Presents an article on Jamaican art and the early artistic production of Edna Manley and Albert Huie, two artists that are commonly identified in art historical accounts as pioneers in the development of a national Jamaican art. Problem of race and representation in Jamaica as perceived by Huie and Manley; Character which held a particular representational significance for Huie and Manley; Role of Ethiopianism, Rastafarianism, Garveyism, and cultural nationalism in Jamaica.;
Examines Zora Neale Hurston's work, particularly her collection of folklore and ethnography of the American South, "Mules and Men." Looks at the author's role, the ways the ethnographer inscribes herself into the text, and speculates about Hurston's understanding of the limits of the impersonal researcher.
247 p., Discusses the diasporic origins of Palo Mayombe, a Kongo-Cuban religious tradition, while seeking to analyze how it fulfills, in a new transplanted setting, the spiritual needs of a given segment of the Cuban immigrant population in the United States—designated here as the “strangers in a new land”—“serving not only as a healing mechanism but also a vehicle towards the preservation of ethnic and cultural identity.”
Discusses the oral and written life histories and other personal testimonies of African Americans. It clears up the realities behind invisible enclaves and spotlight of the immigrant's own history. Professor John H. McWhorter argues that modern America is the home to millions of immigrants who were born in Africa. He notes that their cultures and identities are separated between Africa and the U.S. However, his vision of an unencumbered, native-born black ownership of black is considered optimistic. Transnational identities of immigrants and their children are formed, negotiated and projected primarily within their experiences.
"The Spanish expression--la cultura cura (culture heals)--is an affirmation of the potential healing power of a variety of cultural practices that together constitute the ethos of a people"
Review also covers Whither Thou Goest -- Creoles of Color in the Bayou Country by Carl A. Brasseaux and others; and 'Who Set You Flowin'?' by Farah Jasmine Griffin
Develops data from interviews about stereotypes of Jamaican and Barbadian men and women. The popular music from Jamaica and Barbados is used as a lens for understanding the cultures within which the respondents develop their gender stereotypes. The stereotype data is then compared with the music that is popular during the interviews.
Part of the vision depicted in the novels Middle Passage and Mimic Men is that the image local history is the scenery and landscape. Expresses idea that colonization creates nothing. It is obvious in a place, thrives there then disappears.
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
310 p., "The idea baianidade is very much a model, a source of inspiration, the translation of concrete reality. All cultural identities are just that: ideas. ...They unite people, facilitate dialogue, summarize important, beautiful values. As can also serve to alienate us from other people, to justify to ourselves, our faults and mistakes." --The Author, "Agnes Mariano e a "Invenção da Baianidade" (www.passieweb.com).
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
385 p., The study is not a work about religion but rather of black African identity. Leaning on three black African societies (Yoruba of Benin and Nigeria, Agni-Akan and Senufo Ivory Coast), the author investigates the notion of person. Faced with the question of death, passing moment of earthly existence of man to his condition.
Fox discusses Lydia Cabrera, a novelist and short story writer many consider the mother of Afro-Cuban studies. Examined are her contributions to Cuba's Africanized popular culture, as well as her bridging the cultures of France, Africa and Cuba.;
Crahan,Margaret E. (Author) and Knight,Franklin W. (Author)
Format:
Book, Whole
Publication Date:
1979
Published:
Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press
Location:
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
159 p, Contents: The African migration and the origins of an Afro-American society and culture / Franklin W. Knight and Margaret E. Crahan; The cultural links / Harry Hoetnik;
African and Creole slave family patterns in Trinidad / B.W. Higman; Myalism and the African religious tradition in Jamaica / Monica Schuler; Jamaican Jonkonnu and related Caribbean festivals / Judith Bettelheim; The African impact on language and literature in the English-speaking Caribbean / Maureen Warner Lewis; The African presence in the poetry of Nicolás Guillén / Lorna V. Williams.
