tuluum's Diaryland Diary
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Second Time's The Charm
(Subconscious: Seven Of Wands)
All will turn out well today. So say the cards even though I"m like 2 hours behind on this project. Eep :P Some break this is turning out to be already. Think I'll extend it to Friday :( Anyway. So wow. Same card two days in a row. Again. At least it's not the Seven of Swords right? I'm definitely feeling some transition energy going on here. Especially since the King is the end of an era. Era of the self? This self?
Seven of Wands in the subconscious position shows that I'm feeling much stronger, more flexible and empowered than I have in a while. I think moving rooms, finally undertaking these projects and making the resolution to finish my CD have really paid off.
Not much else to report. J invited me to Boston for Passover. How sweet! I really should give him a chance shouldn't I? We'll see... my senses aren't 100% there yet. Still have a lot to do re: Passover cleaning and seder preparations. I also need matzah. Have to call Sonya to ask about that. Also have to write Ainsley to tell him about Sonya's upcoming trip to JA. OK I'm outie. Got to finish typing this up. I'm back on my detox :) Today is much easier, had some awful headaches yesterday. Glad to have my TrueGreens again :D
Read any good books lately? Share your thoughts in my 'Book Club'
It's Carnival
Author: Burton Sankeralli
"The Carnival well reveals the contradictions of race and class segregation in the all-encompassing vortex of bacchanal, encounter and mixing that is Trinidadian space".
Carnival is the soul of Trinidad. Yet simply to say this reveals and conceals a great deal.
The distinctive recognizable Trinidadian Carnival was born in the period of emancipation from enslavement (1834-1838). Here as the formerly enslaved surged onto the streets, claiming the landscape as their own.
Now this contradicts an interpretation of Carnival that has been popular in some circles. That Carnival (carne � flesh and vale � goodbye) represents the farewell to pleasure as the Catholic Church enters the period of fasting and penance that is Lent. This may be termed the Eurocentric interpretation and indeed in Trinidad the Catholic French Creoles used to have such pre-Lenten Carnival balls. Indeed the descendents of these balls are still in evidence.
But if this were the essence of Trinidad�s Carnival then it would never have reached Jamaica and the rest of the world. It would not have even reached most of Trinidad but would have remained locked up in the white communal ghetto.
Hence the root of the distinctively explosive Trinidadian Carnival is undoubtedly to be located in the African claiming of space in the process of the struggle for liberation. The old name for this Carnival is Canboulay (cannes brulee) which has been viewed as a reference to the burning cane characteristic of the �slave revolt�.
Trinidad�s Carnival hence departs from this living African spiritual energy released in resistance to colonial oppression, the struggle to define Selfhood, the defining of Landscape as �home�.
Yet having said this it is not only about Trinidad. Here we must understand clearly that unlike Jamaica Trinidad in its structuring is not a �slave� society but an immigrant society. Africans came there from other Caribbean islands, most notably Grenada, Barbados and St. Vincent, bringing with them the legacy of struggle against enslavement and oppression, bringing with them their creative genius. Let me also mention that Jamaican traditions are also evident. Africans also came in the post-emancipation period with living ancestral traditions direct from the Continent. Moreover, I have not forgotten Tobago with whom Trinidad was twinned but who nevertheless has a somewhat different history and cultural experience. Nevertheless Tobago is an integral aspect of this process.
Hence Trinidad is the chosen space where all this creative energy reveals itself . Out of this tremendous richness the Trinidadian Carnival emerges This as the principal celebrations are now in the pre-Lenten period in a society where the Catholic Church has been dominant.
But it is not my intention to leave out Europe. This presence is also evident in different ways.
First we may point out the direct and indirect efforts to suppress Carnival. In this regard we can mention the resulting Canboulay Riots of 1884 where the Africans simply refused to back down. The role of Eurocentric Christianity in seeking to restrict, stigmatise and suppress this vital African expression of Self must be noted.
However there is a European presence in Carnival itself. We may note that key Carnival cultural expressions such as calypso, mas and the steeldrum have been defined in this encounter of Africa and Europe. On the streets on Carnival Monday and Tuesday the European aesthetic is clearly evident in the �pretty mas�, even as the entire space is driven by distinctly living African energy. Moreover Trinidad�s whites and other related elites (many of whom may be considered de facto or �neo-whites�) also seek to be involved in Carnival itself.
This impulse most likely goes right back to the early days when the French Creoles confined in their comparatively bland masquerade balls envied the African masses having a complete blast on the streets. But here one runs into a contradiction. On the one hand the very dynamic of Carnival is encounter in a shared living space, on the other the whites wish to maintain the racist order of separation. Hence one aspect of white/elite participation has been such demarcated participation. Masqueraders set apart on the back of trucks, white bands, cordoned off band-sections, all exclusive fetes etc. The Carnival well reveals the contradictions of race and class segregation in the all-encompassing vortex of bacchanal, encounter and mixing that is Trinidadian space.
Trinidad�s powerful Indian presence also reveals the essentially volatile immigrant nature of the society. Its inherent vitality, creativity and instability as well as its contradictions of mixing and separation.
Indians have long participated in all aspects of mainstream Carnival and have themselves contributed to and defined these aspects. Moreover this presence is particularly strong and may even in some ways dominate many of the smaller celebrations outside of Port-of-Spain. Indians have also defined their own Carnival space that in a sense challenges the Afrocentric trinity of calypso, pan and mas. This revolves around the music form of chutney that has definite Carnival continuities and runs throughout the year.
The African youth culture also brings its own challenge, this in its radical redefining of soca, the energy of its fetes and the claiming of space on the road. Here is revealed the Trinidadian version of a global African youth culture where Jamaica�s dancehall has been pivotal. This in all its richness erupts in the Carnival space.
Hence from its point of departure in African struggle Carnival discloses an intensely creative space of cultural encounter, contestation and sharing. That reveals the essence of the Trinidadian landscape itself.
I am prepared to argue that it is Carnival that is a cradle of our society and not the other way around. In a fundamental sense Trinidad�s Carnival precedes its existence as a society. Indeed, recent writing by my colleague Kirk Meighoo suggests that Trinidad is yet to achieve full society status. However, Carnival does reveal its essence as a profoundly creative cultural space, in its rich cultural encounter, in all its pain, struggle, violence. Carnival is really what Trinidadians do throughout the year, evidenced in our rituals of liming and feting, and our constant culture of bacchanal, reaching a highpoint at this time of year. Through all the confusion here is the radical affirmation of raw life-force, of the Spirit of a people that will never be defeated.
Moreover, Carnival is like a contagious disease that Trinidadians carry wherever in the world they or their influence reach. Hence I am informed that there are hundreds of carnivals throughout the Caribbean and the world born of or radically influenced by Trinidad�s.
This is now all a truly global process with all its attendant challenges. This includes very real dangers of commercialization and commodification. Here the everpresent elite culture still threatens to dominate.
Yet all this can also be viewed as the ongoing creative struggle and process that Carnival represents. Trinidad is now the world and we anxiously await what is coming to birth.
Jamaica�s own UWI Carnival is born of all this and a great deal of what we are discussing is evident here. There is the raw energy of the fete, this starts off the celebration on Friday the 4th of March at UTech and continues at UWI on the 5th. Then there is J�Ouvert. I want to speak a little of this.
In Trinidad, J�Ouvert Morning represents �the opening�... Here the people in a sacred annual ritual surge onto the altar that is the road, as do our ancestors. This is the living source of the original Canboulay, of the first Carnival itself born in the �Afric mud�, the raw energy of Mother Earth. It represents the opening of the gate for that living vibration that is the mas, the ancestral Spirit, our very soul.
Burton Sankeralli, Feb. 22nd, 2004
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2:52 p.m. - Monday, Mar. 22, 2004
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