and to US
South-Africa
Apartheid, politics & power land and body, religion, gender, language,  children and education
Afrikaaner, UK
--Cruso/Foe  Writing vs. silence
Exile & return
The Carib-bean
Diaspora; Creolization  language, race & gender  children & education
Slavery & Contract laborers; US.
“Back” to Africa or UK

32. The Caribbean Texts –and their Themes
Sugar Cane Alley –a boy’s experience of 1930’s labor exploitation; Western education vs. local cultures; cultural identities
The Wide Sargasso Sea –1830’s (abolishment of slavery)  poor creole women (girls) vs. a black girl, Tia
Abeng by Michelle Cliff – another creole girl whose great grandfather, Judge Savage, burned his hundred slaves on the eve of their emancipation.
Olive Senior's "Bright Thursdays" –a creole girl’s experience and fear of white culture and open space
Annie John –a black girl’s growth to reject of her mother/culture.
"Children of the Sea" –refugees from Haiti; two voices

33. The Caribbean Texts –and their Locations
Sugar Cane Alley –Martinique
The Wide Sargasso Sea –(Martinique), Dominique, Jamaica
Abeng by Michelle Cliff -- Jamaica)
Olive Senior's "Bright Thursdays"
Annie John
"Children of the Sea"

34. The Caribbean area and the Caribbean diaspora
Canada
The U.S.
“Children of the Sea”; Fugees
Annie John
M. Cliff, B. Marley
Wide Sargasso Sea
Sugar Cane Alley
Derek Walcott
England
France India

35. References
The Evolution of Afro-Caribbean Music <
Caribbean Poetry: Barbados < >