In parallel I do read A Tall History of Sugar [2019] by Curdella Forbes that takes place in rural #Jamaica and starts in the late 1950ies. Seems very promising, being already on page 47! #bookstodon@bookstodon
In the late 1800s, Jamaican children would play Moonshine Baby on the night of a full moon. Claude McKay recalled his father telling them that “the making of these moonshine babies was an old African custom and that different villages used to compete in the making of them.” (“Boyhood in Jamaica”, Phylon (1940-1956), Vol. 14, No. 2 (2nd Qtr., 1953), pp. 134-145)
Olive Senior wrote about this game in her poem “Moonshine Dolly”.
For this week’s #MythologyMonday theme, Brews and Potions, an excerpt from Marlon James’ The Book of Night Women:
“Homer send her to the man lodging to rob a spoonful of gunpowder. Then Homer send Gorgon up to the hill with no tree and she come back with a cup of dirt from Massa Patrick Wilson grave. Homer mix the two in a glass and fill the glass with rum...
Homer prick Lilith thumb and she wince. Homer stick Lilith thumb in the glass until the potion start to turn red.”
Kumina, an Afro-Jamaican religion based on communication with the ancestors, has Congolese origins and was brought to Jamaica by indentured Africans in the 1840s-1860s. The ritual dance, along with drumming that summons and controls the spirits, “seems to be the bridge between esoteric and the exotic...” (Olive Lewin, “Jamaica’s Folk Music”)
“Earlier this month, Jamaica’s Taino chief, Kasike Kalaan Nibonrix Kaiman, gave a presentation titled, ‘Stories as medicine: Taino and African Healing and the Environment in Jamaica’, at Northeastern University.”
A team from the University of the West Indies (UWI) and the Institute of Jamaica (IOJ) will go to Glasgow to retrieve a Jamaican Giant Galliwasp, a species now presumed extinct. This is said to be the first repatriation of a natural history specimen in the Caribbean.
2 Apr 1656: The exiled Charles II agrees a treaty with #Spain#otd in return for 6,000 troops to invade #England. In return he agreed to restore #Jamaica to them, help recover #Portugal, suspend laws against Catholics and implement in #Ireland the Ormond Peace of 1649 (BM)
Fifty-nine disabled Haitian orphans and 13 of their caregivers arrived in Portland Jamaica by boat after 36 hours on the water, on Thursday March 21st, fleeing from the quickly collapsing gang-run Haiti....
Climate advocates protest in downtown Kingston against deep-sea mining
The placard-bearing group shouted chants urging citizens to “say no to deep-sea mining” while standing at the Kingston waterfront across from the Jamaica Conference Centre, where the headquarters of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) is located
Fun fact: Lila Iké is from Christiana, in Manchester, Jamaica - the same parish from which my spouse's family hails. In fact their auntie lives in Christiana. It's a teeny tiny town up in the hills. Pretty fun to see someone from there making it big.
'The full history of Atlantic slavery is scarcely taught in the US or the UK, and so it’s not surprising that few people in either country know much about Tacky’s revolt. Until recently, however, I didn’t realise that Jamaicans don’t know this history much better. I had assumed that in a country with a Black majority population, which had emerged from one of the most brutal slave societies in human history, basic education would have offered a much better understanding of slavery and its legacies than the one I had received in the US. I was wrong.
'While no one in Jamaica denies the importance of slavery’s history, little is known about antislavery uprisings. I asked my friend Sutopa, a high school teacher in Massachusetts who grew up in Jamaica, what she had learned about slavery and slave revolt in primary school. She paused and pursed her lips, then shook her head and smiled ruefully: “Almost nothing.”'
Why do they keep perpetuating the lie that the Taíno are non-existent when their descendants are very much alive and well in Jamaica and throughout the Caribbean and the Americas?
Your periodic reminder that #France and other Western powers actively went out of their way to fuck the #Haitians over at every opportunity, once they had the effrontery to win their freedom.
"#Haiti's prime minister... #ArielHenry has agreed to resign following weeks of mounting pressure and increasing violence in the impoverished country.
"It comes after regional leaders met in #Jamaica on Monday to discuss a political transition in Haiti..."
Jean "Binta" Breeze, who was born on March 11, 1956, was a storyteller, cultural activist, an author, and the first Jamaican woman dub poet who performed her work in all parts of the world. Her poetic vision was “to make words music, move beyond language into sound.”
When someone loses a tooth, a Jamaican custom is to throw it on the rooftop and say, "Rat-a-tat! Rat-a-tat! Tek mi ole teet' an' gimme a new one." The belief is that this prevents the rat from coming for the rest of one's teeth and ensures that one would receive a new tooth.
Introduced the kids to #CoolRunnings tonight. I've always appreciated how they licensed the official Olympic and 1988 Calgary logos to add more realism.
Jamaican food experiment day was a success for my first try making it: Pigeon Peas and Rice for lunch, Calloloo Rice and Impossible Beef patties for dinner. #food#Jamaica#Caribbean
Thish week I'm making three Jamaican recipes. Perfect timing that YouTuber Gaz Oakley is kicking off a multi-part series on Jamaican food culture with some local chef friends of his :) #food#jamaica#GazOakley The First Taste Of Jamaica | EP1 🇯🇲
59 Disabled Orphans embraced by Jamaica; the hard road out of Haiti (magneticmediatv.com)
Fifty-nine disabled Haitian orphans and 13 of their caregivers arrived in Portland Jamaica by boat after 36 hours on the water, on Thursday March 21st, fleeing from the quickly collapsing gang-run Haiti....