Carol J. Williams / Los Angeles Times – A mannequin portrays a white planter’s wife in the basement carriage display of the Sunbury House.
In keeping with our focus on Black history during the month of February to coincide with Black History Month in the USA we highlight an article which appeared in the Los Angeles Times yesterday (10 February 2008). The author Carol J. Williams writes in the article that most Barbadians want to forget about that part of our past which is linked to slavery. It seems that our friend Carol Williams arrived at her conclusion because of her interaction with staff members at the historical Sunbury Plantation great house. To borrow a quote from her article:
Doralene Lashley, 43, puts up her hands to halt the conversation when asked whether she or the plantation’s two dozen other employees, most, like her, descended from enslaved Africans brought here during the colonial era, mind that so little of their forebears’ labor and craftsmanship is acknowledged in heritage houses presented to visitors as replicas of the past. “I personally try not to talk about it. ‘This one did this and that one did that,’ ” Lashley, the catering manager, says distractedly as she checks on the serving trays for a luncheon. “Talking about the past just has a negative impact on the present.”
Source: Los Angeles Times
The columnist went on to quote Ikael Tafari who agreed with her conclusion that Black Barbadians are reluctant to be reminded of that part of history tied to the slave trade, “a sociologist who heads the Commission on Pan-African Affairs, says it has been a struggle to persuade the Caribbean’s black leaders to take their people’s rightful place in history.”Pain and humiliation are not something people want to relive,” he says of black Barbadians, who make up 95% of the island’s 290,000 people. “You can’t understand the level of denial about the slave trade that exists at the official level.”
We are not sure that we agree fully with the LA Times columnist but we feel here observation is worthy of discussion.
11 responses so far ↓
Afrian Heritage // February 11, 2008 at 12:43 AM
I agree that Barbadians have become to European in their thinking. We hold on to the history of our colonial masters but easily forget that of our black ancestors.
Partly Bajan girl // February 11, 2008 at 8:03 AM
I remember the first time I saw the american epos Roots on TV a long time ago.
It hit me like a bulldocer,my past,my heritage.
And most of all I was questioning then, as when we see theese chained slaves with bent necks on old drawings ;
Why are they not fighting?
I think it is very important to show young people the resistence the slaves gave their “masters”.
It was a lot of revolts and also hidden resistence against this horrible machinery,
fx. in spiritual ways.
One thing I really reacted on when I first visited Barbados museum in 93,was the lack of closer look at the slaves history,where they came from,their rich heritage and the way they gave the Caribbean a very special ,colourful identity culturally and ethnically.
Most exhebits were about planters class and all the bling they got from sugar and slavery,
very limitied about the african slaves.
I would like the museum in Barbados to make that part bigger and deeper from an african perspective.
I miss it a lot!
And also how slavery(and slaves) took a big part in the building of a new,powerful andindustrialized Europe and America..
Thanks.
Anonymous // February 12, 2008 at 2:11 PM
I love being black I cant imagine myself any other color. When I wear black to work most people think that I am mourning or will be attending funeral. I find their logic hysterical, I love wearing black it reminds me of who I am where I am going and all the things I will achieve because of being black.
Thomas Gresham // February 12, 2008 at 2:57 PM
I find myself in two minds.
At one level I think we have made only too little progress in breaking the economic structure that slavery left us with. The ownership of capital in the country remains terribly skewed to those groups that were the beneficiaries of slavery. We sit here worrying about the exploits of poor, hard working Guyanese when the most enormous theft of our past labours and opportunities stare us in the face everyday.
To change this quickly will mean “revolution”. A revolution that may be so destabilising with a large chunk of the skills and capital fleeing the country that we could all end up worse off.
Land reform in Zimbabwe may have been well intentioned and justified from a historic and moral perspective, but the result has been a collapse in agricultural production, starvation and 10,000% inflation and it is the very landless blacks that have suffered most from this attempt at a solution.
As a nation we pride ourselves (rightly or wrongly) for not being revolutionaries and prefering stability. This is one of the reasons why we are so ambivalent about slavery. It is not just the deep, inner hurt. To raise a deep consciousness about the obscenities carried out, often in the name of god and church, would not allow our people to live in peace and harmony, sitting comfortably in the same pews as the former slave owners.
Too much consciousness can get in the way of daily lives. 60 years on from the holocaust my liberal jewish friends in New York cannot bring themselves to buy a German car. South Africa tried to address it with a Truth and Reconciliation Commission and policies that actively promote moderate change. Yet many are frustrated by this slow change and the election of Zuma relfects this.
So we need substantial change and we need agents of economic change. The anti-trade and immigration crowd should note that when we try and protect our economy from outside change, we are also helping to preserve an economic structure that reflects a wrongful past. The biggest threat to the cozy life of BS&T’s management and shareholders is not consumer action, but Trinidadian businessmen.
But at the same time, we do not want so much change that we throw away stability and our deep respect for fairness and law and order. I find these objectives in conflict: change, but not too much. My unsatisfactory conclusion is that we must emancipate ourselves from mental slavery by a government that pours its effort into delivering the best education there is, encouraging agents of change to visit us, and encouraging our people to go abroad and learn in order to come back and build.
Partly Bajan girl // February 13, 2008 at 5:45 AM
I liked your perspective or at least the way you express it,Gresham!
And education and wellspokenness is something that is important to give young barbadians of african descent.
But they have to take it themselves,not waiting for someone to offer them a bit of it!
When i visit Barbados and speak with young grownup people,many are scearily little aware of the world outside the Caribbean or the U.S.
And very little interested in local politics or even discussing it.
How can this be?
How can they find new and cooperate with other agents of change when they don`t really know of any?
Have a look at Europe,
or a look to Scandinavia?
Why link everything to U.S and they american lifestyle?
By the way; I learned a lot(I realize that now) about slavery at school here 25 years ago.And it was necessary.
I learned that it was a theft.
A theft of soul,humans,pride,opportunities,hope,labour etc.
And also learned that Europe and U.S benefitted from it.
Did it made me angry? yes.
Did it took away my pride? No
Did it made me having more problems coping with white people every day and their sometimes racist behaviour and often goodness? No
I think it can be hard to be black,still,in Barbados.
But I think you can cope just as well with our common past as blacks in Europe,without starting an avlanche of anger and hate.
Sooner or later,in a more tightly woven worldweb,our past will breath us in the neck,and then it is just as good to know where we are coming from.
So we know where we are going.
It would not be right to wrap the past in cotton or historically isolate bajan children in a bubble,not knowing their past.
Maybe it will work for a while in Barbados,but not in the world.
But it must be a balance of both knowledge and hope and opportunities.
Cat // February 16, 2008 at 11:00 PM
No human being likes to be reminded of past events that might have been inhuman and shameful. However, in order for a black person to feel proud of their ancestry, they must be fully informed about the history and richness of the African culture. These teachings MUST be a part of the curriculum of the Ministry of Education and MUST start at the Kindergarten level as part of a daily teaching ritual and carry onward as a taught subject like Math, English, etc., through elementary, secondary, college and university levels. If you’re taught from a toddler to love and be comfortable with who you are, then it only makes sense that you would love and be comfortable with the adult you have become. Education is power in every society. Therefore, the teaching of African history within the Barbados school system will help the black Barbadian to understand the struggles of their forefathers, make them proud of their heritage and to respect themselves as a black race. Only then can they feel proud to be black and empowered to become whatever they chose to be.
Karia // February 17, 2008 at 10:52 AM
If we look at the evolution of Barbados from 1966 onwards we have seen a society that identifies with the small percentage of European blood that flows through ourr veins. While speaking to Barbadians in North America they remind you of the pigmentation of their skin, they remind you of their hair texture and they even go on about the red “skin side” of their family.
Barbadians find it difficult to celebrate their blackness. May we examine the skin whitening creams that line the cosmetic shelves. If we can use one example we should look at the non-issue of the young intelligent senator who celebrates his Afro-centricity through cornrows yet he is being humiliated. This young man evolved from a group of proud Barbadians who were always proud within their skin. Yet today we are looking him in the eye and sending him mixed messages.
The time has come for all of us to go back to being natural, celebrate our blackness by doing this we might then be taken serious by the OTHER. At the end of the day we will always be seen through the lens of the OTHER as black people blinded within an identity crisis.
Jerome Hinds // February 17, 2008 at 11:07 AM
Matthew Farley’s attempt to malign Damien’s Griffith cornrow hairstyle is truly an example of some Barbadians Want To ” CONVIENIENTLY” Forget The African Connection & Slavery…as in the case of Matthew Farley !
It is interesting that Matthew Farley did not FORGET a tradition practised by some Africa countries……where a man has several female PARTNERS !
I guess he ain’t learnt to be honest as yet !
Cat // February 17, 2008 at 12:48 PM
I think Matthew Farley is what Owen Arthur referred to as a Negrocrat. Have you ever heard such hogwash coming out of the mouth of an educator. Damien Griffith is true to himself and has no hangups about his African heritage. All the best to you Damien in your new position.
Charliemun // October 14, 2008 at 9:49 PM
Europeans engaged in slave trading because this “resource” was made available by African societies where slave trading and kidnapping was common within and between tribes and kingdoms.
Slaves in africa were already a commodity to be sold when Europeans rolled up and capitalised on this.
A terrible thing, but back then we were all as children with toys, lacking the moral, spiritual and social backbone to put human condition before profit.
This is NOT to excuse that it happened or appease a white conscience, but to explain in part how it came about that we might better understand the world as one country, where human dignity and rights should be universally upheld.
We have to deal with life as it is, not as we might have wished it to be.
Ready-Done // May 24, 2009 at 4:02 PM
I love Barbados it is so nice here, i don’t have to run from any lions tigers etc…. i am top of the food chain here……
THAT IS ONE OF THE MANY BENEFITS OF SLAVERY. they are more and we need to focus on those more so that what somebody do to my grate grate grand father.
As a Barbadian i have very little heritage, i have a language, that is English, all i can do is better myself and do my best to better my home land, i can use technology to devise a resource to build back civilization in Africa. But for now i thank the slave driver for bring my fore fathers here to this lovely island in fact for spreading the black race all over the world be cause when them finish kill out all of Africa some of we going to be left to repopulate the place.
Look at the trade embargoes put on Zimbabwe, all the wars fought with guns made buy who? but we will pull through as always.