Caribbean Civilisation

The Caribbean is a distinct civilization, despite skeptics having defined the Caribbean as part of other civilizations such as African, Asian and European. This blog aims to show the cultural development of Caribbean societies and the creation of its diaspora; highlighting the emergence of Caribbean identities.

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Boat Vendors

Haiti, (2016)

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She braided the tourists’ flaxen hair with bright beads cane-row style, then would sit apart from the vendors on her sweet-drink crate while they bickered like blackbirds

over who had stolen whose sale, in the shadows of the thatched hut with T-shirts and flowered sarongs. Her carved face flickering with light-wave patterns cast

among the coconut masks, the coral earrings reflected the sea’s patience. Once, when I passed her shadow mixed with those shadows, I saw the rage

of her measuring eyes, and felt again the chill of a panther hidden in the dark of its cage that drew me towards its shape as it did Achille.

I stopped, but it took me all the strength in the world to approach her stall, as it takes for a hunter to approach a branch where a pantheress lies curled

with leaf-light on its black silk. To stand in front of her and pretend I was interested in the sale of a mask or a T-shirt? Her gaze looked too bored

and just as a pantheress stops swinging its tail to lightly leap into grass, she yawned and entered a thicket of palm-printed cloth, while I stood there

stunned by that feline swiftness, by the speed of her vanishing, and behind her, trembling air divided by her echo that shook like a reed.

[vvirtuous]

Omeros by Derek Walcott

[jhameia]

The Garifuna - A Hybrid Culture (Documentary)

Worldwide Africana, LLC presents a film about the Garifuna of Belize whose ancestry is both West African & indigenous Caribbeans.

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Caribbean Cuisine from Belize

Seafood Coconut Curry .

[exgyalfriend]

Chattabox™ Is a talk show with a Panel of 5 young women & 5 young men of West Indian / Caribbean Roots who discuss topics that men & women fail to see eye to eye on, a lighthearted comedic show that sometimes tackles heavy topics, we intend to bring authentic caribbean culture to the mainstream while giving unique opinions along the way.

[jahhhh88]

Lovers Rock: Valentine’s Day in the Dancehall!

Okay, so I’m not big on Valentine’s day and you surely won’t catch me taking long walks on the beach with a bwoy friend. But this year, multimedia artist Raena Bird AKA gyalfriend has got me in true love-a-dub spirit with her Dancehall/Caribbean VDay card set. She premiered the first part of this card set via her twitter page featuring the likes of Vybz Kartel, Spice, Mavado, and Dexta Daps. Enjoy while we steadily wait for part II! <3 

[superheroesincolor]

Virgil (2015)  //  Image Comics

“Betrayed, beaten, and banished by his own, an outed cop fights his way across Jamaica to save his man and get revenge! Virgil thought he was safe on the police force, but his gun and his attitude can’t protect him from his own secret - he’s gay. 

For thirty years he’s had two lives. In the uniform he’s the toughest on the street. Out of uniform he’s a loving boyfriend. But when his own precinct turns on him, his worlds explodes. They put his name in the paper, raided his house, and took his lover. They left him bleeding in the ocean. They shouldn’t have left him alive. 

Virgil is the next era of exploitation, following in the steps of Shaft and Django Unchained. Hard hitting crime noir given a fresh face but the same busted knuckles.”

Story: Steve Orlando, Art: Jd Faith, Cover: Artyom Trakhanov

Get it now here

Related reading: LGBT rights in Jamaica / Jamaica - Human Rights Watch

[ Follow SuperheroesInColor on facebook / twitter / tumblr ]

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Caribbean women writers tee: Michelle Cliff, Jean Rhys, Jamaica Kincaid, Edwidge Danticat.

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Jamaican Banana Fritters

Ingredients

3 ripe bananas

1 egg

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

½ teaspoon of cinnamon

¼ teaspoon of nutmeg

½ cup of sugar

2 cups of all-purpose flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

¼-½ cup milk

Directions

Peel and mash the ripe bananas.

Beat egg, sugar, vanilla, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

Next, blend egg mixture with mashed bananas.  Make sure it is all incorporated.

Then sift flour and baking powder into the banana/egg mixture.  Mix it all together.

If the batter seems to be too thick add a little milk… I added about ¼ cup to ½ cup of milk.

Add oil to a frying pan and place on medium high heat.  Drop spoonfuls of the banana fritter batter into the hot oiled frying pan. Flip when you see the edges starting to get brown and golden.

Lastly, combine cinnamon and sugar together to create your cinnamon sugar.  This is used to sprinkle on top of the fritters once they are finished cooking and still hot.

Sprinkle cinnamon sugar on top.

Enjoy!

[unirdg-collections]

Money Monday - the Barbados Penny (1788)

Obverse: I SERVE

Reverse: BARBADOES PENNY 1788

This is a Barbados copper Penny, minted in England and is one of the first coins ever to be circulated on the island of Barbados in the Caribbean.

This was not an official currency but one privately commissioned from the Royal Mint in England by Robert Gibbs, a Barbados plantation owner. This was to fill an economic gap on the island but gradually became more widely used around the Caribbean as well, meaning it is often referred to as token coinage. Barbados was an important centre for the slave trade due its geographic position but also as a centre for sugar plantations. Indeed, it was the realisation of where their sugar came from that pushed many British people to support the abolition of slavery. 

The coin reflects the slave-owning economy of the island by depicting a crowned African with the legend ‘I Serve’, while the national symbol of Barbados, the pineapple, is depicted on the reverse.The design is particularly interesting. Slaves had been trafficked to and used on Barbados since the mid-1600s, but it is not clear why an African has been depicted with crown and plumes. The plumes are usually associated with the Prince of Wales whose motto is also ‘I Serve’, meaning the coin may be a cruel satire on the island’s slaves.

Coins featured in Money Monday are a part of the University of Reading’s Stenton Coin Collection. For more information or to view the collection, please contact us: [email protected]

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"What are you going to study in college?" he asked. "I think I am going to be a doctor." "You think? Is this something you like?" "I suppose so," I said. "You have to have a passion for what you do." "My mother says it's important for us to have a doctor in the family." "What if you don't want to be a doctor?" "There's a difference between what a person wants and what's good for them." "You sound like you are quoting someone," he said. "My mother." "What would Sophie like to do?" he asked. That was the problem. Sophie really wasn't sure. I had never really dared to dream on my own. "You're not sure, are you?" He even understood my silences. "It is okay not to have your future on a map," he said. "That way you can flow wherever life takes you." "That is not Haitian," I said. "That's very American." "What is?" "Being a wanderer. The very idea."

Breath, Eyes, Memory by Edwidge Danticat  

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Your blog is everything!!!!!!!! -from a fellow Caribbeanist

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Wind Warden 24x30" from the Trace Exposure series by Antiguan artist Rachel Bento

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Undercurrent 18x24" from the Trace Exposure series by Antiguan Artist Rachel Bentp

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‘Windy City’ 18x24" from the Trace Exposure series by Antiguan Artist Rachel Bento

[lastrealindians-deactivated2015]

Sabantho Aderi, Lokono-Arawak, daughter of LRI’s Damon Corrie. 

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Headly was the king of Slygoville. He was twenty-four years old, six feet tall with copper-brown skin, and a face that could have been sculptured by Edna Manley herself. He had a brash and arrogant way about him from years of being pampered and loved by the women of Slygoville and being worshipped by the young boys who jammed the Puddin’ Pan to see him bat on Sundays. He could eat from any pot in Slygoville, stop at any yard any time of night if he got too tired to go home and no one would deny him a place to sleep. He was young, daring and bold, the best and most handsome cricketer, the man with the sweetest mouth. He had the right blend of confidence, arrogance and beauty that made him irresistible to both men and women. To see Headly, and to understand what show-offmeans, one had to be at the Puddin’ Pan on a Sunday or Saturday afternoon when he played cricket there. One had to see him strut across the field with his ass cocked off into the air, laughing and joking with the opposing team, patting them on their heads like he was Lord of all, in his glistening whites, neatly pressed, shirt tucked into pants without a crease, neat and beautiful even when he dived onto the grass to stop a ball. One had to see him lean back to stroke a ball across the field or stretch forward to stop one on the pitch to the resounding “Noooo …” of the crowd, and then see how he posed after the stroke and rocked back and forth or skipped stylishly before settling to bat again. One had to see him play the crowd, trotting up and down before he went in to bat, charming the ladies with his smile, stretching his bat out to each of them as they called his name, dazzling them with his smile and his sparkling eyes, almost hazel in the sun, and saying as he passed: “How much runs you want today?” and they screaming at him: “Fifty, Headly.” “One hundred, Headly.”  “Twenty-five, Headly.” “Two hundred, Headly,” and he pretending to frown and lifting his eyebrows, replying: “That’s all you want? Ask for more than that, man. That’s all you want? Is me this, this is me. Just tell me how much you want, man, I will go out and make it for you.”

Such As I Have, Garfield Ellis