Imani Tafari-Ama | Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery

I was fortunate to be born on August 1, Emancipation Day, and over the years, I have noticed that Emancipation Day functions as a flashpoint in Jamaica. One axis of thought about our history in this northern Caribbean island celebrates Emancipation as emblematic of the resistance struggles waged by our African ancestors who were enslaved in the Maafa, the Swahili word for “total disaster.” The competing axis to Emancipation celebrations is the August 6 Independence mindset, which downplays the importance of Emancipation as an enduring process of liberation.

Sustained efforts have been made by the national machinery to suppress and erase the Emancipation Day landmark, and it took several years of advocacy for Emancipation Day to be made a national holiday. This reticence resembles the resistance to acknowledging African identity as legitimate, with a pronounced reference to African people as Jamaicans while people are comfortable saying Europeans, Chinese, Jews, Syrians, or Lebanese to describe the assortment of ethnicities represented on the identity spectrum of the island. In a curious turn, Emancipation is currently tagged to Independence in the coinage of “Emancipendence,” as if this merging is meant to further blur the emphasis that Emancipation places on African identity. The current classification of Emancipendence is seen by critics as a sleight of hand to incorporate Emancipation engagement into the mainstream Independence discourse.

In sharp contrast to Emancipation, Independence provides a platform for the maintenance of the structures of British rule. Independent Jamaica maintains the Queen of England as the nation’s head of state and head of the judiciary, represented by the governor general. For six decades now, August 6 independence celebrations have been the event in which the Government invests annually to the tune of millions of dollars. Cynics complain that the Independence lobby has trumped the capacity of the nation to complete the unfinished business of Emancipation, which has been applied to bodies but not minds.

SYMBOLIC STRUGGLE

I look at these oppositional approaches to national identity as a symbolic struggle between marijuana or ganja culture on the one hand and rum culture on the other. The latter, representing the majority of the population, maintains a false sense of security in the vaunted values of nationhood. In contrast, Emancipation protagonists are Pan-Africanists yearning for acknowledgement of the umbilical connection to the Continent and the cause of liberation. Rastafari are principal advocates for the Pan-African perspective and they propose Emancipation as a process, requiring reparations and repatriation.

Because of their black-conscious beliefs, Rastafari have been brutalised by the State, which repeatedly violated their human rights. While the 2017 material compensation package for the 1963 Coral Gardens massacre assuaged some of the impact of these offences, the persistence of prejudicial mindsets serves to reinforce negative attitudes and responses to the community. This pushback started with the declaration by Leonard Howell, the first Rasta, that God is an African King and Queen in Ethiopia (Haile Selassie I and Empress Menen Asfaw) and that the throne of England was illegitimate as far as Africans in Jamaica were concerned. In a colonial context, his words rubbed the authorities the wrong way. What is incredible though, is the prolonged practice of scapegoating of Rastafari, which continues to this day. The shocking shearing of 19-year-old Rastafari nursing student Nzinga King by a policewoman at the Four Paths lock-up in Clarendon is a case in point. This incident demonstrates the impunity with which some agents of the State violate the constitutional rights of Rastafari citizens who are already suffering from unwarranted stigma and stereotyping.

August 1 also marked the 75th anniversary of the Fulbright programme, the flagship award of the United States of America’s Department of State. In 1946, in the aftermath of the costly World War II, President Harry S. Truman “signed legislation into law to establish the Fulbright Program, an international academic exchange program with an ambitious goal – to increase mutual understanding, and support friendly and peaceful relations between the people of the United States and the people of other countries,” as noted on fulbright75.org.

UNIQUE OPPORTUNITY

As a recipient of a Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence Award (2017-2018), I can testify that the Fulbright experience provided a unique opportunity for me to share my ideas and experiences as a Rastafari Womanist scholar and activist with students who were from various backgrounds, including the Caribbean. I taught five courses in the Anthropology Department at Bridgewater State University (BSU) in Massachusetts. Dr Diana Fox, chairperson of the Anthropology Department at BSU, and I led a study- abroad programme to Germany, where I facilitated the final tour of the “Rum, Sweat and Tears” exhibition, which I curated at the Flensburg Maritime Museum in Germany while serving as International Fellow and Curator (2016-17).

The International Seminar with students from the University of Augsburg, Flensburg-Europa University, and BSU, enabled students and faculty to problematise the cognitive dissonance, colonial amnesia, and nostalgia that characterise European and North American responses to the past and consistent failure to make amends for the Maafa. As Dr Carter G. Woodson cautions, we have to be careful that we are not brainwashed by “miseducation” mechanisms of sabotaging critical consciousness. This study – abroad course, which combined academic and experiential learning approaches, is captured in the “Takeaways” video on You Tube.

I join in celebrating the tremendous opportunity that the Fulbright programme affords students and faculty, and I encourage young people and mid-career scholars to apply for this opportunity. Through dialogues we realise that others are subjects like ourselves. While on my Fulbright assignment, I affirmed that everyone’s knowledge is valuable. We all have inalienable human rights, which provide the basis for peaceful engagement. This enlargement of mutual awareness proved that education is the bridge that enables one to cross the threshold from ignorance and backwardness to respect and sustainable forms of social relations. This brings the Emancipation/Independence binary full circle and begs the question that whereas divide and rule could only tear us apart, as Bob Marley sang, education applied through cultural communications can propel us towards a transformation agenda.

Dr Imani Tafari-Ama is a research fellow at The Institute for Gender and Development Studies, Regional Coordinating Office (IGDS-RCO), at The University of the West Indies. She is the author of ‘Blood, Bullets and Bodies: Sexual Politics Below Jamaica’s Poverty Line’ and ‘Up for Air: This Half Has Never Been Told’, a historical novel on the Tivoli Gardens incursion. Send feedback to imani.tafariama@uwimona.edu.jm.