tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-48009470560247848412023-11-16T05:34:58.111-05:00Review of the Indigenous Caribbean(formerly The CAC Review - ISSN 1684-0232)Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.comBlogger581125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-86319261294786623392021-06-27T19:43:00.001-04:002021-06-27T19:43:47.791-04:00After 1492: The Nature of the Damage (UWI Symposium on Indigenous Peoples and Environmental Sustainability)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipN6JnhikusNHCW9-Zwz7UNnpYa9LOlR9iLcFXYI1mtlQBk50buYc8KtdZYCK7A62OarSnBtbhwLosVejdk2_mkbGbzDY7i5d1nBlf1veSCVodl7m5eWLaT7Tity4W-2QJFadJHYXY53U/s842/uwista-conf-photo.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="472" data-original-width="842" height="358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipN6JnhikusNHCW9-Zwz7UNnpYa9LOlR9iLcFXYI1mtlQBk50buYc8KtdZYCK7A62OarSnBtbhwLosVejdk2_mkbGbzDY7i5d1nBlf1veSCVodl7m5eWLaT7Tity4W-2QJFadJHYXY53U/w640-h358/uwista-conf-photo.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">On <b>Monday, October 12, 2020</b>, it was my special honour to participate as the Featured Speaker at a symposium hosted at the University of the West Indies in St. Augustine, Trinidad. The symposium was co-organized by the Faculty of Law and the Santa Rosa First People's Community and it was titled, "</span><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><b><a href="https://www.facebook.com/UWISTA/videos/905924563271777/" target="_blank">Our First Peoples: Leading Us Toward Environmentally Sound and Sustainable Communities</a></b>". The timing of the event was pertinent: held on the 528th anniversary of the entry of Christopher Columbus in the Caribbean, it was also timed to coincide with "The First Peoples' Day of Recognition" and "Heritage Week," with activities running from October 9-14, 2020. One of the most impressive features of this wonderful event was that it involved a live <b>gathering of Indigenous representatives from across the Caribbean, South America, Central America, and North America</b>.</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">My feature address was titled, "</span></span><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><b>After 1492: The Nature of the Damage</b>". The presentation was cautious and sceptical about the sudden intrusion into the region of notably foreign narratives about "environmental sustainability" and the assumption that there must be "Indigenous perspectives" ready-made and waiting for the arrival of this narrative. I alerted those present to the dangers of a Green Imperialism and Green Structural Adjustment by pointing to the historical and geopolitical context in which this narrative has been granted prominence by powerful political and corporate interests.</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The focus of the presentation was on </span></span><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">three dimensions of Indigenous knowledge that I think have gained new prominence, and even new urgency, in the present so-called "pandemic": <span style="color: #cc0000;"><b>one</b> </span>involves the long-standing question of <b>how we manufacture problems for the world</b> by adhering to clearly flawed <b>dichotomous frameworks that separate humans from nature</b>, and set the two in opposition. The <b><span style="color: #cc0000;">second </span></b>concerns the need, in the case of Trinidad, to draw inspiration, strength, and practical solutions not just from Amerindian Indigenous knowledge, but from what we might call the <b>Exogenous Indigenous</b>—peoples from Africa and India who brought with them not just some implements, and even some seeds, but also a wealth of agricultural, horticultural, and herbal knowledge, much of which has survived and blended with other knowledge systems in the Trinidadian context. The <b><span style="color: #cc0000;">third</span></b>, is the recurring and still unresolved issue of <b>food security</b>, or food insecurity, a problem laid bare in the sun by the current "pandemic".</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The event was followed by a joint appearance by Chief Ricardo Bharat Hernandez and myself on Tony Fraser's radio programme on <b>Power 102 FM</b> on <b>October 14, 2020</b>.<br /></span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">All of the files for these two events follow below: a flyer for the symposium; the program of the symposium; a video showing my presentation alone; the complete proceedings of the symposium (which can also be viewed on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/UWISTA/videos/905924563271777/" target="_blank">Facebook</a>); and, a podcast of the joint radio interview on Power 102.</span></span></p>
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe class="scribd_iframe_embed" data-aspect-ratio="0.7729220222793488" data-auto-height="false" frameborder="0" height="800" scrolling="no" src="https://www.scribd.com/embeds/513249370/content?start_page=1&view_mode=scroll&access_key=key-LxVyBXcUnBnxEh39cAZI" tabindex="0" title="Flyer for October 12, 2020 UWI Symposium" width="600"></iframe></div><p style="-x-system-font: none; display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,Sans-serif; font-size-adjust: none; font-size: 14px; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font: 14px Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin: 12px auto 6px;"><a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/513249370/Flyer-for-October-12-2020-UWI-Symposium#from_embed" style="text-decoration: underline;" title="View Flyer for October 12, 2020 UWI Symposium on Scribd">Flyer for October 12, 2020 ...</a> by <a href="https://www.scribd.com/user/4998882/Maximilian-Forte#from_embed" style="text-decoration: underline;" title="View Maximilian Forte's profile on Scribd">Maximilian Forte</a></p>
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe class="scribd_iframe_embed" data-aspect-ratio="0.7729220222793488" data-auto-height="false" frameborder="0" height="800" scrolling="no" src="https://www.scribd.com/embeds/513249369/content?start_page=1&view_mode=scroll&access_key=key-KX1ANlbTz0W7QPuVVUr7" tabindex="0" title="Conference Program, "Our First Peoples: Leading Us Toward Environmentally Sound and Sustainable Communities," UWI, Trinidad, October 12, 2020." width="600"></iframe></div><p style="-x-system-font: none; display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,Sans-serif; font-size-adjust: none; font-size: 14px; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font: 14px Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin: 12px auto 6px;"><a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/513249369/Conference-Program-Our-First-Peoples-Leading-Us-Toward-Environmentally-Sound-and-Sustainable-Communities-UWI-Trinidad-October-12-2020#from_embed" style="text-decoration: underline;" title="View Conference Program, "Our First Peoples: Leading Us Toward Environmentally Sound and Sustainable Communities," UWI, Trinidad, October 12, 2020. on Scribd">Conference Program, "O...</a> by <a href="https://www.scribd.com/user/4998882/Maximilian-Forte#from_embed" style="text-decoration: underline;" title="View Maximilian Forte's profile on Scribd">Maximilian Forte</a></p><div style="text-align: center;"><h3>After 1492: The Nature of the Damage</h3>
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</div>Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-41477212973624237172021-06-27T14:20:00.003-04:002021-06-27T14:20:56.252-04:00Maroons, Indigenous Peoples, and Self-Determination: The 13th Annual Charles Town Maroon Conference<p style="text-align: center;"> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8RtwrFtz2JIlI6XPCr0ek00MTBVHMohRncOcEkIxQIVAu-O7s-6QfLH_1dQwh6SWXoz8Ix2FYBAzirZgzQIKF7kjcakJ9v7zflc0xOzqRLd33b0r2DQm2g3ENPuEHHTLkkcCRi_ARG0I/s1200/12th+CTMC+Flyer+%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="1200" height="424" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8RtwrFtz2JIlI6XPCr0ek00MTBVHMohRncOcEkIxQIVAu-O7s-6QfLH_1dQwh6SWXoz8Ix2FYBAzirZgzQIKF7kjcakJ9v7zflc0xOzqRLd33b0r2DQm2g3ENPuEHHTLkkcCRi_ARG0I/w640-h424/12th+CTMC+Flyer+%25281%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">On Thursday, June 24, 2021, I was honoured to participate (by virtual means) in the <b><a href="https://www.maroons-jamaica.com" target="_blank">13th Annual International Charles Town Maroon Conference and Festival</a></b>. My presentation focused on <b>The State, the Church, and Indigenous Self-Determination in Trinidad & Tobago</b>. You can listen to the audio file of the spoken presentation, or watch the video presentation of the proceedings below. The conference program follows next.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The purpose of the presentation was to outline both the advances and successes of the work done over the past four decades (45 years) by the leadership of the Carib Community in seeking greater national visibility, official recognition, and a land grant. At the same time, I discuss some of the constraints that have been imposed by the Community's relationships with both the state and the Catholic Church. This information can be used to reflect on the strategy of trying to build autonomy at the same time as leading a cultural resurgence, in the absence of significant economic resources.</span></p>
<p style="-x-system-font: none; display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,Sans-serif; font-size-adjust: none; font-size: 14px; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font: 14px Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin: 12px auto 6px;"> <a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/513247340/13th-Annual-International-Charles-Town-Maroon-Conference-Programme-June-23-and-24-2021#from_embed" style="text-decoration: underline;" title="View 13th Annual International Charles Town Maroon Conference Programme - June 23 and 24, 2021 on Scribd">13th Annual International Charles Town Maroon Conference Programme - June 23 and 24, 2021</a> by <a href="https://www.scribd.com/user/4998882/Maximilian-Forte#from_embed" style="text-decoration: underline;" title="View Maximilian Forte's profile on Scribd">Maximilian Forte</a> on Scribd</p><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe class="scribd_iframe_embed" data-aspect-ratio="0.7729220222793488" data-auto-height="false" frameborder="0" height="800" id="doc_35303" scrolling="no" src="https://www.scribd.com/embeds/513247340/content?start_page=1&view_mode=scroll&access_key=key-SskNjo5T7TK5LXIz1V6V" title="13th Annual International Charles Town Maroon Conference Programme - June 23 and 24, 2021" width="600"></iframe>
<iframe frameborder="0" height="252" scrollbars="no" scrolling="no" src="https://audiomack.com/embed/song/zeroanthropology/the-state-the-church-and-indigenous-self-determination-in-trinidad?background=1" width="100%"></iframe>
<iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/I7O8Jpmuc7w?start=9661" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe></div>Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-80286267099971140132020-06-17T09:42:00.001-04:002020-06-17T11:13:46.479-04:00The Pandemic: Indigenous Perspectives on Survival, Adaptation, Rebuilding, and Preparedness<br />
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<i><b>Statement released by Chief Ricardo Bharath Hernandez,<br />Santa Rosa First Peoples Community,<br />Arima, Trinidad & Tobago,<br />June 16, 2020.</b></i><br />
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As Amerindians<span lang="en-US">/Indigenous Peoples in the Caribbean, we are historically well acquainted with a series of epidemics and pandemics. </span>We<span lang="en-US"> therefore </span>have a lot of historical experience in suffering and surviving from both local epidemics and regional pandemics. We have seen some of the worst in the past, and now the rest of the world is getting a small taste of what we had to go through. The big difference is that we did not have a World Health Organization looking into our situation; nobody came to our assistance; there was no protection or support from the authorities; we were left to our own devices. We have survived the very worst, <span lang="en-US">rebuilt our economies, </span>and we are <span lang="en-US">still </span>here today thanks to our ancestors’ survival skills.<span lang="en-US"> We have some lessons to offer from those experiences.</span></div>
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Here are some key points from our historical experience: </div>
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(i) “by 1518 only 16,000 [Taino] survived. That year a <b>smallpox epidemic</b> swept through the Spanish colonies, a <b>pandemic</b>, according to the historical demographer Henry Dobyns, that by 1525 had left no American culture untouched. By 1545 the 29 sugar mills on Hispaniola were using nearly 6,000 non-Taino from the South American mainland and the Lesser Antilles and 3,300 Africans as laborers”.<sup><a class="sdendnoteanc" href="https://draft.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4800947056024784841#sdendnote1sym" name="sdendnote1anc"><sup>i</sup></a></sup></div>
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(ii) In <b>1739, a smallpox outbreak</b> “decimated” Trinidad’s Indian population.<sup><a class="sdendnoteanc" href="https://draft.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4800947056024784841#sdendnote2sym" name="sdendnote2anc"><sup>ii</sup></a></sup><span lang="en-US"> </span> </div>
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<span lang="en-US">(iii) </span>In 1817 the <b>Yellow Fever </b><span lang="en-US"><b>Epidemic </b></span><b>swept Trinidad</b>, followed by the <b>cholera</b> epidemic in the <b>1850s</b>; and, <b>smallpox</b> in the <b>1870s</b>.<sup><a class="sdendnoteanc" href="https://draft.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4800947056024784841#sdendnote3sym" name="sdendnote3anc"><sup>iii</sup></a></sup></div>
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<span lang="en-US">(iv) </span>“<b>In 1854 a cholera epidemic</b> struck North coast Indians<span lang="en-US">*</span> heavily” (pp. 14–15); “The same epidemic decimated the Amerindian population living in the hills around the old Arima mission”.<sup><a class="sdendnoteanc" href="https://draft.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4800947056024784841#sdendnote4sym" name="sdendnote4anc"><sup>iv</sup></a></sup></div>
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(v) “On the north coast...the surviving Amerindian families were brought together in the mission at Cumana (Toco); but they disappeared inexorably, and the <b>cholera epidemic of 1854</b> apparently exterminated nearly all the north coast Indians. By 1885 there were only perhaps a dozen half-caste Amerindian families on the north coast”; “In Arima the story was the same. In 1840 there were only about three hundred Indians of pure descent in the old mission, mostly aged. Occasionally surviving members of a group of Chayma Indians used to come down from the heights beyond Arima to the Farfan estate, to barter wild meats for small household goods. But after 1854 they were seen no more: <b>cholera had extinguished the Chaymas</b>”.<sup><a class="sdendnoteanc" href="https://draft.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4800947056024784841#sdendnote5sym" name="sdendnote5anc"><sup>v</sup></a></sup></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Chief Ricardo leading his people in prayer</td></tr>
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<span lang="en-US">Our Amerindian/Indigenous peoples are closely connected to Mother Earth and all the life she sustains. Of benefit to the modern world are the </span>Caribbean Indigenous lessons on listening to and learning from the natural environment; revising our relationships with animals; <span lang="en-US">and </span>building self-sustaining local agriculture.</div>
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<b>Part of this pandemic appears to stem from an imbalance between humans and other animals</b>. We cannot afford to continue viewing the natural environment with contempt, or as something to be devoured. <span lang="en-US">The “Medicine Man or Woman” is very important in our culture, with knowledge of the healing herbs and minerals which are gifted to us in the natural environment. </span>The Caribbean Amerindian<span lang="en-US">/Indigenous </span>relationship with the natural, animal world was intensely intimate. It was not just a matter of living in a “harmonious relationship” with nature—it is about being one and the same with nature, inseparable, indivisible, and indistinguishable. On the mainland Amerindian ancestor communities in places such as Guyana, heralded themselves as members of the “Jaguar clan” or the “Eagle clan”—this was not just a matter of empty symbolism. They firmly believed that their ultimate ancestor was a jaguar, or an eagle, and so on. <b>We need to rein</b><span lang="en-US"><b>s</b></span><b>titute that relationship of respect, knowing our limits as human beings, and being attentive to the realities of where we live.</b></div>
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Instead of being constantly and repeatedly exposed to destruction from recurring phenomena, we must learn lessons from the past, and implement changes.</div>
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A hurricane will flatten one of our Caribbean neighbours, razing as many as 90% of all structures. So what do they do? They rebuild the same sort of structures that are vulnerable to destruction from hurricanes—square or rectangular houses, with jagged rooftops. <b>The best structure is the Amerindian</b><span lang="en-US"><b>/Indigenous</b></span><b> one, which is conical, and at the very worst is easy to rebuild.</b></div>
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The same is true about having an abundance of root crops (ground provisions)<span lang="en-US">, as practised by the Amerindians/Indigenous People. </span><span lang="en-US"><b>Ground provisions </b></span><b>cannot be destroyed in a hurricane, thus ensuring that people have a ready supply of food in order to rebuild.</b></div>
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This pandemic revealed similar frailty. We are fragile by design: it is an outcome of inappropriate policies, and inadequate planning. Our dependency on foreign imports of food placed us in a situation of great insecurity. People were also dependent on going out to buy food, rather than turning to supplies that could have been provided by their own gardens—we were over exposed, and for no good reason. </div>
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In rebuilding, there needs to be a dramatic new investment in local agriculture, and a national plan that includes everyone—not just career “farmers”. Every yard needs to be planted. There should be an abundance of cassava flour that renders imported wheat flour too expensive, and is even a less healthy alternative to cassava flour. We need to teach our people what they can do with local products, that they are not currently doing. A national farming system could turn every household into a unit of production, with excess supply purchased by the state, and processed into items with a long shelf-life. National education, through government media programming, could teach people how they can contribute, or how they can use items such as cassava flour.</div>
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What can we do to make life during the next pandemic more bearable? How can we act now, to not be like victims in the future? What must change? How can the Indigenous People of Trinidad & Tobago offer some vital guidance?</div>
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Trinidad’s Indigenous People are prepared to lead in establishing the foundations of a national cassava industry. <span lang="en-US">We already have the support of the University of Trinidad and Tobago. </span>The First Peoples Heritage Village<span lang="en-US">, currently under construction, </span>is well positioned <span lang="en-US">to</span> become the nucleus of an expanded agricultural enterprise—it will be a true model, to all other Trinidadians.</div>
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<span style="font-size: medium;"><b>Notes</b></span></div>
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<a class="sdendnotesym" href="https://draft.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4800947056024784841#sdendnote1anc" name="sdendnote1sym">i</a> <span lang="en-US">“Indians” here as stated by the Authors, refer to the Amerindians, and not East Indians. </span><span lang="en-US">From: Keegan, William. (1992). “Death Toll”. </span><span lang="en-US"><i>Archaeology </i></span><span lang="en-US">(January/February), p. 55.</span></div>
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<span style="color: navy;"><span lang="zxx"><u><a class="western" href="http://muweb.millersville.edu/~columbus/data/ant/KEEGAN08.ANT*1" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: x-small;">http://muweb.millersville.edu/~columbus/data/ant/KEEGAN08.ANT</span></a></u></span></span></div>
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<a class="sdendnotesym" href="https://draft.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4800947056024784841#sdendnote2anc" name="sdendnote2sym">ii</a> <span lang="en-US">From: Ottley, C. Robert. (1955). </span><span lang="en-US"><i>An Account of Life in Spanish Trinidad (From 1498-b 1797). </i></span><span lang="en-US"><i>1st ed. Diego Martin, Trinidad: C. R. Ottley</i></span><span lang="en-US">, p. 42.</span></div>
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<a class="sdendnotesym" href="https://draft.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4800947056024784841#sdendnote3anc" name="sdendnote3sym">iii</a> <span lang="en-US">From Page 253 in: Joseph, E.L. (1970 [1838]). </span><span lang="en-US"><i>History of Trinidad. </i></span><span lang="en-US">London: </span>Frank Cass & Co., Ltd.</div>
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<a class="sdendnotesym" href="https://draft.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4800947056024784841#sdendnote4anc" name="sdendnote4sym">iv</a> <span lang="en-US">From: Goldwasser, Michele. (1994-96). “Remembrances of the Warao: the Miraculous Statue of Siparia, </span><span lang="en-US">Trinidad”. </span><span lang="en-US"><i>Antropologica</i></span><span lang="en-US">, p. 15.</span></div>
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<a class="sdendnotesym" href="https://draft.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4800947056024784841#sdendnote5anc" name="sdendnote5sym">v</a> <span lang="en-US">From: Brereton, Bridget. (1979) </span><span lang="en-US"><i>Race Relations in Colonial Trinidad</i></span><span lang="en-US">. </span> </div>
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<span lang="en-US">Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 130–131.</span></div>
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Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-72249786421165649232020-06-16T23:10:00.000-04:002020-06-16T23:10:02.559-04:00Trinidad: Chief Asks How Does Removing Columbus Statue Improve First Peoples?<div style="text-align: justify;">
Reproduced from <a href="https://www.stabroeknews.com/2020/06/15/news/regional/trinidad/trinidad-chief-asks-how-does-removing-columbus-statue-improve-first-peoples/" target="_blank">Stabroek News, June 15, 2020</a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixJ-l8PGI47yicyT-ZpxPyrLJ2tJGkFdy5Ff0l7MnuwihkvJEmR6uwwT0WBMrpJHTcyHAOuValbRihMFIaRyqLOzh1_EngEMAq7nwLq1Zx6KWSRnPXomJFNs4Sb5qllFbikuPk1G0f96E/s1600/columbus.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="806" data-original-width="1196" height="428" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixJ-l8PGI47yicyT-ZpxPyrLJ2tJGkFdy5Ff0l7MnuwihkvJEmR6uwwT0WBMrpJHTcyHAOuValbRihMFIaRyqLOzh1_EngEMAq7nwLq1Zx6KWSRnPXomJFNs4Sb5qllFbikuPk1G0f96E/s640/columbus.PNG" width="640" /></a></div>
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<i>Defaced: Red paint is splattered on the statue of Christopher Columbus in Columbus Square, corner of Independence Square and Duncan Street, Port of Spain.</i></div>
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Don’t kill Christopher Columbus a second time just for killing sake.</div>
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It will not do the First Peoples any good unless it’s accompanied by tangible measures to advance the indigenous people of Trinidad and Tobago.</div>
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So said Chief of the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community, Ricardo Bharath.</div>
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“We want to kill Columbus a second time and it doesn’t do one blooming thing for us,” Bharath told the Express yesterday.</div>
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His position comes even as another indigenous group, supported by the Emancipation Support Committee (ESC) through its Cross Rhodes Freedom Project, is making a call for the removal of Columbus’ statue in Port of Spain.</div>
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Bharath said he was invited by the ESC to make a statement at a recent indigenous ritual ceremony where the call for the removal of Columbus’ statue was made.</div>
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He said he made his position clear but it was drowned out.</div>
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Bharath said there remain several issues relating to the First Peoples which have not been addressed.</div>
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He said indigenous people of T&T were the ones most affected by the coming of Columbus in 1498.</div>
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He said it was 200 years after Columbus came, however, that the Spanish authorities began the decimation of the First Peoples.</div>
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“They forced them to give up their religion and their language. If they did not accept the new religion, they were sometimes put to death. Some of them fled and killed themselves,” he said.</div>
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“You hear about so many suicide points around the country. Many accepted the new religion because they did not want to face death or starvation.”</div>
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Bharath said only a fraction of the First Peoples remain today, most of them having intermarried.</div>
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Leader of another indigenous group, Queen of the Warao Nation, Donna Bermudez-Bovell, last week called on Port of Spain Mayor Joel Martinez to remove the statue of Columbus from Columbus Square and replace it with an indigenous freedom fighter.</div>
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The Warao Nation and the ESC have begun an online petition for support and thousands have responded.</div>
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Their calls to remove Columbus and other “racist” monuments comes after the removal of the statue of slave trader Edward Colston in Britain by Black Lives Matter protesters.</div>
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But Bharath cleared the air on the Santa Rosa First Peoples community’s position on the matter.</div>
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“I am not a Columbus fighter saying his statue must remain and neither am I asking for its removal,” he said yesterday.</div>
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“How does the removal of Columbus’ statue improve the lives and the plight of the descendants of the First Peoples today?</div>
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“If it is just removing Columbus’ statue for the sake of removing it, I see no benefit and no merit. The removal must be replaced with something significant to advance our cause today.</div>
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“And if that cannot be done, it’s a waste of time in fighting for the removal of a statue. What is done is done. By removing Columbus’ statue we cannot undo the past.”</div>
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Bharath said they have already presented a model of a monument to a government committee concerning the removal of the bones of indigenous peoples during excavation works in the restoration of the Red House.</div>
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He claimed funding has been the cause of the keep back in the setting up of this monument, which comprises an indigenous figure and remains of the First Peoples.</div>
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The Red House, site of Parliament, is a colonial relic allegedly constructed on a burial site of indigenous peoples.</div>
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Bharath listed some present and ongoing issues affecting the First Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago.</div>
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He said even though the descendants of indigenous people were considered a small group, they want a political voice, both at the local and central government levels.</div>
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He said they were promised assistance to establish an Amerindian village in Blanchissuesse and, to date, were still struggling with this with a small UNESCO grant.</div>
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“There are funds in the Public Sector Investment Programme for this but nobody seems to be able to get this out.</div>
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“We have land issues. There are areas we would like to see protected which are now being destroyed by quarrying.</div>
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“If none of those things can’t be done, I don’t see what is the fuss about this Columbus statue,” he said.</div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-24868599558307722252020-06-16T23:03:00.001-04:002020-06-16T23:03:25.568-04:00Trinidad & Tobago Government Breaks Ground on First Peoples' Site, Pledging More Support<div style="text-align: justify;">
Originally published as:</div>
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"<a href="https://www.looptt.com/content/govt-breaks-ground-first-peoples-site-pledges-further-support" target="_blank">Gov’t breaks ground on First Peoples site, pledges further support</a>"</div>
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on Loop News, by Nneka Parsanlal, February 4, 2020</div>
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Minister of Education, Anthony Garcia has pledged $5000 of his own money to the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community. </div>
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He made the promise at the sod turning ceremony for the construction of the Santa Rosa First Peoples Village in Arima today. </div>
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Garcia says that as the Member of Parliament for Arima and as President of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Trinidad and Tobago, he’s pleased to be part of the progression of the First Peoples in T&T. </div>
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Calling the Santa Rosa community, ‘the official indigenous community in Trinidad and Tobago’, Garcia also said that he’d be ensuring that they get further governmental support for their community. </div>
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Earlier in the ceremony, Chief of the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community, Ricardo Bharath Hernandez lamented that the community felt forgotten and overlooked by successive governments. He said that the community was ready and willing to meet government agencies halfway to get their village constructed, but the government never held up their end of the bargain. </div>
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Garcia promised that this time around would be different. </div>
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“You have my fullest commitment in the two roles I represent here today,” he said. </div>
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Hernandez also raised concerns about the First Peoples not getting their budgetary allocations, but Garcia promised that they wouldn’t have to worry for much longer. </div>
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“I want to assure you also that we will be speaking to the Minister of Culture, Community Development and the Arts, Dr Nyan Gasby Dolly to make sure that the allocations in the budget will be made available to you,” he said. </div>
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The proposed village will feature a number of traditional and indigenous depictions, including a cacique’s (chief) home, a kitchen and other familiar structures. </div>
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They'll also be hosting a fundraising event on May 23, in order to further facilitate works within the community. President Paula Mae Weekes has pledged her attendance.</div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-64253912890108405662020-06-16T22:59:00.001-04:002020-06-16T22:59:17.372-04:00UNESCO T&T pledges $176,000 to Santa Rosa First Peoples Community<div style="text-align: justify;">
Originally published on <a href="https://www.looptt.com/content/unesco-tt-pledges-176000-santa-rosa-first-peoples-community" target="_blank">LOOP NEWS, February 5, 2020</a></div>
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<i>Education Minister and President of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) of Trinidad and Tobago, Anthony Garcia.</i></div>
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The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) of Trinidad and Tobago, an agency of the Ministry of Education, has approved US$26,000.00 which is equivalent to TT$176,000 to the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community (SRFPC) to finance the construction of phase one of the First Peoples Community in Arima.</div>
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Speaking at the sod-turning ceremony on Tuesday, the President of UNESCO Trinidad and Tobago and Minister of Education, Anthony Garcia, said the investment highlights the importance of the project for the preservation of history and culture.</div>
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“Through the involvement of UNESCO we will be able to share with the wider society of Trinidad and Tobago insight into a culture that is so integral into who we are as a people today. Trinidad and Tobago boasts of an eclectic and cosmopolitan mix of religions, people, traditions and beliefs and this, is evident simply by looking around at the persons gathered here today. For many of us, tracing our lineage and understanding our heritage is difficult because of generations of misinformation, separation or migration. Therefore, to be able to engage in the establishment of this Heritage Village will be to the benefit of so many people who will now be able to have a better understanding of where they came from and what has contributed to the life that we know today.”</div>
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Garcia said the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community is recognised by the Government as the official representative of the country’s indigenous people. In December 2012, the Government agreed to allocate 25 acres of forested lands in the Arima Forest Reserve, to this community. The intended purpose was to demonstrate how a community could engage in sustainable forest-based livelihoods and contribute to the socio-economic development of the wider community while maintaining traditional cultural and spiritual values.</div>
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Minister of Agriculture, Lands and Fisheries, Clarence Rambharat, also attended the sod-turning ceremony. He urged society to begin recognising the First Peoples with the degree of pre-eminence which they deserve and that is now the norm in other countries, such as in Canada.</div>
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Chief of the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community, Ricardo Hernandez Bharath, in delivering remarks, thanked UNESCO for the assistance. He said this First Phase of the Heritage Village will consist of a building depicting the traditional home of an Amerindian Cacique/Chief, the traditional home of an Amerindian family and a traditional kitchen for the preparation of indigenous foods. These structures will serve as the genesis of an established physical Community for the Santa Rosa First People.</div>
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Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-68417551316503912692020-02-04T12:02:00.000-05:002020-02-04T12:29:14.287-05:00ARIMA BORN: Land, Labour, Power, and Colonial Mythology in Trinidad<br />
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Focusing on the history of the Arima Mission in the Island of Trinidad, ostensibly a mission for Indigenous people, the documentary below features what was learned from the baptismal registers of the Mission of Santa Rosa de Arima—in conjunction with historical texts, government documents, and official memoranda and reports of the time. What we encounter are four main “myths,” or working fictions: 1) the myth that the Mission was for Indians alone; 2) the myth of “Christian protection”; 3) the myth of assimilation; and, 4) the myth of extinction. The film, and the book on which it is based, argues that a proper understanding of the history of the rise and demise of the Mission has to be in relation to the slave plantation economy. Broadly speaking, we are dealing with a story at the intersection of land, labour, and power under conditions of oligarchic domination and the creation of poverty out of plenty.</div>
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Research that went into the book, <b><a href="https://www.alertpress.org/arima-born.html" target="_blank"><i>Arima Born</i></a></b>, on which the documentary below was based, became part of my <b>“knowledge repatriation” strategy</b>. This was accompanied by a series of events that, for some, would be examples of “<b>public anthropology</b>”.</div>
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<b>First</b>, copies of the book were deposited for free in various key access points: in Canada, copies were deposited with Libraries & Archives Canada, along with an e-book; in Trinidad, copies were deposited in the Heritage Collection of the National Library (NALIS), the Arima Public Library, and the West Indian Collection of the Alma Jordan Library of the University of the West Indies. </div>
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<b>Second</b>, free copies of the book were delivered to the Santa Rosa First People’s Community, in addition to providing copies to select members of the Arima community more broadly, including the Santa Rosa Roman Catholic Church.</div>
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<b>Third</b>, an offer was made to the leadership of the Santa Rosa First People’s Community to republish and print the book locally in Trinidad, under an imprint of its choice, with the majority of revenues going to the SRFPC.</div>
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<b>Fourth</b>, public presentations based on the book were made at the community centre of the Santa Rosa First People’s Community on December 10, 2019, and at the Arima Public Library on January 8, 2020. The slides below accompanied those public presentations, and are being made available for download:</div>
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<a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/445448931/ARIMA-BORN-Land-Labour-Power-and-Colonial-Mythology-in-Trinidad#from_embed" style="text-decoration: underline;" title="View ARIMA BORN: Land, Labour, Power, and Colonial Mythology in Trinidad on Scribd">ARIMA BORN: Land, Labour, P...</a> by <a href="https://www.scribd.com/user/4998882/Maximilian-Forte#from_embed" style="text-decoration: underline;" title="View Maximilian Forte's profile on Scribd">Maximilian Forte</a> on Scribd</div>
<iframe class="scribd_iframe_embed" data-aspect-ratio="1.2941176470588236" data-auto-height="true" frameborder="0" height="600" scrolling="no" src="https://www.scribd.com/embeds/445448931/content?start_page=1&view_mode=slideshow&show_recommendations=false&access_key=key-JCQ3kT9Lac3KAQUDjkPi" title="ARIMA BORN: Land, Labour, Power, and Colonial Mythology in Trinidad" width="100%"></iframe><br />
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<b>Fifth</b>, awareness of the issues presented in the book, and in the public presentations, was heightened by the publication of three separate articles by different authors in the national media in Trinidad & Tobago:</div>
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“<a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2019/10/22/arima-mission-a-slave-colony/" target="_blank"><b>Arima mission a ‘slave colony’</b></a>,” in <a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2019/10/22/arima-mission-a-slave-colony/" target="_blank"><i><b>Newsday</b></i></a> (Oct. 22, 2019), also available <a href="https://indigenousreview.blogspot.com/2019/10/arima-mission-slave-colony-author.html" target="_blank"><b>here</b></a>.</div>
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“<a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2019/12/12/first-peoples-want-hdc-house-for-carib-queen/" target="_blank"><b>First Peoples want HDC house for Carib Queen</b></a>,” in <a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2019/12/12/first-peoples-want-hdc-house-for-carib-queen/" target="_blank"><i><b>Newsday</b></i></a> (Dec. 12, 2019), also available <a href="https://indigenousreview.blogspot.com/2019/12/trinidads-indigenous-peoples.html" target="_blank"><b>here</b></a>.</div>
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“<a href="https://indigenousreview.blogspot.com/2020/02/counting-indios-review-by-bridget.html" target="_blank"><b>Counting ‘Indios’</b></a>,” review by Bridget Brereton in the <a href="https://trinidadexpress.com/opinion/columnists/counting-indios/article_92fa04b4-42f9-11ea-9061-b3b76ea48b69.html" target="_blank"><i><b>Daily Express</b></i></a> (Jan. 29, 2020), full text available <a href="https://indigenousreview.blogspot.com/2020/02/counting-indios-review-by-bridget.html" target="_blank"><b>here</b></a>.</div>
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<b>Sixth</b>, the documentary below is the latest form of public presentation of the knowledge gained from this research. The film is available both on <b><a href="https://youtu.be/eSqFqoM22ts" target="_blank">YouTube</a></b> and <b><a href="https://vimeo.com/389148920" target="_blank">Vimeo</a></b>.<br />
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Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-54724086069235339982020-02-01T09:40:00.000-05:002020-02-01T09:40:14.670-05:00“Counting ‘Indios’”: Review by Bridget Brereton<br />
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Originally published in the <i><a href="https://trinidadexpress.com/opinion/columnists/counting-indios/article_92fa04b4-42f9-11ea-9061-b3b76ea48b69.html" target="_blank">Daily Express</a></i>, </div>
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by Dr. Bridget Brereton<br />
January 29, 2020</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dr. Bridget Brereton, Trinidad Historian</td></tr>
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The history of Trinidad’s First Peoples before the coming of the Europeans has been researched by archaeologists like John Bullbrook, Irving Rouse and (more recently) Arie Boomert. After European contact (from 1498) written records are available to reconstruct what happened to these people, and the Arima based Santa Rosa First Peoples Community (SRFPC) has worked hard over several decades to remind us that their descendants today form an important part of the national population.</div>
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Maximilian Forte, a Canadian anthropologist at Concordia University in Montreal, has researched the history of Trinidad’s First Peoples, especially those associated with the Arima Mission, for many years. He published an important book in 2005, with the (typically academic!) title <i>Ruins of Absence, Presence of Caribs: (Post)Colonial Representations of Aboriginality in Trinidad and Tobago</i>, and is a long-standing collaborator with the SRFPC<i>.</i></div>
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Last month, I was lucky to attend the launch of Forte’s new book, <i>Arima Born</i>, held at the SRFPC Centre in Arima. Introducing him, Chief Ricardo Bharath Hernandez described him as a friend and “documentalist” of the SRFPC for over 20 years, a counsellor and teacher “with the characteristics of the eagle”.</div>
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In a fascinating presentation, Forte explained that his new book was based on the baptism registers of the Arima (Roman Catholic) Mission Church, covering the period 1820 to 1916, plus various other documents of the same period. In Trinidad, as in many other places, surviving church registers (baptisms, marriages, burials) are a key source for historians, especially when we remember that government or “civil” registration of births, marriages and deaths typically began only in the 1800s (1847 in Trinidad).</div>
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Forte said that his research for <i>Arima Born</i> has led him to expose what he called four “myths” about the Arima Mission, which was the main Catholic-run centre for surviving First Peoples (whom Spanish priests called “Indios” or Indians) in Trinidad from 1786. (Overall, 630 “Indios” appear in the Mission’s baptism registers.)</div>
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First, Arima’s population in the early 1800s was predominantly African not “Indian”: most baptisms recorded in the Mission registers for the 1820s were of enslaved (African) children. Arima was a small settlement surrounded by plantations, many owned by French Creole families, and worked by enslaved Africans, who outnumbered the First Peoples (“Indios”) in the “Indian Mission”.</div>
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Second, what Forte called the “myth of Christian protection”: in fact, the Church could and did sell or grant the lands of the Mission (in theory vested in the resident “Indios”) to others for plantation development, such as the Farfan family. And the Mission ran its own rum shop and allowed the “Indios” to run up debts to the shop, a way of controlling their labour and maybe forcing them to sell their lands.</div>
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Third, the myth of “assimilation”, the idea that the First Peoples of the Mission adopted Christianity and its associated lifestyles with little resistance. In fact, many fled from the Mission; disobeyed church teachings; buried their dead in the hills not in the Mission cemetery; and rejected Christian marriage (53 per cent of the baptisms of “Indio” children were “illegitimate” between 1820 and 1852).</div>
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Finally, the myth of “extinction”, the “vanishing Indian”: the “Indios” didn’t vanish, of course, but the Mission was disbanded when slavery ended in the 1830s. Now, their labour was no longer needed and their lands in Arima were wanted for plantation development. And so they were no longer counted; in the baptism registers, they were no longer identified as “Indios” from the 1840s, but given a new ethnic identity, such as “mestizo”.</div>
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Sadly, <i>Arima Born</i> was not available for purchase at the launch, but Forte’s new book—from his presentation clearly a major contribution—can be ordered online from Alert Press.</div>
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Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-18107848141295337462020-02-01T09:30:00.001-05:002020-02-01T09:30:37.196-05:00The Peopling of the Caribbean: New Research Findings<div style="text-align: justify;">
From the <i><a href="https://trinidadexpress.com/features/local/tech-proves-columbus-claims/article_e40cb870-4163-11ea-988d-cb66a6675fdd.html" target="_blank">Daily Express</a></i>, where it was published with the headline: "Tech proves Columbus’ claims: Hundreds-year-old beliefs debunked," republished from scitechdaily.</div>
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Jan 27, 2020</div>
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Christopher Columbus’ accounts of the Caribbean include harrowing descriptions of fierce raiders who abducted women and cannibalised men—stories long dismissed as myths.</div>
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But a new study published on January 10 in Scientific Reports suggests Columbus may have been telling the truth.</div>
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Using the equivalent of facial recognition technology, researchers analysed the skulls of early Caribbean inhabitants, uncovering relationships between people groups and upending long-standing hypotheses about how the islands were first colonised.</div>
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One surprising finding was that the Caribs, marauders from South America and rumoured cannibals, invaded Jamaica, Hispaniola and the Bahamas, overturning half a century of assumptions that they never made it further north than Guadeloupe.</div>
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“I’ve spent years trying to prove Columbus wrong when he was right: There were Caribs in the northern Caribbean when he arrived,” said William Keegan, Florida Museum of Natural History curator of Caribbean archaeology. “We’re going to have to reinterpret everything we thought we knew.”</div>
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Columbus had recounted how peaceful Arawaks in modern-day Bahamas were terrorised by pillagers he mistakenly described as “Caniba,” the Asiatic subjects of the Grand Khan. His Spanish successors corrected the name to “Caribe” a few decades later, but the similar-sounding names led most archaeologists to chalk up the references to a mix-up: How could Caribs have been in the Bahamas when their closest outpost was nearly 1,000 miles to the south?</div>
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But skulls reveal the Carib presence in the Caribbean was far more prominent than previously thought, giving credence to Columbus’ claims.</div>
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Face to face with the Caribbean’s earliest inhabitants</div>
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Previous studies relied on artefacts such as tools and pottery to trace the geographical origin and movement of people through the Caribbean over time. Adding a biological component brings the region’s history into sharper focus, said Ann Ross, a professor of biological sciences at North Carolina State University and the study’s lead author.</div>
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Ross used 3D facial “landmarks,” such as the size of an eye socket or length of a nose, to analyse more than 100 skulls dating from about A.D. 800 to 1542. These landmarks can act as a genetic proxy for determining how closely people are related to one another.</div>
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The analysis not only revealed three distinct Caribbean people groups, but also their migration routes, which was “really stunning,” Ross said.</div>
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Looking at ancient faces shows the Caribbean’s earliest settlers came from the Yucatan, moving into Cuba and the Northern Antilles, which supports a previous hypothesis based on similarities in stone tools. Arawak speakers from coastal Colombia and Venezuela migrated to Puerto Rico between 800 and 200 BC, a journey also documented in pottery.</div>
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The earliest inhabitants of the Bahamas and Hispaniola, however, were not from Cuba as commonly thought, but the North-west Amazon—the Caribs. Around AD 800, they pushed north into Hispaniola and Jamaica and then the Bahamas where they were well established by the time Columbus arrived.</div>
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“I had been stumped for years because I didn’t have this Bahamian component,” Ross said. “Those remains were so key. This will change the perspective on the people and peopling of the Caribbean.”</div>
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For Keegan, the discovery lays to rest a puzzle that pestered him for years: why a type of pottery known as Meillacoid appears in Hispaniola by AD 800, Jamaica around 900 and the Bahamas around 1000.</div>
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“Why was this pottery so different from everything else we see? That had bothered me,” he said. “It makes sense that Meillacoid pottery is associated with the Carib expansion.”</div>
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The sudden appearance of Meillacoid pottery also corresponds with a general reshuffling of people in the Caribbean after a 1,000-year period of tranquillity, further evidence that “Carib invaders were on the move,” Keegan said.</div>
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Raiders of the lost Arawaks</div>
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So, was there any substance to the tales of cannibalism?</div>
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Possibly, Keegan said.</div>
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Arawaks and Caribs were enemies, but they often lived side by side with occasional intermarriage before blood feuds erupted, he said.</div>
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“It’s almost a ‘Hatfields and McCoys’ kind of situation,” Keegan said. “Maybe there was some cannibalism involved. If you need to frighten your enemies, that’s a really good way to do it.”</div>
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Whether or not it was accurate, the European perception that Caribs were cannibals had a tremendous impact on the region’s history, he said. The Spanish monarchy initially insisted that indigenous people be paid for work and treated with respect, but reversed its position after receiving reports that they refused to convert to Christianity and ate human flesh.</div>
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“The crown said, ‘Well, if they’re going to behave that way, they can be enslaved,’” Keegan said. “All of a sudden, every native person in the entire Caribbean became a Carib as far as the colonists were concerned.”</div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-89349905425188654052020-02-01T09:23:00.001-05:002020-02-01T09:23:46.597-05:00Community centre on ancient burial ground?<div style="text-align: justify;">
Originally published in the <i><a href="https://trinidadexpress.com/news/local/community-centre-on-ancient-burial-ground/article_800237e2-8eb7-11e9-89ee-ab19a03ddb20.html" target="_blank">Daily Express</a></i>,</div>
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by Kimoy Leon Sing,<br />June 14, 2019</div>
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<i>Community centre: The newly opened San Fernando North Community Centre.</i></div>
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Flickering lights and power failure marked the official opening of the San Fernando North Community Centre on Wednesday.</div>
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Minister of Community Development, Culture and the Arts Dr Nyan Gadsby-Dolly and mayor of San Fernando Junia Regrello were at the site to open the multi-storey facility, which has had several unexplained occurrences since 2009.</div>
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It was reported during the initial phase of construction that these incidences were believed to be the work of spirits.</div>
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Some of these unexplained occurrences included falling tools and various accidents, after members of Amerindian tribes visited the site in 2009, claiming it as a First Peoples burial ground.</div>
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However, these claims were never confirmed.</div>
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According to Gadsby-Dolly, the centre sits on one acre of land along St Vincent Street, San Fernando and has taken 11 years to build to the tune of $16.8 million.</div>
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The multi-million dollar facility is a four-storey structure which consists of an auditorium with a capacity to hold 275 people along with changing rooms and washrooms, all located on the top two floors of the facility.</div>
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On the ground floor, the centre is comprised of an audio-visual room, computer room, a gymnasium, administrative office, kitchen, and multipurpose room.</div>
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There is parking in the basement and outside the building. There is also an elevator and ramps for the differently abled.</div>
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Speaking to media following the unveiling of the commemorative plaque and ribbon cutting ceremony, Gadsby-Dolly chuckled when asked about the supernatural occurrences at the centre.</div>
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She said, the country is steeped in folklore, but the flickering lights and power failure at the start of the opening ceremony was not any foreboding of evil and doom, but there was a reasonable explanation.</div>
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“We are a country rich in folklore and heritage and that’s good too. Burial sites are revered by T&T’s first people and were happy to have done the right kind of ceremony, which had the blessings of the Amerindian descendants,” she said.</div>
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“We feel that we are honoured to be on this site. We feel that it is a good addition to the foundation and it means that the whole centre is steeped in the good values of our ancestors and we look forward to that continuing,” Gadsby-Dolly said.</div>
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She noted with the change of government in 2010, work at the center halted, but with PNM returning to office in 2015, work at the center resumed in 2017.</div>
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At the opening ceremony, residents of Spring Vale, San Fernando, and environs said the center was a great addition to the community.</div>
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Regrello said the centre will now be used for various events and outreach programmes spanning education campaigns, health activities, and many cultural items.</div>
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It will also act as a safe haven and be a central pillar in the community, he said.</div>
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“These activities are simply some of the everyday initiatives that community centres such as this can host. However, one of the most critical factors that we all must pay heed is ensuring that all those who utilise this facility take responsibility for it. Treat it as your own. The long-term sustainability of this building, as well as many of the other upcoming projects in San Fernando, hinge on our citizens accepting responsibility for the general upkeep of these buildings,” he said.</div>
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Project manager of UDeCOTT, Terrence Beepath attributed the flickering lights and loss of power during the opening ceremony as power failure.</div>
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He said, “UDeCOTT is going to be here one year after, on this project to improve all aspects.”</div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-15173412450654258112019-12-12T22:53:00.001-05:002019-12-12T22:53:53.935-05:00Trinidad's Indigenous Peoples, Reparations, and the History of the Arima Mission<div style="text-align: justify;">
<i>On Tuesday, December 10, 2019, I delivered a presentation based on <a href="https://www.alertpress.org/arima-born.html" target="_blank"><b>Arima Born</b></a> at the Santa Rosa First People's Community Centre in Arima (Trinidad). In January (2020), on this site readers will be able to access a PDF with all of the slides used, plus there will be an accompanying video lecture. The event on Tuesday was covered by the local media--please see the article that follows.</i><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i><b>Maximilian Forte at the podium.</b></i></span> </div>
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Republished from <i><b>Newsday</b></i>, December 12, 2019<br />
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<a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2019/12/12/first-peoples-want-hdc-house-for-carib-queen/" target="_blank">First Peoples want HDC house for Carib Queen</a></h2>
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<b>by Tyrell Gittens</b><br />
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FIRST Peoples chief Ricardo Bharath-Hernandez is calling on the government to provide a house for Carib Queen Nona Aqua.</div>
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Bharath-Hernandez made the call on Tuesday <span style="background-color: yellow;">while speaking at the launch of the book <a href="https://www.alertpress.org/arima-born.html" target="_blank"><i><b>Arima Born</b></i></a> by <b>Maximilian Forte</b>, at the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community Centre</span>. </div>
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“We have asked, recently, for a house for our Carib Queen to be made available”.</div>
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He said the recently built Carina Housing Development was one site where a unit could be made available, not only because of the location, but also because of its historical significance of the land.</div>
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“A house ought to be made available in one of these housing developments, preferably Carina Gardens on the By-Pass Road. </div>
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“When you look at the (historical) maps you see the King of the Caribs, and all his descendants, occupying that land and they lost it whatever way,” said Bharath-Hernandez.</div>
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He said given the rate at which housing developments are being built, and houses distributed, he is puzzled as to why a house cannot be provided.</div>
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“In this development and this distribution of houses, one cannot be made available for our Carib Queen?</div>
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“And when you consider all the contributions that the early ancestors have made, to the (country's) development, tell me why it cannot be done. Why? Can anyone answer me that?” </div>
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<span style="background-color: yellow;"><b>Forte’s book explores the birth and baptismal records of indigenous people in Arima in the 1800s. The records were maintained by Arima’s RC church during the church’s Arima Mission.</b> </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: yellow;"><b>Forte, a lecturer in anthropology and Caribbean history at Concordia University, in an hour-long presentation on Tuesday detailed the hardships of Arima’s indigenous population during the church’s mission. During that time, they were stripped of their lands and made to provide free labour for plantation owners. </b></span></div>
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The way the First Peoples were treated, said Bharath-Hernandez, suggests why a house for the Carib Queen is the least that can be provided to descendants of the group. </div>
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<span style="background-color: yellow;"><b>He said the book also informs on the need to renew wider discussions of reparations for descendants of indigenous communities. He called on Forte to use his knowledge to help advocate, on behalf of the communities, to Caricom's reparation committee. </b></span></div>
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Noting that Caribbean governments are responsible for discussions on reparations he said that responsibility was not solely theirs but one they inherited. </div>
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<span style="background-color: yellow;"><b>“We heard it here today (in the book), and this is the kind of information that informs reparation.</b></span></div>
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Acknowledging a verbal apology had been made by representatives of the Santa Rosa RC Church to the indigenous community Bharath-Hernandez said, “We do not really want an apology with words coming from the mouth. That apology must come with some depth, some meaning.</div>
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“We feel that the church, at the level of collective churches in TT, can come together and, in some way, do something towards the development of the First Peoples”.</div>
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The Santa Rosa First Peoples Community is now turning its attention towards building a heritage park. Bharath-Hernandez, holding up an artist's rendering of what the park will look like, said, “We, the descendants of the original peoples, of the mission of Arima, are striving to establish our heritage village.</div>
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“If we can accomplish the first phase (of building) – there are many phases – then I think we would be well on our way to doing many things”.<br />
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<i><b><span style="font-size: x-small;">Dr. Brinsley Samaroo shares a comment during the discussion following the presentation.</span></b></i></div>
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Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-11935802743203005082019-10-24T18:02:00.000-04:002019-10-24T18:41:47.702-04:00Arima mission a ‘slave colony’<b><span style="font-size: large;">Author explores records of First Peoples</span></b><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">First Peoples visits San Fernando last week. - Marvin Hamilton</span></i></td></tr>
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By TRACY ASSING</div>
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<i>Originally published in </i><a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2019/10/22/arima-mission-a-slave-colony/" target="_blank"><b><span style="font-style: italic;">NEWSDAY</span>, October 22, 2019</b></a>.</div>
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In December, Maximilian C Forte returns with an exciting new text which deals specifically with the history of Trinidad’s indigenous population, titled Arima Born.</div>
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Forte has continued his research in the Carib/First Peoples' Community, which began in 1995, and has already contributed to the documentation of TT history with Ruins of Absence, Presence of Caribs, which was published in 2005. Forte’s other work on the Amerindians of Trinidad is titled Indigenous Resurgence in the Contemporary Caribbean: Amerindian Survival and Revival.</div>
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The new, self-published text (Forte’s Alert Press) is invaluable to any Caribbean history collection. Forte has based this new work on his study of the baptismal registers of the RC church in Arima for 1820-1916.</div>
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He is the first to admit that his work is incomplete, as huge chunks of the records were missing, illegible, and systems of record-keeping were flawed. He has included re-productions of the records he studied, bringing the page count to just over 300.</div>
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In the preface of the book he reveals that the registers he had the opportunity to examine were sent to the archives of the Archbishop’s residence and are now difficult to access.</div>
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Forte is a professor of anthropology in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Concordia University, Montreal, Canada. He first learned of the Carib Community in the early 90s through a newspaper article. He committed to sharing the results of his research with members of the Santa Rosa Carib/First Peoples Community, some of whom believe the very proof of their indignity lies in these records, but Forte says: “Identity is ultimately an idea.”</div>
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At Concordia University he teaches courses on indigenous resurgence, media and visual anthropology, political anthropology, Caribbean history and political economy, among other subjects.</div>
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He makes the point that the registers are “not only material evidence concerning the history of the Amerindians in the Arima Mission, they are also a detailed repository of data on African slaves in Arima and environs.”</div>
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This is so, he notes, “in a period when reparations are being studied and proposed at the highest political levels across the Caribbean.”</div>
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In Arima Born, readers learn that Arima was never actually a mission just for Amerindians. In fact, Forte describes it as a “slave colony.” Even though missions were initially conceived to “pacify” the Amerindian population, toward the end of the 1700s the Amerindians were, as ever, “caught between shifts of value.” The mission to “pacify” and Christianise failed. Then Don Miguel Sorzano, a Spanish slave owner who was the first corregidor, established the mission in 1784. There were other slave owners in Arima and at that time, the mission’s indigenous inhabitants included tribes forcibly displaced from their lands in Tacarigua, Caura and Arouca.</div>
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According to Forte: “Between field work, public works and armed security one cannot interpret the founding of the Mission as anything less than a form of state patronage in the service of landed capital and the existing oligarchy.” Amerindians even built homes for the disbanded 3rd West India Regiment.</div>
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Even when the British came, the Amerindians were only valued as long as their labour was valued. British authorities “imported” Amerindian/mestizo labourers from Venezuela, and they got to work shoulder to shoulder with the Amerindians of Trinidad: “Amerindian labour was utilised to create value in land, by clearing it for cultivation. Once that land was cleared, its value would have increased while the labour that produced that value would then become disposable.”</div>
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When the priests in the mission kept careful accounting through racial/ethnic registry, it was because real legal obligations and rights were attached to members of different groups. Forte concludes: “The Amerindians of Arima went extinct but in a political-economic sense only, rather in than either ethnic/cultural or biological terms.”</div>
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Arima Born shares more information about the socio-political structures which orchestrated this “paper genocide.” Two priests of interest who appear in Forte’s text are Fr Pedro Josef Reyes Bravo (1786-1818), who gave testimony in the trial of Luisa Calderon, and Msgr Charles de Martini (1895-1916), whose family came to own substantial cocoa estates during his tenure.</div>
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Forte also reveals that the position of Carib Queen did not exist before the 1800s and the first queen may even have come from Venezuela. In exploring the roots of the Santa Rosa Festival, which is essentially why a queen was appointed, he examines the similarities between the Santa Rosa Festival and the Cross Wake (Veloria de la Cruz). He also offers more information about the existence of Amerindians outside the missions, those who choose to live in the forests of the Northern Range. Add this to the fact that we have no way of knowing how many baptised children were not included in the register and how many were not baptised, or the numbers contained in the records which have been lost.</div>
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What becomes clear is that the assertion that Amerindians “died out” or “lost their heritage through miscegenation” is a myth. And, Forte wrote: “Far from offering the Amerindians ‘protection,’ the mission was an engine of their socio-economic demise."</div>
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<a href="https://www.alertpress.org/arima-born.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: x-large;">CLICK HERE TO ORDER A COPY OF <b><i>ARIMA BORN</i></b></span></a></div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-27569788498054688982019-10-17T20:19:00.001-04:002019-10-17T20:19:25.801-04:00Trinidad Caribs Inaugurate New QueenRepublished from:<br /><b><i>NEWSDAY, October 13, 2019</i></b><br />
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<b><a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2019/10/13/caribs-crown-queen-nona/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: x-large;">Caribs crown queen Nona</span></a></b><br />
<b><a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2019/10/13/caribs-crown-queen-nona/" target="_blank">First Peoples conduct ceremony in Arima</a></b><br />
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<i>by Janelle De Souza, with photos from Ayanna Kinsale</i><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Carib royalty: Nona López Calderón Galera Moreno Aquan is regal, during her inauguration as the new Carib Queen in the Carib Centre on Paul Mitchell Street, Arima.</td></tr>
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It was a very emotional moment for 63-year-old Nona Aquan when she was inaugurated as the new Carib Queen.</div>
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The indigenous ceremony took place yesterday at the Carib Centre, Arima, in the presence of First Peoples and political dignitaries alike.</div>
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Aquan, full name Nona Lopez Calderon Galera Moreno Aquan, shook, cried and smiled in her seat as she was surrounded and blessed by pyai (shamans or religious leaders) from TT, Suriname, Guyana, Guatemala, and Guyana. She, along with First Peoples chief Ricardo Bharath-Hernandez, will work together for the leadership and upliftment of TT’s indigenous people.</div>
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The ceremony started with Aquan cleansing her face and hands with consecrated water before seating herself on a chair at the centre of a large carat shed as Bharath-Hernandez explained the history of the institution of the Carib Queen.</div>
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He said the mission of Santa Rosa was established for the First Peoples but some Spanish people, and eventually others, settled and ‘mixed’ with them. He said while the chiefs had the authority there was always a female elder who would be their Keeper of Traditions. However, in the 1800s there was a crisis in the male leadership and so the Carib Queen was sanctioned by the Roman Catholic Church.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Carib Queen Nona Lopez Calderon Galera Moreno Aquan receives her blessings from 100-year-old-Moruga Chief Paul Navarro during her inauguration at the Carib Centre, Paul Mitchell Street, Arima</td></tr>
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<br />Aquan was then blessed by the pyai. The smoke of incense and tobacco filled the air as the pyai, including 100-year-old Moruga Chief, Paul Navarro, prayed to the great spirits in their native languages, and blessed her by wafting and blowing the smoke in her face and on her body.</div>
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During the blessing by the Suriname contingent, the queen’s headdress was placed upon her head. She was then invested with special beads and a cape before several First People’s women held sacred palm branches over her head and sang spiritual songs in tribute to the queen.</div>
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Explaining the symbolism of the branches, Bharath-Hernandez said when Jesus was born and King Herod pursued the family as they fled, palm branches fell on Mary to hide her from her attackers. Therefore the branches was a symbol of protection.</div>
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For the last part of the ceremony, Aquan knelt in front of her mother to receive her blessing – a kiss on the forehead.</div>
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With tears in her eyes, Aquan told members of the media she was touched and overwhelmed to see and feel her connection to all the indigenous people in TT and abroad. In between numerous hugs, congratulations, and well-wishing, she thanked her relatives, friends and all other supporters for being at the ceremony.</div>
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Asked what she planned to work on as queen she said, </div>
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“I want to see more things for the youth... get them more involved with the community because we are stronger in numbers. I think they should have a daycare for young mothers. There are a lot of aunties at home, providing (care) so the younger ones can go out and be comfortable.”</blockquote>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWCmcOgQ4wO0rs7dfOOPf1ASNDjnYCOVwX1-XwFDbwlpmOBs0FgTlHf_XW-YtZ8Feqwd52Yrqt57_troDewv-ceRuQFq2DEKPVUOfuhXNj-ughyphenhyphenpqVpREGAmcSi8LxZ6eFyoERFELllts/s1600/queen_nona3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="675" data-original-width="1024" height="420" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWCmcOgQ4wO0rs7dfOOPf1ASNDjnYCOVwX1-XwFDbwlpmOBs0FgTlHf_XW-YtZ8Feqwd52Yrqt57_troDewv-ceRuQFq2DEKPVUOfuhXNj-ughyphenhyphenpqVpREGAmcSi8LxZ6eFyoERFELllts/s640/queen_nona3.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Carib Queen Nona Lopez Calderon Galera Moreno Aquan, right, dances with guests at her inauguration held at the Carib Centre, Paul Mitchell Street, Arima on October 12.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br />Arima Mayor Lisa Morris-Julian attended the ceremony. She said, </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: justify;">
“I am extremely proud. I love how the First Peoples took something so colonial and made it so much theirs. The queen of the First Peoples is not just a title. She’s going to be responsible for so many things in our community, keeping the children of the community alive, so I am very happy.”</blockquote>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
There to witness the event were Permanent Representative to the UN, Pennelope Beckles; former culture minister Joan Yuille-Williams; Toco/Sangre Grande Regional Corporation chairman Terry Rondon; PNM PRO, Laurel Lezama-Lee Sing; and former minister of national diversity and social integration, Dr Roger Samuel. Also in attendance were visitors from the US, Belize, Dominica, and Japan.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The indigenous ceremony was followed by an inauguration mass at Santa Rosa RC Church, Arima.</div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-35273776730908128242019-10-14T13:17:00.002-04:002019-10-14T13:27:49.344-04:00Indigenous Survival Day: Forgetting Myths of Extinction<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<img border="0" data-original-height="803" data-original-width="796" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJoVKtHGJ-_eaQfJ_Sar-SN0bf8I8UFCt5wxYuu1YIaOPHsO61Uel1jcRR3MqX3Ns5Uj6eH0cSqBZnwgBeDZXxng8KnTo2Zfwc43quPMmfq9YkaQBiScevThvqgVR64Bv0gPO4Q77poQs/s400/lucayan.PNG" width="395" /></div>
<h2 style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<i><a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/world/the-lucayan-the-indigenous-people-christopher-columbus-could-not-annihilate#comments-area" target="_blank">The Lucayan: The Indigenous people Christopher Columbus could not annihilate</a></i></h2>
<h2 style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
October 14, 2019</h2>
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
The Lucayan did not know it was Oct. 12, 1492. They did not know that their island, in what would become the Bahamas, had been spotted by Spanish explorers led by a Genoese man named Christopher Columbus. And they did not know that in less than 30 years, their island would be empty from the coming genocide. As Columbus and his men approached, the Lucayans greeted them warmly, offering food and water, and “we understood that they had asked us if we had come from heaven,” he wrote in his journal. Then he added, “With 50 men they can all be subjugated and made to do what is required of them.”</blockquote>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
As the article progresses, it makes the observation that the previously dominant histories of Indigenous extinction in the Caribbean have now completely fallen apart, citing some of the latest research on the prevalence of Indigenous DNA in the contemporary Caribbean. The article takes us to the following reports:</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<img border="0" data-original-height="746" data-original-width="750" height="397" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGZGVts_JS7mjy2L_9JT2r2NY-WzxcCxiMtLgDqvJ0Oo5ObascL5lvBjJDEx1F741EwgVQ9lCYlHE6I1EoV0y_vQRabPjwFpsjRyaHY525cztATT6vtPeoFnPkBfzw1h6gHd7henD3_iw/s400/extinct.PNG" width="400" /></div>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://www.newsweek.com/taino-caribbean-indigenous-people-extinct-812729" target="_blank">TAÍNO: 'EXTINCT' INDIGENOUS AMERICANS NEVER ACTUALLY DISAPPEARED, ANCIENT TOOTH REVEALS</a><br />February 20, 2019</h2>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The tooth-derived genome is the first concrete genetic evidence that Taíno ancestry survives to this day. Scientists compared the ancient Bahamian genome to those of contemporary Puerto Ricans and discovered they were more closely related to the Taíno than to any other indigenous group in the Americas. This is likely to also be true of other Caribbean communities, the researchers said. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Lead author Eske Willerslev, who has posts at both the University of Cambridge, U.K., and the University of Copenhagen, said in a statement: "It has always been clear that people in the Caribbean have Native American ancestry, but because the region has such a complex history of migration, it was difficult to prove whether this was specifically indigenous to the Caribbean, until now."</blockquote>
<div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The study's other lead author, Hannes Schroeder from the University of Copenhagen, called the finding fascinating. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Many history books will tell you that the indigenous population of the Caribbean was all but wiped out, but people who self-identify as Taíno have always argued for continuity," he said in a statement. "Now we know they were right all along: there has been some form of genetic continuity in the Caribbean." </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>Jorge Estevez, a Taíno descendent working at the National Museum of the American Indian in New York, assisted the project team. "I wish my grandmother were alive today so that I could confirm to her what she already knew," he said. "It shows that the true story is one of assimilation, certainly, but not total extinction."</b></blockquote>
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhx2BTUvfcVfkToZt6CsT9Vg7dKZLHKSaeaJiTHesEexjChI5gvZsCvTgzrKcVozk2JrBRCG_xsTa3iLZVDMGhAn7jwxENlqEh805JDsI8y0EZybK9JGVHPISZbisCTSpqmDpfKIyG7lic/s1600/taino.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="588" data-original-width="768" height="306" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhx2BTUvfcVfkToZt6CsT9Vg7dKZLHKSaeaJiTHesEexjChI5gvZsCvTgzrKcVozk2JrBRCG_xsTa3iLZVDMGhAn7jwxENlqEh805JDsI8y0EZybK9JGVHPISZbisCTSpqmDpfKIyG7lic/s400/taino.PNG" width="400" /></a></div>
<h2 style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://phys.org/news/2018-02-indigenous-taino-present-day-caribbean-populations.html" target="_blank">Study identifies traces of indigenous 'Taino' in present-day Caribbean populations</a><br />February 19, 2018</h2>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
A thousand-year-old tooth has provided genetic evidence that the so-called "Taíno", the first indigenous Americans to feel the full impact of European colonisation after Columbus arrived in the New World, still have living descendants in the Caribbean today. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Researchers were able to use the tooth of a woman found in a cave on the island of Eleuthera in the Bahamas to sequence the first complete ancient human genome from the Caribbean. The woman lived at some point between the 8th and 10th centuries, at least 500 years before Columbus made landfall in the Bahamas. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The results provide unprecedented insights into the genetic makeup of the Taíno - a label commonly used to describe the indigenous people of that region. This includes the first clear evidence that there has been some degree of continuity between the indigenous peoples of the Caribbean and contemporary communities living in the region today. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Such a link had previously been suggested by other studies based on modern DNA. None of these, however, was able to draw on an ancient genome. The new research finally provides concrete proof that indigenous ancestry in the region has survived to the present day.</blockquote>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLzAAXSIOVnOpAMkjloIrrQBjJ6HqG1xm08O8oQd6yWoTbnj0ap-khUBKh2SS34btcMK-Rly2tp812GIBhKrpdymQZpxG8pL5evtIqEk6MOYR5niGQ1Ou2BhoDXes3TpOlHSurYtnF7xo/s1600/pnas.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="546" data-original-width="670" height="325" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLzAAXSIOVnOpAMkjloIrrQBjJ6HqG1xm08O8oQd6yWoTbnj0ap-khUBKh2SS34btcMK-Rly2tp812GIBhKrpdymQZpxG8pL5evtIqEk6MOYR5niGQ1Ou2BhoDXes3TpOlHSurYtnF7xo/s400/pnas.PNG" width="400" /></a></div>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://www.pnas.org/content/115/10/2341" target="_blank">Origins and genetic legacies of the Caribbean Taino</a><br />March 6, 2018</h2>
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: justify;">
The Caribbean was one of the last parts of the Americas to be settled by humans, but how and when the islands were first occupied remains a matter of debate. Ancient DNA can help answering these questions, but the work has been hampered by poor DNA preservation. We report the genome sequence of a 1,000-year-old Lucayan Taino individual recovered from the site of Preacher’s Cave in the Bahamas. We sequenced her genome to 12.4-fold coverage and show that she is genetically most closely related to present-day Arawakan speakers from northern South America, suggesting that the ancestors of the Lucayans originated there. Further, we find no evidence for recent inbreeding or isolation in the ancient genome, suggesting that the Lucayans had a relatively large effective population size. Finally, we show that the native American components in some present-day Caribbean genomes are closely related to the ancient Taino, demonstrating an element of continuity between precontact populations and present-day Latino populations in the Caribbean.</blockquote>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
</div>
</div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-27619386004035055772019-10-13T18:23:00.000-04:002019-10-13T18:23:15.085-04:00Pearls, Grenada: Histories of Resistance by an Old Runway<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcvc8p0fFSsfe9yL0sbXgYpLMnoaEZpAPJf6Z6u9Kg3ACkbmQ8q-mXiDk3BO3M5zDabE3brMwQ3V4iH3V00daSJr7TUHjimNPVs81HCqGvD9sv06nDilQhqepe5SDa36be7uS4O4Be18E/s1600/pearls-beach.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="793" data-original-width="1140" height="380" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcvc8p0fFSsfe9yL0sbXgYpLMnoaEZpAPJf6Z6u9Kg3ACkbmQ8q-mXiDk3BO3M5zDabE3brMwQ3V4iH3V00daSJr7TUHjimNPVs81HCqGvD9sv06nDilQhqepe5SDa36be7uS4O4Be18E/s400/pearls-beach.jpg" width="550" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A view out toward the sea, from the beach at the end of the runway in Pearls, Grenada</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify;">
<b><a href="https://www.google.com/maps/place/Pearls+Airport,+Grenada/@12.1334332,-61.6159582,1366a,35y,39.04t/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x8c38174f085eb4af:0x1aaa3b6e6427b0b4!8m2!3d12.1441373!4d-61.6139965" target="_blank">Pearls</a></b>, in the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Andrew_Parish,_Grenada" target="_blank">Parish of St. Andrew’s</a>, <a href="https://www.google.com/maps/place/Grenada/@12.1976352,-61.6571206,10.75z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x8c381789f4877bd1:0x36d8c7015a1f4f8e!8m2!3d12.1165!4d-61.679" target="_blank"><b>Grenada</b></a>, just up the road from the main town of <a href="https://www.google.com/maps/place/Grenville,+Grenada/@12.1151179,-61.6235293,962a,35y,39.17t/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x8c3819e5cedc1467:0xb1c20669bad9057a!8m2!3d12.1242614!4d-61.6238565" target="_blank"><b>Grenville</b></a>, is a unique place that sits at the intersection of two of the main themes of my research career: the cultures and histories of Indigenous Peoples of the Caribbean, and the political economy of US imperialist interventions. Both of these strands come together, in one specific spot: the old runway—still very much intact—at what was once <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pearls_Airport" target="_blank"><b>Pearls Airport</b></a>. The airport is the subject of the short photo essay contained in the article titled, "<a href="https://zeroanthropology.net/2019/10/11/pearls-before-swine/" style="font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Pearls before Swine</a>," from which the following sections were extracted.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHqUoYnGGOAwYq2eFL8xpZMy9ej6S25pJ8kxX_FJQqyfV7Z3xx6m-HKdvEMXvx_twwHx6BW5Kw9M3_1ke23B_mMq7mQdetZruz4UqDMTWCnDdOw4L4ra_PWGrZNJ_JADPVjACt0G9KByI/s1600/pearls.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="340" data-original-width="1600" height="115" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHqUoYnGGOAwYq2eFL8xpZMy9ej6S25pJ8kxX_FJQqyfV7Z3xx6m-HKdvEMXvx_twwHx6BW5Kw9M3_1ke23B_mMq7mQdetZruz4UqDMTWCnDdOw4L4ra_PWGrZNJ_JADPVjACt0G9KByI/s320/pearls.PNG" width="550" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Aerial view of the runway at the old airport in Pearls.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
....The old runway at Pearls
is a place that is barely frequented by tourists; there were only two
young American ladies doing a self-guided tour when we were there,
but then again we were there during low season. On local tourist maps
the image of the runway is accompanied by a label boasting of
“Amerindian Sites,” except there is no museum in the vicinity,
nor any tours or tour guides to take one to see these “sites”.
The two American women we met were totally mystified by this apparent
absence, and they had asked everyone they encountered, as we had,
about where they were to go to see the Amerindian artifacts. None of
the locals could (or would) give an answer.<br />
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
What we did not realize,
at least not at first, is that we were standing right on top of the
artifacts: they were spread all around the borders of the runway, and
in the heaps of soil piled up at the end of the runway by the beach,
where British bulldozers pushed the soil when clearing land for the
tarmac.</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
That then is the other,
older history of Pearls: it was once a major Amerindian port,
possibly the largest of its kind, connecting Indigenous communities
spread across the Lesser Antilles. Some historians have described it
as “<a href="http://www.grenada-history.org/kalinago.htm" target="_blank">the
most important archaeological site in the Caribbean</a>”. Pearls
had been occupied for at least <a href="https://www.caribheritage.org/discover-caribbean-heritage/grenada#paragraph_1" target="_blank">seven
centuries</a>, from 300 BC to 400 AD. Trinidad, just 80 miles to the
south, and much larger, has nothing like Pearls in terms of the broad
expanse of Amerindian artifacts covering such a large area, with
<a href="https://thegrenadainformer.com/columnists/item/1151-from-the-amerindians-to-independence" target="_blank">always
more artifacts</a> being uncovered at Pearls. I am not aware of the
remnants of any “Amerindian port” in all of Trinidad, or Tobago
for that matter.</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
The runway ends just feet
from a long and wild beach, not the kind which would normally attract
swimmers. The waters are pretty rough, with waves coming in fast and
furious, from all angles. The humid air is thick with sea salt. The
beach is “littered” with gorgeous pieces of sun-bleached
driftwood. The beach shows a few signs of being used by locals for
liming purposes: a small amount of discarded soft drink bottles, for
example....</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
....what
is also buried in Pearls is the Amerindian side of what could have
been. Amerindian Grenada was a proud place, which for over 150
years—think of that astounding number—successfully drove off
colonizing efforts by the British and French, and preserved Grenada
as a Caribbean bastion of Indigenous freedom. It is a history that is
both awesome and inspiring. In those encounters with the military
superpowers of the time, Grenada was utterly victorious. This is one
of the reasons I call the Caribs the original anti-imperialists of
the modern world-system.</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Amerindian
Grenada was a green place of beauty, of people who knew how to live
the good life and enjoy the free bounties of nature. Grenada is of
course still ultra green, and Grenadians show all signs of knowing
how to enjoy the good life regardless of any strife or troubles. Yet
Amerindian Grenada was something different: their society was one
without schools, prisons, offices, army bases, plantations, slavery,
or money. Theirs was the peace to which we all claim to strive, but
pretend to be unable to achieve, buried under mountains of
corruption, addictions to all manner of artifice, and constrained by
the daily authoritarianism that dominates our lives.</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
In
terms of preserving or at least acknowledging the Amerindian past, it
is true that the Grenada National Museum (the subject of essays to
come), has made some efforts to advance local knowledge of Pearls’
Indigenous heritage, with <a href="https://openanthropology.files.wordpress.com/2019/10/fieldtripguides.pdf" target="_blank">special
archaeological field trips for local schoolchildren</a>, assisted by
the incredible <b>Michael
John</b>. Michael John,
himself from Pearls, is a self-made archaeologist, with an apparently
natural talent for spotting Amerindian artifacts. He is a man who is
very likely of Carib descent and who also makes a living carving
stone objects that look much like those one normally finds buried in
the ground, those carved by his likely ancestors.</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
On
the whole, however, what is being done to preserve and protect the
memory of the Amerindians is far too little. Amerindian history is
sometimes looted by tourists, some of whom possibly do not know that
it is against the law to remove artifacts—but then again, nobody is
enforcing the law. Suitcases and other travel items are not checked
by the authorities when one flies out of Grenada, as they ought to be
in all cases. Locals who claim to know nothing about “Amerindian
sites” in the vicinity of the Pearls runway may be performing a
very valuable service.</div>
</div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<br />Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-55327165985175372362019-10-13T17:59:00.002-04:002019-10-13T17:59:41.333-04:00Colonial Myth-Making and the Mission of Santa Rosa de Arima, Trinidad<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://www.alertpress.org/arima-born.html" target="_blank"><br />
<img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="358" data-original-width="1600" height="111" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLvtn8RtIOY9OZIRn5BhrKTD2_BX-0nP6otfqBI5EfDiDAS78WbJ2oKa1o8Jg63W6z-NoQfvIqYwoJrUlh7GfSvdcgV9jhaXBgP71E1Zxs0t_7vbrwF13XxrEEtVvILA6q90RN9R9CxmQ/s400/alertheader-arima-born.jpg" title="" width="500" /></a></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Was the Arima Mission an “Indian Mission”? For what purposes, and in whose interests, was the Arima Mission established? How many Indigenous people lived in the Arima Mission, and in Trinidad as a whole? Who counted them? How were they counted, and why? Why did Arima come to be seen as a centre of Indigenous culture in Trinidad? Exactly how did the Amerindians “vanish” from the Mission? What “secrets” are revealed by the Baptismal Registers about the nature and impact of the Christian “civilizing mission”?<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
When under Spanish colonial rule the authorities approved the Catholic Church’s plans for building mission towns in Trinidad, it was as part of dual commercial and counterinsurgency strategy. Mission towns were established in the early to mid-1700s, in an effort to “pacify” the Amerindian population<!--[if supportFields]><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA;mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'> XE "Amerindian population" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA;mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span
style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]-->, and to incorporate Amerindians into profitable, market-oriented activities. Missions were multi-pronged: they combined religious, political, economic, and military objectives. While cocoa<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA;mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span
style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'> XE "<span style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>cocoa</span>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA;mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span
style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> production increased under the direction of missionaries, and would eventually become a lucrative commodity destined for export, the missions had limited or mixed results on the other fronts. The missions were subject to attacks from Amerindians outside of the missions, and were subject to internal resistance, outright rebellions, and flight of the Indigenous population.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Myths</b><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Among the many things that we learned from studying the primary sources and the baptismal records of the Arima Mission are that certain myths<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA;mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> XE "myths" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> (working fictions) have been in operation and, like all good myths, they are contradicted by documentary evidence. The primary myths include the following:<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<ol start="1" style="margin-top: 0in;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in; text-align: justify;">The myth<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA;mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> XE "myth:myths, myth-making, working fictions" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> of the Mission as a form of racial segregation and exclusion;<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in; text-align: justify;">The myth<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA;mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> XE "myth:myths, myth-making, working fictions" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> of protection of the Amerindians by the authorities;<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in; text-align: justify;">The myth<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA;mso-bidi-font-style:italic'> XE "myth:myths, myth-making, working fictions" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> of the vanishing Amerindians; and,</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in; text-align: justify;">The myth<span style="font-size: 12pt;"> of </span>successful<span style="font-size: 12pt;"> assimilation and Christian indoctrination.</span></li>
</ol>
<div>
Let's start by looking at myth #3, one of the most popular, influential, and enduring because it has been institutionalized.</div>
<div>
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<div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Extinction via Miscegenation<o:p></o:p></b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i>Extinction</i><!--[if supportFields]><i
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span></i><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'> XE "<i style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>Extinction</i>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><i
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span></i><![endif]--><i> via miscegenation</i><!--[if supportFields]><i
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span></i><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'> XE "<i style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>miscegenation</i>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><i
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span></i><![endif]--> was the dominant and thus standard mode of rhetorically displacing Arima’s Amerindians (see Forte, 2013). This idea, that Amerindians became “extinct” by virtue of forming unions with members of other racial/ethnic groups, amounted to the most common and thus most taken for granted “explanation” that was widely reproduced in the literature on Trinidad in the 19<sup>th</sup> and even the 20<sup>th</sup> centuries. Writers of local histories, memoirs, and travel books reflected what was ultimately state policy: the <st1:city w:st="on">Mission</st1:city> was only for those persons who were “pure” Indians. Any mixed offspring would lose the right (and the obligation) to reside in the Mission. This policy was succinctly explained by the corregidor<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "<i>corregidor</i>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> of the <st1:city w:st="on">Mission</st1:city>, Martin Sorzano<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "Sorzano, Martin" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]-->, in testimony before the Burnley Commission<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "Burnley Commission" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> on July 16, 1841. In response to the commissioner’s question, “To what, then, do you ascribe the gradual and rapid diminution in their number?” Sorzano replied:</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
“Chiefly to the gradual mixture of the races. As pure Indians they were compelled to remain at the mission, and conform to the regulations; but the children born of Spanish and Creole fathers could not be so classed, and would not submit to the restraint of remaining there”. (Burnley, 1842, p. 109)</blockquote>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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As a fundamentally racial narrative, the idea of extinction via miscegenation found favour with colonial élites who has busied themselves with formulating and then disseminating—even legislating—the racial ordering of the working class in Trinidad, especially as material questions of rights to property and free labour were determined by such an ordering. Governor Woodford instructed Captain William Wright, on the latter taking charge of the Mission, to do as follows with the Indian residents: “<span lang="EN-AU">You will then proceed to make a return of them by families, shewing their lineage or descent as well as their trades, and if intermixed with other than Indian blood” (quoted in Fraser, 1971[1896], p. 104).</span> Dating from the earliest years of British colonization in Trinidad, an English writer described Mission Indians in one of the earliest recorded instances of the racial extinctionist theme: </div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
“Some of the <i>Peons</i><!--[if supportFields]><i
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span></i><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'> XE "<i style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>Peons</i>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><i
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span></i><![endif]--> are Indians of South America,—others are the mongrel offspring of the white Spaniard and Indian, the Indian and Negro, or the progeny of any of them, united in such varieties of shade, as almost to have effaced the traits of the aboriginees [<i>sic</i>]. But there are many of the true Indians to be seen, at the different Indian villages, or <i>missions</i>”. (Letter to the Duke of Portland, 1807, p. 60)</blockquote>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One of the first and most prominent local history volumes was that authored by E.L. Joseph in 1838, which is a valuable source of insights into élite thinking of the time, and a source of tremendous misinformation as well. In one notable passage on this topic of race and indigenous identity, Joseph wrote the following:</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span lang="EN-AU">“This indolent harmless race is here fast merging on extinction – from no fault of the local government, nor from any disease: the births amongst the Indian women exceed the deaths in the usual ratio; the fact is, that the Indian men, since they are obliged to live in society, choose mates of other races, and the women do the same (Mr. Coleridge was misinformed when he stated that the Indians will not intermarry with other races), hence out of every seven children born of an Indian mother during the last 30 years, there are scarcely two of pure blood</span><!--[if supportFields]><span
lang=EN-AU style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'> XE "pure blood" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
lang=EN-AU style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--><span lang="EN-AU">, as I have been informed; this will of course decrease their population; for those of the mixed race, whether they be Samboes (between Negroes and Indians), or Mustees (between Europeans and Indians), or the countless castes that the admixture between the African</span><!--[if supportFields]><span
lang=EN-AU style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'> XE "</span><span lang=EN-AU
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'>African:</span><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'>Africans, Blacks, slaves" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
lang=EN-AU style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--><span lang="EN-AU">, European, and Indian tribes produce, they are not the real aboriginal race, and leave the inactive community of Indians as soon as they reach the age of discretion”. (1970[1838], pp. 102–103)</span></blockquote>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As if to concretely prove Joseph’s adherence to plainly racial paradigms, he cited in one passage the argument that the Amerindian cranium “is uniformly superior to the cranium of a negro, whose powers of mind are as much inferior to those of the Indian, as those of the latter to the powers of the European” (1970[1838], p. 121).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Extinction<!--[if supportFields]><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "<i
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>Extinction</i>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> via miscegenation<!--[if supportFields]><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "<i style='mso-bidi-font-style:
normal'>miscegenation</i>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> as a narrative was as enduring as it was influential. The “approximate extinction” of the Amerindians, through the process of inter-marriage<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "inter-marriage" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]-->, was a concept used by De Verteuil (1858, p. 172). One travel writer asserted, presumably on the basis of what he was told by his hosts, that by 1797, “probably many of them [Indians] had been absorbed by intermarriage with the invaders. At present, there is hardly an Indian of certainly pure blood<!--[if supportFields]><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "pure blood" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> in the island, and that only in the northern mountains” (Kingsley, 1877, p. 74). Several decades after Joseph, Fr. Cothonay wrote, “<span lang="EN-AU">The inhabitants of this earthly paradise are not in effect Indians….they are descendants of the Spaniards</span><!--[if supportFields]><span
lang=EN-AU style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'> XE "Spaniards" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
lang=EN-AU style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--><span lang="EN-AU">, more or less mixed with the Indians [Amerindians] and the blacks</span><!--[if supportFields]><span
lang=EN-AU style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'> XE "</span><span lang=EN-AU
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'>blacks</span><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'>" \t "See Africans" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
lang=EN-AU style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--><span lang="EN-AU">” (1893, pp. 241–242).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-AU">However, much is missed if we take sources at face value. On the one hand we are told that the Arima Mission</span><!--[if supportFields]><span
lang=EN-AU style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'> XE "Arima Mission" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
lang=EN-AU style='mso-ansi-language:EN-AU'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--><span lang="EN-AU"> was something of an exclusive racial zone designed to preserve Indian purity: thus </span>Harricharan (1983, p. 22) asserts that priests “prohibited ‘mission’ Indians from contact with ‘bush’ Indians, Negro slaves, mestizos or other Spaniards<!--[if supportFields]><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "Spaniards" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> and kept them confined to the missions”; Noel argued that one of the successes of the Capuchins “seems to have been the partial preservation of the Indigenous race as agricultural workers under the external guise of living a Catholic life” (1972, p. 18). How contact with other groups could have been prevented, when these other groups also formed the population of the Mission, would be something that strains credulity. Indeed, what if the opposite were true? What if, in a colony ordered by a racial hierarchy, the Mission Indians<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "Mission Indians" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> had been deliberately made to cohabit with members of other ethnic groups, knowing that the result would be miscegenation<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "<i style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>miscegenation</i>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]-->, and thus eventual removal from the Mission?<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Ethnic Substitution<o:p></o:p></b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With the displacement of Indigenous residents of the Mission, which accompanied the rise of the cocoa<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "<span style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>cocoa</span>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> industry, a new wave of migrants from Venezuela<!--[if supportFields]><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "<span style='mso-bidi-font-style:
italic'>Venezuela</span>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> entered the area and furnished the workforce for the expanded industry. To get a sense of the magnitude of the immigration, Brereton (1979, p. 12) indicated that Trinidad’s population <span lang="EN-AU">increased from 84,438 in 1861 to 200,028 in 1891. </span>Some of the major cocoa estates<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "cocoa estates" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> in the Arima Ward Union<!--[if supportFields]><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "Arima Ward Union" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> included the <i>Santa Rosa</i><!--[if supportFields]><i
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span></i><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'> XE "Santa Rosa:Saint Rose" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><i
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span></i><![endif]--> estate owned by C.G. Scheult; <i>Buena Vista</i>, owned by Jules Cipriani; and <i>El Retiro</i>, held by the De Martini family (Collens, 1896). Given that many of the migrants were of a similar cultural, religious, and ethnic background as the former Indian and Mestizo residents of the Mission, what transpired was a process of <i>ethnic substitution</i><!--[if supportFields]><i
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-begin'></span></span></i><span style='mso-ansi-language:
EN-CA'> XE "<i style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>ethnic substitution</i>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><i style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span></i><![endif]--> and what then appeared to be a revitalization or resurgence<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "</span>resurgence<span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]--> of a number of key traditions and ritual practices, when viewed from a certain angle (Brereton, 1979, pp. 131–132, 152; Moodie-Kublalsingh, 1994, pp. 2–3, 4, 33, 41). In some areas, there was a fusion of the two groups, that is, the Indians already present in Trinidad and the Venezuelan migrants<!--[if supportFields]><span
style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span style='mso-element:field-begin'></span> XE "<span style='mso-bidi-font-style:italic'>Venezuelan migrants</span>" </span><![endif]--><!--[if supportFields]><span style='mso-ansi-language:EN-CA'><span
style='mso-element:field-end'></span></span><![endif]-->. The baptismal registers reflect all of these developments and transformations, except for the process of fusion.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.alertpress.org/arima-born.html" target="_blank">See the book, ARIMA BORN</a></span></b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://www.alertpress.org/arima-born.html" target="_blank"><br />
<img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1404" height="570" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWEZq-m5pyqECsQOvW6p5FNyJGhgBVZ_sr3tRofwVaHAQMqq2blza4cnA9wUR4j7dwigsr-lISUntId5-MuTVzaKMmAio-xjcNNdExnIHJe1nqF3lx2-ozguFoVy7c94s9jQX50e0DVwc/s400/arima-born-part-cover-alertpress.jpg" width="500" /></a></div>
</div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-63854839995378756352019-09-30T23:43:00.000-04:002019-10-01T11:31:24.585-04:00The Real History of the Mission of Santa Rosa de Arima: From ARIMA BORN<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://www.alertpress.org/arima-born.html" target="_blank"><br />
<img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="358" data-original-width="1600" height="111" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLvtn8RtIOY9OZIRn5BhrKTD2_BX-0nP6otfqBI5EfDiDAS78WbJ2oKa1o8Jg63W6z-NoQfvIqYwoJrUlh7GfSvdcgV9jhaXBgP71E1Zxs0t_7vbrwF13XxrEEtVvILA6q90RN9R9CxmQ/s400/alertheader-arima-born.jpg" title="" width="500" /></a></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The real history of the Arima Mission in Trinidad is one of exploitation, and even abuse. The Arima Mission is revealed to have been primarily a slave colony, dominated by the presence of Black slaves. The mission itself was under the authority of Don Manuel Sorzano, a prominent official in the outgoing Spanish regime, a major estate owner in Arima, and an owner of slaves. Rather than just an Amerindian history, the baptismal registers reveal a masked and obscured African history of Arima. The baptismal registers, coupled with other documentary sources, also reveal a history of Amerindian resistance to assimilation promoted by the “civilizing mission” of Christianization. Assimilation was largely a failure—a fact that was embarrassing to colonial élites—and rather than confront their failures they airbrushed Amerindians out of history altogether. We also witness how colonial authorities, priests included, went about the business of deliberately under-counting the Amerindian population, when it became convenient. The fabricated “vanishing” of Amerindians also reveals a complex political economy of land, labour, and power.<br />
<br />
Amerindians were valued while their labour had value, and their labour had value only for as long as they cultivated cassava to feed slaves, cleared lands for cultivation, built roads to speed the products of estates to market, and staffed the armed militia used to put down slave revolts. When the cocoa-producing lands occupied by the Mission’s Amerindians soared in value, and when slaves were emancipated, plus an influx of new labourers from abroad came in, the value of Amerindian labour plunged. It is no accident that the Arima Mission was dissolved a few short years after slaves were fully emancipated at the end of apprenticeship in 1838. Amerindian labour, and Amerindians as such, became disposable.<br />
<br />
By a change in labelling practices, they were made to disappear from the baptismal registers. Rather than help perpetuate a community of Amerindians, the mission promoted its breakdown. This book tells that story for the first time.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.alertpress.org/arima-born.html" target="_blank">See the book, ARIMA BORN</a></span></b></div>
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<br />Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-67240805371192155512019-09-26T12:13:00.002-04:002019-09-26T12:38:57.537-04:00New Book: ARIMA BORN<h2 style="text-align: justify;">
Arima Born: Revealing the History of Arima and its Mission through the Catholic Church’s Baptismal Registers, 1820–1916</h2>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br />
<a href="https://www.alertpress.org/arima-born.html" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img alt="ARIMA BORN" border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1404" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjahwoZ0KKtEmRX3f-9xxRTqFsSmYQFn9w2EUsWUju4anI6vAqi3dUNVCumvV7CoS-yRHZCnaJYfSnUHkdprfMIwc5aRVLsWFxollK5BRImC3zda9CKNuKdBCkIm1BthWUPolvPpyU2XKA/s400/arima-born-part-cover-alertpress.jpg" title="ARIMA BORN" width="350" /></a>The Catholic Mission of Santa Rosa is something that helped to make Arima a distinctive town in Trinidad, accounting for nearly half of the Amerindian population of the colony in the 1800s. The baptismal registers of the Catholic Church in Arima, including those pertaining to its years as a Mission, offer us unique insights into the social history of Arima, its demographic and cultural transformations, while opening another window onto the profound political-economic and legal changes that occurred in the colony throughout the 19<sup>th</sup>-century. However, when the data from those baptismal registers are read in conjunction with government documents and texts from the time, we are faced with what might seem like a series of deep mysteries.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<i>Was Arima’s mission an Indian Mission after all? Was the mission established “for the good” of the Amerindians? How many Indigenous people lived in the Arima Mission, and in Trinidad as a whole? Who counted them? How were they counted, and why? Were the Amerindians segregated from other races? Why did Arima come to be seen as a centre of Indigenous culture in Trinidad? Exactly how did the Amerindians “vanish” from the Mission? Did the mission help to perpetuate Amerindian social and cultural forms in Trinidad, or did it promote their dissolution? Did the Amerindians gladly convert to Catholicism and adhere to an austere lifestyle of obedience and service in the mission? What explains the alleged “decline” in Trinidad’s Indigenous population? Did the Arima Mission have a secret side?</i></div>
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<br /></div>
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These questions are answered in this book by using two sets of documentary sources: complete data from the Baptismal Registers of the Santa Rosa RC Church about Indigenous and Mestizo persons in the Arima Mission and after (1820 to 1916), reproduced in full in this book; and, newly available historical reports from the 1800s, including the earliest report in print of a visit to the Arima Mission. This book provides new estimates of both the Amerindian population of the Arima Mission and all of Trinidad; revised, updated, and expanded census data for Trinidad’s Amerindian population from the late 1700s to the mid-1800s is also provided, making it the most comprehensive accounting thus far. Ethnohistorians will gain valuable insights and detailed notes about using baptismal registers as sources of data. However, the larger questions about the politics of counting a target population are addressed through a critique of the four dominant myths concerning the Arima Mission.</div>
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<br /></div>
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This book, based entirely on primary sources and reproducing—in full—all of the entries in the baptismal registers from 1820 to 1916 concerning Arima’s Amerindian, Mestizo, and much of its Spanish-language population, addresses the questions above by presenting some striking findings that advance a provocative narrative. Colonial oligarchic domination, the political economy of racism, and the creation of inequality and poverty now stand out.<br />
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Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-30989860803074463512018-12-07T22:18:00.003-05:002018-12-14T23:09:20.780-05:00Book Review: The Indigenous Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago from the First Settlers until Today, by Arie Boomert<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIF1eylaralITNeBSWjXEQQoxVyOgDmDG4bPFWApL8gvmGE5HzNTGoudCO-rivYp9-Sc-_vT6eTHLiFXLWDK0Pgj0Mu9ezuL4dgvHy_ZK-lkB7EgQNgJ3B36wxigFrIfujCCTCkng2xXM/s1600/boomert.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="763" data-original-width="539" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIF1eylaralITNeBSWjXEQQoxVyOgDmDG4bPFWApL8gvmGE5HzNTGoudCO-rivYp9-Sc-_vT6eTHLiFXLWDK0Pgj0Mu9ezuL4dgvHy_ZK-lkB7EgQNgJ3B36wxigFrIfujCCTCkng2xXM/s400/boomert.PNG" width="282" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Arie Boomert</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Indigenous Peoples
of Trinidad and Tobago
from the First Settlers until Today</i>.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Leiden, Netherlands: Sidestone Press, 2016.
xv + 197. (Paper US$ 45.00)</div>
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<br /></div>
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[This is a pre-publication draft. The <a href="https://brill.com/view/journals/nwig/92/3-4/article-p395_54.xml" target="_blank">published version</a> is in the <i><a href="https://brill.com/view/journals/nwig/92/3-4/article-p395_54.xml" target="_blank">New West Indian Guide (NWIG), Vol. 92, Issue 3-4, December, 2018</a>, </i><a href="https://doi.org/10.1163/22134360-09203027" target="_blank">https://doi.org/10.1163/22134360-09203027</a>] </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Trinidad and Tobago are the oldest settled islands of the
Caribbean archipelago, and as Arie Boomert demonstrates, Trinidad’s geography
is not only still marked by hundreds of Amerindian toponyms (unlike any other
Caribbean island), but the Indigenous Peoples’ cultural heritage was implanted
in the rural and domestic traditions of a peasantry that fused Amerindians,
Africans, and Spanish people and lives on to this day. Arie Boomert’s synthesis
of archaeological, ethnohistoric, and ethnographic research on the Indigenous
Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago is more than
just a capstone to his many years of research in this field. It is also more
than a book written for the general public (students, history teachers, and
adult citizens of the twin-island republic). It is the only existing,
up-to-date text on this long-neglected subject that is both comprehensive and
yet highly informative on very specific points. Both specialists in the
subject, and those with a general interest in the cultural history of the
Caribbean, or even the history of the Spanish Caribbean alone, will find great
value in this work which should form a part of every serious library collection
on the Caribbean.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The structure of the volume is chronologically sound,
divided into eight distinct time periods covering roughly ten thousand years,
without any one period occupying more space than the others. As an
archaeologist himself, Boomert was well equipped to provide the layperson with
a good overview of archaeological research conducted in Trinidad,
dating back to the 1800s, with roughly 300 sites studied. The strength of the
volume lies in its archaeological and ethnohistoric dimensions, with roughly
the past century and the present confined to the final chapter. In that sense,
the volume tends to reinforce the established tendency to speak of Trinidad indigeneity in the past tense. Yet Boomert’s
book also shows how indigeneity in Trinidad is
constantly returning from the margins, and is partly due to the island’s close
proximity to neighbouring Indigenous populations on the mainland, whose
presence figures prominently throughout the book.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Many will appreciate the thick detail in this book,
systematically organized as it is. Boomert draws from a wide variety of
sources, including his own archaeological work, the offerings of diverse museum
collections across Europe, and insights from
very rare texts. There is a minimum of speculation in this book, and a maximum
emphasis on information. It is also very well illustrated throughout, with
attractive photographs, diagrams, and maps. Tobago is not an afterthought
either: a significant amount of information about Tobago
is presented throughout, with a dense chapter devoted to the Indigenous People
of Tobago which in itself is a significant contribution to knowledge. Just to
give the reader a sense of the coverage contained in this book, it typically
focuses on trade, subsistence, material culture (pottery especially, and
weaponry), ritual (burial), warfare, social structure, the division of labour,
house construction, political organization, chiefs (many are named) and
shamans, and an expertly synthesized and engaging presentation of colonial
ethnohistory. The description of the emergence of a rural peasantry, with
syncretic religious, ecological and domestic agricultural traditions founded on
Indigenous knowledge and practices, is impressive. The book thus also covers
issues pertaining to ecology, folklore, health and healing, and food
production. Politically, Boomert also devotes considerable attention to slavery
(which first emerged in the Caribbean with the
Spanish enslavement of Indigenous Peoples); resistance, in the form of revolts;
and, collaboration between Indigenous communities and foreign invaders.
Boomert’s overview of the Catholic missions among Trinidad’s
Amerindians is comprehensive, and not confined to Arima alone, one of the longest
standing and more recent missions that is the current home of the revitalized
Santa Rosa First Peoples’ Community.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Among the very few shortcomings of the book, there was
insufficient effort made to transform archaeologists’ writing into material genuinely
intended for a broad public (few would call a bowl a “serving vessel”), and
some of the names of vegetables and ground provisions do not appear to be
Trinidadian but are imported by the author from elsewhere (such as “coontie
[zamia]”). There was actually very little on the figure of the Nepuyo warrior,
Hyarima, a treasured part of Arima’s history, with only a few lines offering no
new information, yet a subsection of a chapter was seemingly devoted to him. Most
importantly, however, is the consistent lack of citations in the text, thus not
allowing readers to track down the original sources of information. Instead,
Boomert opts for a select bibliography, organized into not very helpful
sections. One could also quibble about other specific historical and
interpretive points, but none of this is meant to detract from the fact that
this book stands as a highly detailed, comprehensive synthesis, that will
likely stand unrivalled for many years as a central, go-to resource on the
Indigenous Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Maximilian C. Forte</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Department of Sociology & Anthropology, Concordia University</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-16802661953927180482018-07-24T23:03:00.002-04:002018-07-29T22:53:35.137-04:00On the Passing of Carib Queen Jennifer Cassar<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://www.guardian.co.tt/news/2018-07-20/tributes-queen-first-peoples" target="_blank">Tributes for queen of First Peoples</a></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Guardian</i>, July
21, 2018</div>
<br />
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“The Santa Rosa First Peoples Community is mourning the
death of its Queen Jennifer Cassar. Cassar, 66, died on Thursday after a brief
illness. She would have celebrated her birthday on August 4. She was elected
Queen of the Santa Rosa First Peoples’ Community in 2011, until her death.
Cassar succeeded then ‘Carib Queen’ Valentina Medina, who died at the age of
78. A statement from the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community said Cassar would
be remembered ‘as being a very warm, humble and compassionate Queen of the
Community, who worked tirelessly with the young Community members.’ She was a
cultural activist for over 20 years and known for her advocacy for the arts…. The
‘Carib Queen’ as she was affectionately called, Jennifer Cassar was born on
August 4, 1951 at Malabar, Arima to Nicholasa Lara-Pile and Rawle Pile. She is
the first of five children. Her ancestral line was quite deep as she was
descended from the full Amerindian bloodline through her maternal great, great,
grandparents—Jose and Annicasia Lara (nee Lopez); Great Grandmother Maria
Chichita Lara and Grandfather Pablito Lara, also called Hubert de France. Her
paternal grandmother was also of full Amerindian blood from Guyana while
her mother was also a descendant of the Caribs. Cassar was a member and
Assistant Secretary of the Santa Rosa First Peoples (Carib) Community. She was
a practising Roman Catholic who lived the Amerindian way of life through her
grandparents who observed a staunch indigenous lifestyle through their
involvement with the Santa Rosa Festival. She was a member of the
Cabinet-appointed Amerindian Project Committee for five years. Cassar
represented the Santa Rosa First Peoples Carib Community at the 3rd Indigenous
Leaders’ Summit of the Americas in Panama City, Panama
in April 2009. In December of that year she participated in a seminar on the
United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples for the
Caribbean held in Port-of-Spain, Trinidad. She
had was a cultural activist for over 20 years and was a member of the Regional
Carnival Commission with responsibility for co-ordinating National
Stick-Fighting Competitions. As a career public servant, Cassar joined the
Public Service of T&T in 1971 and served the country for 40 years. She
worked in several government ministries including the Ministries of Education,
Community Development, Culture, Sports, Health and the Judiciary. She was also
a certified Home Health Care professional.”</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Please note: Carib
Queen—no quotation marks needed—is not an “affectionate title”. It is a formal
title in the Carib community, as has been the case for a period stretching now
across three centuries.</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Read more at:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="http://www.guardian.co.tt/news/2018-07-20/tributes-queen-first-peoples" target="_blank">http://www.guardian.co.tt/news/2018-07-20/tributes-queen-first-peoples</a></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://news.gov.tt/content/condolences-passing-carib-queen-jennifer-cassar" target="_blank">Condolences on the passing of the Carib Queen Jennifer Cassar</a></b></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Government of the
Republic of Trinidad & Tobago</i>, Statement from Prime Minister Keith
Rowley.</div>
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<br /></div>
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“I wish to extend sincerest and heartfelt condolences to The
Santa Rosa First Peoples Community on the passing of the Carib Queen Jennifer
Cassar. As the First People mourn this loss so too do the people of Arima, as
Mrs. Cassar was a symbol of strength, will and power within this community.
Though today we feel sadness having experienced this loss, I feel comforted by
the fact that as Carib Queen Jennifer Cassar was able to experience the
celebration of the First People across Trinidad and Tobago in 2017. This
celebration and recognition of the community showed to all of us the vigour, energy
and excitement that was Jennifer Cassar as she ceremoniously paraded through
the streets in this celebration. Mrs. Cassar was not only the Carib Queen but
also heralded a career in the Public Service of Trinidad and Tobago
and served this country for over forty years. She contributed to the
development of her country through work in Education, Community Development,
Culture, Sport, Health and the Judiciary. Today I take the opportunity to again
express my humblest gratitude to Mrs. Jennifer Cassar for her yeoman service to
the First Peoples Community, to the Borough of Arima and to Trinidad and Tobago. May her life
be an example to those in and outside of the Carib community and may her legacy
be carried with love, light and positivity. May she rest in peace”.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://thebigboardcompany.co.tt/press-release/pm-issues-tribute-late-carib-queen" target="_blank">PM issues tribute to late Carib Queen</a></b></span></div>
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CNC3, no date</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
“Mrs. Jennifer Cassar worked tirelessly to sensitise us to
the role and contributions of the First Peoples Community and continuously
strived to preserve and revitalise Amerindian history and traditions. The Carib
Queen was one of the key advocates who lobbied Government to honour a
long-standing call for a one-off holiday to formally recognise her Community’s
presence and contribution to our country. Government granted the request and
the holiday was celebrated on October 13th, 2017 with Queen Cassar leading a
procession through the streets of Arima. She was a member of the
Cabinet-appointed Amerindian Project Committee from 2007 and also a member of
the Regional Carnival Committee of the National Carnival Commission with
responsibility for coordinating National Stick Fighting Competitions”.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Read more at:</div>
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<a href="http://thebigboardcompany.co.tt/press-release/pm-issues-tribute-late-carib-queen" target="_blank">http://thebigboardcompany.co.tt/press-release/pm-issues-tribute-late-carib-queen</a><br />
<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b><a href="https://www.trinidadexpress.com/news/local/carib-queen-s-life-celebrated-by-president/article_720185d8-902c-11e8-a90f-334756047262.html" target="_blank">Carib Queen’s life celebrated by President</a></b></span><br />
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Sunday Express</i>, July 25, 2018</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
President of the Republic
of Trinidad & Tobago,
Paula-Mae Weekes:</div>
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<br /></div>
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“Having worked for forty years in the public sector before her retirement, Ms. Cassar devoted almost her entire life to the service of her country. I have known her since 1996 when I had been working at the Hall of Justice. I quickly became aware of the esteem in which Ms. Cassar was held by members of her team and was struck by the diligence with which she executed her duties. She was fiercely loyal to the judge for whom she was the Executive Secretary for many years and involved herself with many other ancillary functions of the Judiciary until she retired. During her tenure at the Judiciary, Ms. Cassar held a deep concern for the welfare of the First Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago. She had always wholeheartedly embraced her indigenous identity and sought to encourage others to also take pride in their heritage. Her inauguration as Carib Queen in 2011 therefore acknowledged her many years of activism and her standing in the First Peoples’ community. I was pleased to follow her leadership as Carib Queen as she worked tirelessly to improve the unity and solidarity of the indigenous people and to secure greater recognition for their customs and traditions, such as
stick-fighting [<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">sic</i>]”.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b><a href="http://www.ncctt.org/new/index.php/media-centre/news/624-ncc-mourns-the-passing-of-jennifer-cassar-the-carib-queen.html" target="_blank">NCC Mourns the Passing of Jennifer Cassar, the Carib Queen</a></b></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">National Carnival
Commission</i>, July, 2018.</div>
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<br /></div>
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“The National Carnival Commission of Trinidad and Tobago
(NCC) joins with the nation in remembering the life of Jennifer Cassar –
beloved Carib Queen, organiser, and cultural pioneer – who died on July 19,
2018. Cassar is widely lauded as a smiling, kind-hearted leader who worked
alongside her community to organise events such as last year’s grand
celebration for the First Peoples Public Holiday. Additionally, she has been an
invaluable contributor and guiding figure in the Annual Arima Fest
celebrations, Santa Rosa Festival, and First People’s Heritage Week. Cassar
would also have a tremendous impact in an area outside of First Peoples’
empowerment movement. She is also fondly remembered for her work in bringing
Stick Fighting to the fore and her tireless energy in giving the artform the
respect and recognition it so rightly deserves. Remembering Cassar’s legacy and
invaluable contributions, NCC Chairman, Winston ‘Gypsy’ Peters said, ‘We, at
the Commission, are deeply touched by her passing’”.</div>
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Read more at:</div>
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<a href="http://www.ncctt.org/new/index.php/media-centre/news/624-ncc-mourns-the-passing-of-jennifer-cassar-the-carib-queen.html" target="_blank">http://www.ncctt.org/new/index.php/media-centre/news/624-ncc-mourns-the-passing-of-jennifer-cassar-the-carib-queen.html</a></div>
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<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://news.power102fm.com/passing-of-carib-queen-jennifer-cassar-sends-arima-into-mourning-57553" target="_blank">Passing of Carib Queen, Jennifer Cassar Sends Arima into Mourning</a></b></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Power 102 FM</i>, July
19, 2018, Press Release from the Arima Borough Council.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
“Mayor Lisa Morris-Julian and the Arima Borough Council are
grieved by the passing of beloved Carib Queen, Jennifer Cassar. The Council
describes the loss as a blow to Arima’s foundation, which is rooted on the
First Peoples’ contributions. The Council laments the loss of a phenomenal
woman of pure Carib descent. However, the council is thankful that she assisted
in extensive work to keep persons of First Peoples’ lineage united and thriving
in the Santa Rosa First Peoples’ Community. It recognizes her decades of labour
which assisted to create a space in the borough where the First Peoples are
acknowledged and respected. The Council recalls fond memories of the late Carib
Queen as a smiling, kind-hearted leader who worked alongside her Community to
organize events such as last year’s grand celebration for the First Peoples
one-off Public Holiday. The Council will miss her contribution to this year’s
Arima Fest celebrations, Santa Rosa Festival and First People’s Heritage Week.
The Arima Borough Council wishes to express sincere condolences to her family,
the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community and all of her loved ones”.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://www.trinidadexpress.com/news/local/the-carib-queen-has-died/article_8cecf37c-8c22-11e8-9366-233b1a58cf45.html" target="_blank">The Carib Queen has died</a></b></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Daily Express</i>,
July 20, 2018, by Sandhya Santoo</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
“Education Minister and Arima Member of Parliament Anthony
Garcia also extended condolences on the passing of Cassar….’She contributed to
the development of her country through work in Education, Community
Development, Culture, Sport, Health and the Judiciary. Today I take the
opportunity to again express my humblest gratitude to Mrs. Jennifer Cassar for
her yeoman service to the First Peoples Community, to the Borough of Arima and
to Trinidad and Tobago.
May her life be an example to those in and outside of the Carib community and
may her legacy be carried with love, light and positivity. May she rest in
peace,’ he said”.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Read more at:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="https://www.trinidadexpress.com/news/local/the-carib-queen-has-died/article_8cecf37c-8c22-11e8-9366-233b1a58cf45.html" target="_blank">https://www.trinidadexpress.com/news/local/the-carib-queen-has-died/article_8cecf37c-8c22-11e8-9366-233b1a58cf45.html</a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2018/07/20/carib-queen-jennifer-cassar-has-died/" target="_blank">The Carib Queen is dead</a></b></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Trinidad & Tobago
Newsday</i>, July 20, 2018, by Carol Matroo</div>
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<br /></div>
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“Arima Mayor Lisa Morris-Julien said Cassar was not only
Carib Queen but the ‘Queen of Arima’…. ‘We expected to have Mrs Cassar with us
for a very long time. She was loved by everyone, by her neighbours, by the
entire community. Every Arimian was proud that she was our queen. She was
heavily involved in culture and I credit her for bringing back stick fighting
back to Arima, always trying to ensure that we become the cultural mecca that
we should be,’ Morris-Julian said…. It was Cassar’s dream to establish an
Amerindian village in Blanchisseuse and the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community
was granted 100 acres towards this venture. ‘Government gave them the land and I’m so happy that she
lived to see the one off holiday (last October 13). Her role in the community
could never be underestimated. She was the right hand of the chief (Ricardo
Bharath) and she always took the needs of her people before her own. She was an
excellent mother and wife,’ she said.”</div>
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<br /></div>
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Read more at:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2018/07/20/carib-queen-jennifer-cassar-has-died/" target="_blank">https://newsday.co.tt/2018/07/20/carib-queen-jennifer-cassar-has-died/</a></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2018/07/23/regional-amerindians-for-cassars-funeral/" target="_blank">Regional Amerindians for Cassar’s funeral</a></b></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Trinidad & Tobago
Newsday</i>, July 24, 2018, by Carol Matroo</div>
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<br /></div>
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“Her casket will be open for public viewing at the Arima Town
Hall on Friday from 10 am to 12 noon and a
funeral service will be at the Santa Rosa RC Church. A full Amerindian ritual
service will be conducted at the Santa
Rosa Cemetery
‘where her body would be offered back to the elements from which she came.’
Indigenous members from Guyana
and Surname are expected to attend”.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Read more at:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="https://newsday.co.tt/2018/07/23/regional-amerindians-for-cassars-funeral/" target="_blank">https://newsday.co.tt/2018/07/23/regional-amerindians-for-cassars-funeral/</a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://www.trinidadexpress.com/news/local/carib-queen-s-funeral-on-friday/article_fa3a2e10-8ea0-11e8-a0f3-d7ca371cf031.html" target="_blank">Carib Queen’s funeral on Friday</a></b></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Daily Express</i>,<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> </i>July 23, 2018</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
“Viewing of the body will take place at the Arima Town
Hall from 10 a.m. to 12 noon where a condolence
book will be available. After this there will be a procession through the
streets of Arima and then to the Santa Rosa Catholic Church on Woodford Street for
the funeral service. Following the interment at the Catholic Cemetery,
guests will gather at the Santa Rosa First Peoples Centre at Paul Mitchell Street, Arima. Nightly
wakes will be held today and on Tuesday at Koon Koon Street, Malabar, Arima from
7p.m. to 12 p.m. On Wednesday, the wake will be held at the Santa Rosa First
Peoples Community headquarters at Paul
Mitchell street”.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Read more at:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="https://www.trinidadexpress.com/news/local/carib-queen-s-funeral-on-friday/article_fa3a2e10-8ea0-11e8-a0f3-d7ca371cf031.html" target="_blank">https://www.trinidadexpress.com/news/local/carib-queen-s-funeral-on-friday/article_fa3a2e10-8ea0-11e8-a0f3-d7ca371cf031.html</a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://www.caribbeannationalweekly.com/caribbean-breaking-news-featured/tt-mourns-passing-of-carib-queen-jennifer-cassar/" target="_blank">T&T mourns passing of Carib Queen Jennifer Cassar</a></b></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Caribbean</i><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> National Weekly</i>, July 22, 2018</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
“Carib Chief Ricardo Bharath-Hernandez has described her
passing as a great loss to the Community, especially coming on the eve of the
Santa Rosa De Lima Festival on August 26, the 223rd Anniversary of the
festival. ‘She was indeed a Queen, for our time’”.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Read more at:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="https://www.caribbeannationalweekly.com/caribbean-breaking-news-featured/tt-mourns-passing-of-carib-queen-jennifer-cassar/" target="_blank">https://www.caribbeannationalweekly.com/caribbean-breaking-news-featured/tt-mourns-passing-of-carib-queen-jennifer-cassar/</a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<iframe allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/GNKeSh07aw4?rel=0" width="560"></iframe>
</div>
<br />
<i>Updated on July 29, 2018</i>
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</div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-38613263103204433782017-12-04T20:27:00.001-05:002017-12-04T20:27:32.908-05:00First Peoples: We are Trinis too<a href="http://newsday.co.tt/2017/10/08/first-peoples-we-are-trinis-too/" target="_blank"><i>Originally published in <b>Newsday</b></i></a><br />
<i>Sunday, October 8, 2017</i><br />
<i><b> </b></i><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxtpg65_WFaKFGxzz_TuAN-OH1jD48Fw0hFSC99SW3pB_fEA-h0pgYEo86rYWn00BdXblHytc4Hq-zaQ3E8Po4sK0oaAzQVgTTYbDGwmOunVRuuemPA_qaUWiSxndmBJkvOSWXTHSHKrM/s1600/hyarima.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="890" data-original-width="1200" height="296" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxtpg65_WFaKFGxzz_TuAN-OH1jD48Fw0hFSC99SW3pB_fEA-h0pgYEo86rYWn00BdXblHytc4Hq-zaQ3E8Po4sK0oaAzQVgTTYbDGwmOunVRuuemPA_qaUWiSxndmBJkvOSWXTHSHKrM/s400/hyarima.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i><b> </b></i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i><b></b></i>Narad
Mahabir acts as Hyarima in the play Hyarima and the Saints written by
Gyasi Garcia of St Francis College during the First Peoples Schools
Outreach programme, UWI-ROYTEC North Campus, on September 26. This was
one of the events leading up to Friday’s First Peoples holiday.</div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
After years of clamouring for greater national acknowledgement,
the First Peoples in TT will be recognised formally on Friday with a
one-off public holiday.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
And to commemorate the observance, the community has organised a week
of activities, under the theme, On Becoming Visible Towards Meaningful
Recognition, in an effort to enlighten fellow descendants and others
about the history and contribution of the indigenous peoples to the
country’s development. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The activities began on Friday with a lecture on the topic, DNA
Testing of the First Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago: Identification of
their genealogical ancestry, at the National Academy for the Performing
Arts, Port-of-Spain.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Later that day, the group hosted a Waponaka Concert, a rich mix of
parang, calypso and other cultural presentations at the Santa Rosa First
Peoples Centre, Paul Mitchell Street, Arima.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Today, at 6 pm, the community is expected to host an orientation
ceremony for visiting First Peoples delegates at the centre on Paul
Mitchell Street. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Tomorrow, the group is due to host an ancestral journey to Moruga, at
which celebrants will perform sacred rites and various musical
expressions.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Other events scheduled for the week include a symposium, titled, From
Chrysalis to Butterfly: On Becoming Visible Towards Meaningful
Recognition, at the University of Trinidad and Tobago’s O’Meara campus; a
children’s rally and a ceremonial walk through Arima.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
For Chief Ricardo Bharath-Hernandez, president of the Santa Rosa
First Peoples, Arima–perhaps the largest and most vocal First Peoples
community in the country–the holiday is not intended to encourage
relaxation.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Rather, he said, apart from reflecting on the atrocities which were
committed against the indigenous peoples, centuries ago, the holiday
presented an opportunity to truly celebrate their contribution. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
It gives First Peoples descendants, numbering close to 1,500 in
Arima, and others a chance to participate fully in the community’s
events.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
“Because, in ordinary times, without a holiday, people would usually
say they can’t come because they have to work or their children can’t
come because they have to go to school. So, my feeling and the
community’s feeling was that with a national holiday, nobody cannot use
that excuse not to participate.”</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Outside of Arima, First Peoples descendants can be found in Lopinot,
La Pastora, Maracas/St Joseph, Santa Cruz, Paria, Brasso Seco,
Tabaquite, Moruga, Brazil, San Rafael and Talparo.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Bharath-Hernandez, who has said repeatedly they are not just another
minority cultural group, insisted they had inherent rights with respect
to land titles, which were supported by the United Nations Declaration
of Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Some 144 countries, including TT, voted
for the Declaration.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Bharath-Hernandez was cautiously optimistic that the group’s lobby
for a heritage park–a permanent place to call their own–will become a
reality.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Plans for the park began during the former People’s National Movement
administration, under late prime minister Patrick Manning. A Cabinet
decision was taken to give the First Peoples a five-acre plot of land
along Blanchisseuse Road, Arima, which they found to be inadequate. The
community later identified a hilly piece of land which had once been
occupied by First Peoples centuries ago.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
When the People’s Partnership came into office, in May 2010, it
rescinded the PNM’s offer of a five-acre plot, and gave the community an
additional 20-acres at the same site. The land has since been surveyed,
following which an offer of lease was issued to the community from the
Commissioner of State Lands on September 9, 2015. Alluding to the
movement toward economic diversification in this year’s budget,
Bharath-Hernandez said First Peoples in other parts of the region,
namely Dominica, Guyana and Suriname, were already firmly entrenched in
their islands’ tourism initiatives.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
“We are still to reach that point but we see potential in our vision
for a permanent space to call our own. We can contribute to the tourism
sector".</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Bharath-Hernandez said the parcel of land which the community has
received for its park, is expected to provide employment in the areas of
food processing and sales, handicraft, wildlife farming and
eco-tourism.</div>
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The facility also will contain a museum, cultural/recreational space
and living quarters for the Carib Queen and about a dozen families.</div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-30650627597056842072017-12-04T20:21:00.000-05:002017-12-04T20:21:00.353-05:00Yefan, son of the First Peoples<i><a href="http://newsday.co.tt/2017/10/08/yefan-son-of-the-first-peoples/" target="_blank">Originally published in </a><b><a href="http://newsday.co.tt/2017/10/08/yefan-son-of-the-first-peoples/" target="_blank">Newsday</a></b> </i><br />
<i>By Tenisha Sylvester</i><br />
<i>Photo by </i><i>Enrique Assoon </i><br />
<i>Sunday, October 8, 2017 </i><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgddRnDU9JIxePe0vyPsA-xhYc_rT868N2D_GUyUBmWhJlY8zI17FQ-Xe2qD9gsnV6lr9DeRl7_TqAsCXandpEiDhyphenhyphenh5dn8m9Bd34mjvIXCBBtz-UNbAFMRkBxVEziQK-F-QP9b_JdlsX4/s1600/yefan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1026" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgddRnDU9JIxePe0vyPsA-xhYc_rT868N2D_GUyUBmWhJlY8zI17FQ-Xe2qD9gsnV6lr9DeRl7_TqAsCXandpEiDhyphenhyphenh5dn8m9Bd34mjvIXCBBtz-UNbAFMRkBxVEziQK-F-QP9b_JdlsX4/s640/yefan.jpg" width="545" /></a></div>
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Yefan Sealey shows how his ancestors would have wielded a spear.</div>
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Ten-year-old Yefan Sealey is taking pride in his heritage, as he
is a descendent of the indigenous people in Trinidad and Tobago.</div>
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"I feel very happy that I am a descendant of the First Peoples, it's
exciting," said Yefan last Thursday at the Santa Rosa First Peoples
Community Centre, Arima.</div>
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Yefan means strength and in his daily life he manages to eat a
nutritional diet and his favorite foods are corn pastelles and cassava
bread. He enjoys listening to parang music which is popular at Christmas
time. Parang in TT is also a hybrid of Spanish and Amerindian music.</div>
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With less than a week left, the community centre is filled with
people working feverishly on props, building huts and practising their
singing all in anticipation of the First Peoples holiday on Friday 13.</div>
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Yefan explained that many still think that the First Peoples were war-like.</div>
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Arima was the home of the Nepuyo tribe whose active resistance to
Spanish Rule limited Spanish attempts to control and settle in northern
Trinidad. "Even though the best known of the Nepuyo was the war chief,
Hyarima, who continuously harassed Spanish settlements from his base in
Arima, they were peaceful people despite the war-like nature Columbus
recorded. What they did was stand up for themselves against outsiders."</div>
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A statue of Hyarima is located in the heart of Arima. On May 25 1993
it was unveiled, in keeping with the theme of -The year of the
Indigenous People.</div>
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Living in Valencia, Yefan visits the Community Centre twice a week
where he learns about the history of the indigenous peoples; that they
were nature-worshippers who believed in the Great Spirit who is the God
they cannot see but is always present.</div>
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"I have also learned that places named Caroni, Arouca, Caura, Tunapuna and Oropouche have Amerindian origin."</div>
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He also partakes in the First Peoples rituals where they pray, chant,
dance and play their musical instruments like the chac chac, whistles
and drums.</div>
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"I also enjoy learning archery there because that's one of the main
ways the indigenous people hunted for food and I am looking forward to
seeing the lighting of the smoke-signal on Friday."</div>
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The lighting of the smoke-signal symbolises the beginning of
celebrations for the First Peoples community and is followed by a series
of ceremonial prayers.</div>
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The intelligent standard three student attends Christian Primary
Academy, Elementary School where his favourite subjects are science and
art.</div>
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" I love science because I learn a lot of things about technology and I love art because I like to draw and paint."</div>
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Yefan's goal is to become a scientist or an artist because he wants
to use his creativity to invent something that could be used by
everyone, to make their lives easier.</div>
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This straight-A student is encouraged to pursue his dreams by his
mother Chelese Arindell , grand-mother Sheila Cumberbatch and the entire
First Peoples community.</div>
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Yefan enjoys playing with his dog, Ninja and in his spare time he creates colourful drawings and paintings.</div>
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The First Peoples celebration begins on Friday at 7am in Arima for
the lighting of the smoke-signal. Then there would be a sacred street
procession to the Arima Velodrome where various exhibitions would be set
up in honour of the indigenous peoples. At 11am there is the formal
opening with the Prime Minister, leading up to the concert at 4pm.</div>
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" I am really excited and looking forward to taking part in the
street celebration on Friday, I encourage everyone to come see the
festivities because it will be amazing."</div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-40504442731418523822017-05-11T17:21:00.003-04:002017-05-12T11:43:07.187-04:00Trinidad & Tobago: First Peoples Public Holiday announced<div abp="486">
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<span abp="487" style="font-size: large;"><strong abp="2451">First Peoples Public Holiday announced</strong></span></div>
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<span abp="489" style="font-size: large;"><strong abp="2455">...Gov't comes good on promise</strong></span>
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<strong abp="492">Published on May 11, 2017</strong></div>
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<strong abp="494">In the <i abp="495"><a abp="496" href="http://www.trinidadexpress.com/20170511/news/first-peoples-public-holiday-announced" target="_blank">Daily Express</a></i></strong></div>
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Chief Ricardo Bharath Hernandez</div>
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IN October 2016, Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley promised the First Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago that they would be given a one-off national holiday in recognition of their contribution to the islands.</div>
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On Thursday, Government announced that Friday October 13 had been approved as the public holiday.</div>
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The call for a public holiday had been made by Ricardo Hernandez Bharath, representing the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community. He said that the holiday would be in recognition of the history of indigenous peoples.</div>
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The disclosure of the public holiday came in a statement from, the Ministry of Community Development, Culture and Arts, which noted that the First Peoples have been calling for greater recognition of their history and customs. </div>
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<a abp="2652" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRL_bjLAANIz9uwEFj7eKL7HexHB0-aWpcHEk1-ylNzSNKUU_jkW9YCXSsjNSuAoX0VclwPtUFr82oyyXrxJXTclfQhBPaIfhffRaeBlsUjNVwdDfXq9PyiFCvTSXGKCJ5wmGFJz4t3aE/s1600/arima-srcc-holiday.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img abp="2653" border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRL_bjLAANIz9uwEFj7eKL7HexHB0-aWpcHEk1-ylNzSNKUU_jkW9YCXSsjNSuAoX0VclwPtUFr82oyyXrxJXTclfQhBPaIfhffRaeBlsUjNVwdDfXq9PyiFCvTSXGKCJ5wmGFJz4t3aE/s640/arima-srcc-holiday.jpg" width="411" /></a></div>
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Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-36413513037391503052016-04-19T08:21:00.000-04:002016-04-19T08:21:10.760-04:00New Book: Narratives of Amerindians in Trinidad & Tobago, by Selwyn Cudjoe<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwAJ03Hu_-odKxHqxlLQqsvsLO5Bv_GqB9DNpRXK-A5JtJXI9SLLxJgbrOvJ-XiDi6ZS71pF_OKT-ARWl61fvUAAk-bOXz5n4ysv-CGwyVoSQmSrsIl-OM4z814M_oNZWuGlkQCa4rRX8/s1600/cudjoe.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwAJ03Hu_-odKxHqxlLQqsvsLO5Bv_GqB9DNpRXK-A5JtJXI9SLLxJgbrOvJ-XiDi6ZS71pF_OKT-ARWl61fvUAAk-bOXz5n4ysv-CGwyVoSQmSrsIl-OM4z814M_oNZWuGlkQCa4rRX8/s400/cudjoe.jpg" width="285" /></a></div>
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Another new book to have come out this year is Selwyn Cudjoe's <a href="https://www.facebook.com/NarrativesofAmerindians/?fref=nf" target="_blank"><i><b>Narratives of Amerindians in Trinidad and Tobago; or, Becoming Trinbagonian</b></i></a>, published by Calaloux Publications. As I wrote in my commentary/endorsement of this volume: "Thanks to Selwyn Cudjoe's intimate knowledge of the history of Trinidad and Tobago, he provides the reader with a fascinating compendium of key documents on the narration of the Amerindian presence in Trinidad. There is much to be learned here, by both the novice and those with an advanced knowledge of the country. Professor Cudjoe has a keen eye for what is unique, central and foundational, coupled with great skill in bringing to light that which is little known at present. I would not want to begin, or continue, a study of the narrative history of Trinidad's Amerindians without the aid of this wonderful resource. In addition, this work is a testament to the efforts undertaken by Trinidadian scholars in deepening and broadening national self-knowledge, in redefining what Trinidadian means, and in revealing the deep roots of the nation". The book brings together a wide range of materials, from poems to plays, stories, and autobiographical essays that directly relate to the Amerindian presence during the end of the 1800s and the start of the 1900s, as well as providing some critically important colonial historical documents.</div>
Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4800947056024784841.post-64266915416329598672016-04-19T08:07:00.003-04:002016-04-19T08:07:55.631-04:00New Book: The Indigenous Peoples of Trinidad & Tobago, by Arie Boomert<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihI9Zp24pi42GHs7NMgXy9sfi14pGx5j3Ds70nGbbbtQ7efdQ179wDBGqIZOExsqvTas8SntalUcjSLZ3Im-ksXU_E0xbWn7SoIgrMyEEM9gIrApJZ_r6DBKlLG2T4RkfEb1k_NCTBwTQ/s1600/boomert.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihI9Zp24pi42GHs7NMgXy9sfi14pGx5j3Ds70nGbbbtQ7efdQ179wDBGqIZOExsqvTas8SntalUcjSLZ3Im-ksXU_E0xbWn7SoIgrMyEEM9gIrApJZ_r6DBKlLG2T4RkfEb1k_NCTBwTQ/s400/boomert.PNG" width="282" /></a>This year has seen the publication of a comprehensive new study by Dutch archaeologist, Arie Boomert, titled <a href="https://www.sidestone.com/bookshop/the-indigenous-peoples-of-trinidad-and-tobago" target="_blank"><i><b>The Indigenous Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago: From the First Settlers until Today</b></i></a>, published by <a href="https://www.sidestone.com/bookshop/the-indigenous-peoples-of-trinidad-and-tobago" target="_blank">Sidestone Press</a>, and available for <a href="https://www.sidestone.com/library/the-indigenous-peoples-of-trinidad-and-tobago" target="_blank">free reading online</a>. The book covers the many changes experienced in the lives of the Amerindian peoples who lived or still inhabit the islands of Trinidad and Tobago, from the earliest occupants, ca. 8000 BC, until at present. Using archaeological, ethnohistorical and linguistic data, it discusses the social, political, economic, and religious development of indigenous society through the ages. The Amerindian struggle with European colonization is chronicled in detail, following centuries of independent existence during pre-Columbian times, as well as the survival of the current people of indigenous ancestry in the twin-island republic. The text has also been endorsed by Ricardo Bharath Hernandez, Chief of the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community in Arima, Trinidad: “This book is a welcome addition to the literature we are now seeking to inform our work here at the Santa Rosa First Peoples Community, as it brings to light important aspects of our buried history. Of particular interest is the information on the involvement of the Dutch in the struggles of the First Peoples, and the connection with Hierreyma, our great Nepuyo Chieftain. It is an inspiration to those of us who are currently engaged in efforts to secure the rightful place of the First Peoples of this land – Kairi.”
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Maximilian C. Fortehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11209329841918356753noreply@blogger.com0