Afro-Creole: Power, Opposition, and Play in the Caribbean 9781501722431

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Afro-Creole

P0 W ER PLAY

I

IN

0 PP0 SI T I 0 N THE

•

I

and

CARIBBEAN

Richard D. E. Burton

CORNELL UNIVERSITY PRESS Ithaca and London

Copyright ©

1997

by Cornell University

All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher. For information, address Cornell University Press, Sage House, 512 East State Street, Ithaca, New York 14850. First published 1997 by Cornell University Press Printed in the United States of America

@l The paper in this book meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences-Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Burton, Richard D.E., 1946Afro-Creole : power, opposition, and play in the Caribbean I Richard D.E. Burton p. em. Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index. ISBN 0-8014-3249-9 (cloth : alk. paper) I. Jamaica-Civilization-African influences. 2. Trinidad and Tobago-Civilization-African influences. 3. Haiti-CivilizationAfrican influences. 4. Slavery-West Indies-History. 5. CreolesJamaica-Religion. 6. Creoles-Trinidad and Tobago-Social life and customs. 7. Creoles-Haiti-Religion. 8. Government, Resistance to-West Indies-History. 9. West Indies-Race relations. I. Title. F1874.B8 1997 303.48'272906-dc21 96-50046 Cloth printing Paperback printing

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10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2

Contents

Illustrations

vii

Acknowledgments

ix

A Note on Terminology

xi

Introduction

1

From African to Afro-Creole: The Making of Jamaican

13

Slave Culture, 1655-1838

2

Resistance and Opposition in Jamaica, 1800-1834

47

3

In the Shadow of the Whip: Religion and Opposition in

90

Jamaica, 1834-1992

4

The Carnival Complex

156

5

Masquerade, Possession, and Power in the Caribbean

221

Conclusion

263

Glossary

269

References

271

Index

291

"Slave Play on the Dombi Plantation" ( 1707) "Sunday Morning in the Country" ( 1836) '"Queen' or 'Maam' of the Set-Girls" (1837-38) "French Set-Girls" (1837-38) Jonkonnu troupe from St. Thomas, Jamaica ( 1976) Paul Bogle, leader of the Morant Bay uprising ( 1865) John Eyre, governor of Jamaica ( 1865) Rev. Alexander Bedward, radical preacher One of Bedward's revivalist meetings (ca. 1920) Leonard Perceval Howell, Rastafarian preacher (ca. 1935) Timothy (Fuzzy or Bongo) Hill, Rastafarian (1980) Norman Washington Manley and Alexander Bustamante ( 1938) Alexander Bustamante taking the salute "A Cudgelling Match between English and French Negroes" (ca. 1770) Gary Sobers, Barbadian cricketer ( 1973) Michael Holding, Jamaican fast bowler ( 1980) Crowd watching cricket match between the West Indies and Australia (1973)

Cricket on Bathsheba Beach, Barbados (ca. 1970) Calypsonian Raphael de Leon ( 1936) "Carnival" (1888) The 1919 carnival in Port of Spain "Mancrab," centerpiece of the 1983 carnival in Port of Spain Haitian Rara band Jonkonnu "courtier" with ax and mace ( 1976) An Orisha (Shango) altar in Trinidad Female revivalist preaching at a Jamaican market ( 1972) Jonkonnu dancer wearing a "house" (ca. 1920)

23 39 68 69 74 II 0 114 117 118 124 143 145 146 174 182 183 186 187 192 202 204 214 229 240 241 242 244

Since my primary discipline is French, and since almost all of my previously published work on the Caribbean concerns Martinique, writing a book that focuses on Jamaica, Trinidad, and Haiti and attempts to bring together as wide a range of historical, anthropological, and political materials, as Afro-Creole does, has taken me into areas of Caribbean studies in which I am more than usually dependent on the ideas and scholarship of others. In these circumstances I am all the more eager both to acknowledge the major intellectual debts I have incurred while working on this project and to absolve the authors concerned of responsibility for any tendentious use to which I may have put their ideas. Every idea I have taken over is, I hope, correctly attributed, and I have derived particular inspiration from the work of the following people, whom, whether I know them personally or not, I list in uncontroversial alphabetical order: Roger Abrahams, Mervyn Alleyne, Diane Austin-Broos, Karen McCarthy Brown, Barry Chevannes, Carolyn Cooper, Michael Craton, Robert Dirks, Lisa Douglass, Barry Gaspar, Richard Hart, Gad Heuman, Barry Higman, Errol Hill, Thomas Holt, Michel Laguerre, Earl Lovelace, Anthony Maingot, Frank Manning, Daniel Miller, Errol Miller, Sidney Mintz, Ken Post, Richard and Sally Price, Gordon Rohlehr, James Scott, Elisa Janine Sobo, Paul Sutton, Peter Wilson, Carole Yawney, and Kevin Yelvington. All illustrations are credited in the proper place, and I am particularly grateful to Gerry Besson, Judith Bettelheim, John P. Homiak, James Houk, William Wedenoja, Dolores M. Yonker, and not least Raphael de Leon (the Roaring Lion), who have permitted me to use material in their personal collections. A place apart belongs to Ross Chambers, who, in addition to countless personal kindnesses, introduced me, through his work in nineteenth-century French literature (which is where, intellectually, I began), to Michel de Certeau's distinction between resistance and opposition on which much of the argument of this book depends. It is also a particular pleasure to thank Nigel and Ellie Bolland, whom I knew at the University of the West Indies in Jamaica in the early 1970s but with whom I had had no subsequent contact, for the warmth with which they received me into their home while I was writing this book: there is nothing Caribbeanists like more than swapping stories,

x + Acknowledgments memories, and ideas about the Caribbean, and these were good times, spent in wonderful surroundings in upstate New York. I am also extremely grateful to Peter Agree of Cornell University Press for the positive way responded to the project from the first and for his patience in shepherding me and my manuscript through the various stages of publication. Three other debts: to Henning Pape-Santos, who word processed the manuscript with speed, aplomb, and precision; to David Robinson, dean of the School of African and Asian Studies at Sussex University, who generously provided me with financial support; and above all to Dominick LaCapra, director of the Society for the Humanities at Cornell University, and to his predecessor, Jonathan Culler, who jointly enabled me to write this book in the optimum conditions afforded by Cornell and its superb Olin Library. Honneur et respect a tous, as they say in the French Caribbean. R. D. E. B. Ithaca, New York

Throughout this book "colored" is used in the standard Caribbean sense of "mixed race." Used as an adjective it is lowercased and spelled in the conventional American English manner; as a noun it is capitalized, and I use the standard British English spelling, "Coloured." In general, "white" and "black" are used as adjectives, "White" and "Black" as nouns, and many similar terms follow this pattern. Spellings in quotations are as in the originals, apart from some minor standardization in quotations from twentieth-century works. I have not attempted to standardize the spelling of either patwa (patois) or French Creole terms. Translations are mine unless otherwise indicated in the references, and italics in quotations are present in the original unless attributed to me. A glossary of terms not otherwise identified in the text or footnotes is provided at the end of the book.

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