The hostility between Afro and Indo Caribbean Women may be about Featurism not Colourism
The Caribbean has a long history of multiculturalism due to the migration that occurred voluntarily and by force. This history includes the division of Afro Caribbean and Indo Caribbean people, predominantly in Guyana, Jamaica, Grenada and Trinidad & Tobago. The same system that was held in the United States, separating house slaves from field slaves based on their shade of brown was also implemented in the Caribbean between the Indians and the Africans.
Ti Fanm An Mas-la (Young girl playing Mas)
Soca takes over my body. Dressed in black and white, teenagers and young adults from all around the island are there to celebrate the death of King Vaval. Doing the helicopter with a small towel, singing and dancing behind the music truck, my cousin and I enjoy these last free-spirited moments.
GET IN YUH SECTION
I never really took part in Mash again, either as a participant or bystander, until University. You see, despite what the Wikipedia article on Mash says, the celebration was a very racially divided one. Sure, many ethnicities lined the parade route, although conservative families didn’t do even this, but the persons in the parade were largely Guyanese of African heritage
Tout Pour Plaire
J’ai été conditionné à être un objet.
Il fallait à tout prix appartenir à quelqu’un. Mon
quotidien consistait à faire le beau, en espérant qu’on
me remarque et qu’on me choisisse.
I am that little Black Girl
I can also vividly remember being told by somebody I loved that I was beautiful for a black girl. I can honestly say that I did not fully understand the implications of this comment. I now understand.
Don't Marry Us. Instead, Stand By Us.
The worst part of it all, is that there are deep roots of trauma still plaguing our families yet the outsiders only care about the resorts, the plantain, or the reggae that is overplayed on certain radio stations.
Invisible Scars
Here she was, head laid, in the lap of the boy who was her rising sun, the peas to her rice. A tender moment spoiled by a bigoted anecdote.
THE WHITE ROOM
Everything was completely white. I was the only object of colour but for once that excited me. I shut the door behind me and began to look around. There really wasn’t much to see, two white leather couches, white Persian rug, white statue of some naked man. It was boring, but new all the same.
Sensory Adaptation
Colonialism never done, only adapted; they changed its mask. We see our leaders are nothing but puppets to the same masters. Spitting in our faces progressive rhetorics while doing their master's bid.
Brown Oceans
Do oceans that aren’t
green or blue…
Colourism and Good Hair
My partner was a beautiful Muslim woman, and I realized I was jealous of her. Why? Because even though I had never seen her hair under her hijab, I was sure that she must have good hair, not hard hair like I had been cursed with, but the good hair that everyone coveted.
Unlearning anti-Blackness
It was only after my hair started to grow into its own, after my hair started to gain length that the attitude they had changed. It went from “yuh good hair yuh cut off” to “you get your hair from me; you know Guyanese hair does grow long and nice”. Recently an aunt said in conversation that Black hair can only grow long if you’re mixed with something... I didn’t feel comfortable hearing that.
Radical Love
We learn to love the devils that hold the whip against us,
We mistake them as gods, accepting the laws they pass…
I’m That Girl
You may set a standard for her, but let me
inform you: This girl who stands before you
is more capable than what you or anyone
else thinks, and she can achieve things
higher than the stars and your expectations.
Broken Beyond Repair
A quarter section split in two,
Wide, livid eyes deep in life
Peers into the map of my tragedy.
Dark Coffee
“Sadie you make me so mad. You skin too dark. You see this?” Sticking her hand in Sadie’s face for her to see she continued, “This is the color you supposed to get. A nice brown skin. Nice light brown skin. That’s what you supposed to get. Why you so black!?”, another tug of her hair, “Why? Black means poverty and light skin means wealth. You are nothing but a poor little unwanted child and I HATE you.”
Carnival Hangover
It have people who, when they play mas does get tired, does need to pee, does complain they foot burning them. Not her. And though she was the kind of can’t mash ants girl who never let no man pass his place with her – the very cliché of a stoosh bank employee, Carnival was different.
The Rebellion
“This ana jus fa you!”
“Carnival ah fo arwe too!”
Alice
Children live what they learn an’ fi mi muma an’ pupa look like dem frighten fi Alice. Mi sure seh dem nevah suh happy wen me did born but wen Alice come, a one piece a celebration inna di yard.Their naming her Alice-Elizabeth, after some Princess from England and my having been given the archaic name, Dorcas - Esmeralda immediately proved to me that there was demarcation based on the color of our skin.We were of the same race and one blood, so why the difference?