Cultural Penetration

Many philosophers and scholars have ventured to define and debate cultural penetration and whereas we may agree with some of their arguments for or against, the fact is, cultural penetration has been with us from the beginning of humankind and will be with us forever.

Because the British were such vicious and determined colonialist, building for themselves an empire 'on which the sun would never set', in modern civilization, it's the English language which has prevailed worldwide.

We in Jamaica, having been enslaved then colonized by the British, did not escape. And while I am happy to have learnt that Interational language, I am still upset about the lengths they went to, to demonize and even demolish the language and culture of my African ancestors. 

Despite the brutality, some things prevailed somehow so when you listen to the Jamaican Patois, our language, you realize that many of its words and phrases were adopted from the Twi language, the mother tongue of over nine million Ashanti people. 

I am mulling on the issue of cultural penetration and how a tiny little island like Jamaica has managed  to have its culture adopted worldwide.

This trend of thought began when I saw and listened to the video below.

This video also demonstrates the ridiculousness of still having words commonly used in Jamaca and internationally, labeled 'bad words,' (supposedly indecent language) and the use still being punished in by a fine!

These are totally innocuous words which the British oppressors could not understand when their slaves/colonial subjects used them to express defiance, surprise, frustration etc. hence they banned them and established a 40 shilling fine each time they heard them.

Despite us being independent for 60 years and the shilling not even being in existence anymore, these so-called 'bad words' continue to attract a menial fines. 

It has always been my opinion that the law has never been repealed only because it gives the police another stupid and unnecessary reason to continue oppressing us, although no one uses them more than the police themselves!

In fact, I had the experience some years ago, of a policeman stopping me for a traffic offence and during our heated exchange, he told me some of his badwords and I told him some of mine, only to have my arrest include a charge of using 'indecent language!'

So, the language persecution continues.

This is amusing in some respects, for while we continue with that nonsense, through cultural penetration, our badwords have been adopted by many people throughout world and awarded much love. 

For example, it is impossible to walk around Georgetown in Guyana and not hear one of our favorite 'badwords' raass, in common use.

I recall once being in Dominica in the Eastern Caribbean too and hearing a slew of 'raass, bumboclaat, etc. Thinking a Jamaican was around, I went to introduce myself, only to find that through cultural penetration, the user had been an Antiguan. 

On another occasion I was sitting on a park bench in Colon, Panama, when I heard a teenager shouting  a bunch of  'raass, bumboclaat' etc. on top of his voice. When I approached him, I discovered to my great amusement that he spoke no English, no Patois but was fluent in our 'badwords' which he learnt from his long-dead grandfather who had worked on the Panama Canal and had settled there when the project was completed.

So yes, thanks to cultural penetration, I could write pages on how our language, food and culture took wings long ago.

Let me instead address my favorite term; 'bumbo/bumboclaat ' which is still deemed a 'badword' in Jamaica.

Some years ago, when my grandson attended St. Peter and Paul Preparatory School in Jamaica, I heard him saying 'bumbo'. As it was deemed a 'big people word' in my house, I admonished him gently, only for him to show me the book he was reading entitled "Bumbo the Elephant'".

Horrified, but suspecting it was a misprint, since elephants were often called Dumbo or Jumbo, I approached his teacher the next day to demand that the book be withdrawn. She however insisted that  she had no authority to do so, as books were provided by the Ministry of Education.😓

Long story short, since then, the sanitized bumbo/bumboclaat  has become my favorite expression whenever I am astonished, hurt, impressed, unnerved, stupefied, dumfounded etc!

Thanks to the video above, I have now learnt that bumboclaat has taken on new meanings, in that it has been adopted as the name for a dog and the new definition declared as; ETERNAL PEACE.😅😅😅😅

I like this new trend.

All power to cultural penetration.

https://youtu.be/LYfi5487FEk

 

Of Yoga, Blackness and the Maroons

I suppose I should have long recognised that many of the values held by my generation are passé as far as the younger generation is concerned. I am really speaking here to the issues of mental slavery, black pride, self confidence...all the things Marcus Garvey and other great black philosophers of yore, thought important.

I suppose its the new age sense of “couldn't care less” that allows most young black people to see nothing strange about their cohorts who bleach their skins.

Actually, I have found it quite significant recently when an immediate silence prevailed after a few people who claimed to have a problem with the issue, were shut up by Vybes Kartel. 

He did this by pointing out to them that people who straightened their hair to try to look white or bought wigs to disguise their roots, had no moral authority to criticise him! The silence that has prevailed since his rejoinder is deafening! 

Oh poor Jamaica. Poor black people, we so hate ourselves, are so immersed in mental slavery and so confused to boot.

You know all this reflection came out of an incident yesterday when I actually lost my temper to the point where I can’t even recall what I said! 

To most people, losing one's temper is a matter of course. In fact, for many years it was for me too until I started yoga some 40 years ago. In fact, I am here to tell you that if I have lost my temper twice in the last 30 years and for me, that is plenty.

But I totally lost it yesterday. 

This was at Cudjoe Mountain in St. Catherine.

Cudjoe had been a brave maroon leader and while most history I have seen about him places him in Portland and occasionally other northern parishes such as Trelawny, St. Mary and St. Ann, there is an area located just above Point hill in St. Catherine which bears his name.

At Cudjoe Mountain, there is a small cave called the Mountain River Cave, which had been used by the Tainos and which has a few drawings verifying their activities there. According to local lore, Cudjoe later used that cave as a hideout as he escaped from the British, hence the district is called after him.

A few of the persons we met there claimed to be Maroons and when you consider that the Maroons of history took money from the British to hunt down, trap and return newly arrived slaves from Africa who dared to escape from bondage, I suppose this could explain why mental slavery and a disdain for black people is alive and well in Cudjoe Mountain.

Well I really don’t know how widespread it is, but amazingly the stark experience I had with was with an influential resident there, the employee of the Jamaica National Heritage Trust who organises tours to the cave.

That is what led to my burst of temper.

At first, I thought she was making a joke as we set out to cross the river and someone made a comment about the size and slipperiness of the boulders that we had to walk on to get to the other side. Her comment was 'When I take white people here they don’t complain." I found the comment a bit out of sorts, but ignored it for Jamaica's history was replete with that type of attitude by menial workers in the tourism industry, but with training it became just that....history.

However, as we hiked further up the treacherous, rocky hillside, someone else complained about the steepness of the path. Again I heard her outburst “When I bring white people here they don’t complain.” Although I found it a bit annoying, I still said nothing for I have really matured and am less prone to be emotive.

However when we got to the top and discovered that the highly promoted cave was very small and the markings on the top were fairly insignificant and someone commented on this only to be rejoined by her third 'When I take white people here they don’t complain."

 That's when I totally lost it! 

I know I gave here a good cussing on top of my voice and walked off back down the hill to cool off in the river, but I really don’t recall what I actually said except I know I cursed her for rude, disrespectful and suffering from mental slavery. I might also have called her an asshole. I hope I did!

What amazed me however, is that no one else in the party who heard these comments seemed to have a problem with it. Or if they had a problem, they certainly kept it to themselves, hence my musings about the values of my generation being passé. 

People my age were nurtured in the 60's when black pride and the defense of our race was the ultimate purpose in life, so no one could insult our race in that way and get away with it for our motto then was 'Say it loud, I am black and I am proud." And being black and proud meant embracing all aspects of our blackness with pride. But now, bleaching, wigs etc have made such sentiments obsolete.

Time for you to get some cake soap Joan and chill out, compliments of Vybes Kartel et al.