Mashramani: An African festival?
Arts on sunday
By Al Creighton
Stabroek News
April 4, 2004
Like other traditions Mashramani is driven by popular culture.
In 2004 a new wave of ethnic arguments has emerged around the subject of Mashramani. Some groups and individuals are arguing that Mashramani is an 'African' festival and, as such, cannot be regarded as 'national;' that the government is trying to foist this African festival upon the nation; that it is vulgar African culture to which Indians do not belong and in which they should not participate; that it does not reflect the spirit, the tenets or the ideals of republicanism; and, with its emphasis on revelry, cannot be used to celebrate the country's republican status.
These are very unfortunate attitudes being revisited at a time when Mashramani, even with all its present flaws, is at an undeniable period of ascendancy; when it has overcome several hurdles; is now, at last, very well organized; and was hoping to shed some of the political and racial baggage of its chequered past. It was adopted as one of the means through which Guyana would celebrate nationhood, its acquisition of a Guyanese identity through its declaration as a republic.
But how can revelry achieve any of this? It appears that the idea is similar to what obtained in the creation of the Jamaica Festival, which, through revelry and a grand celebration of the arts and the traditions, proclaims the country's independence. Mashramani, through the name that it has adapted and adopted, seeks to be a celebration, a merrymaking after 'cooperative' work. The Arawak word from which it comes, mashirimehi, puts the emphasis on 'work' (JP Bennett), but the Arawak practice is that sporting follows the completion of the task of work. The idea might well be that the nation celebrates with 'sporting' after the long colonial struggle that ends in the triumph of liberation. This is the same spirit that drove Crop-Over and Carnival, which both have their origins in plantation slavery. Along with this is also the notion of an exhibition of identity through a national cultural expression. This is where the tradition and the arts come in Jamaica, and where the intention is in Guyana. The adoption of an Amerindian name suggests the country's attempt to be identified by something from its indigenous root.
The further complaint is that a licentious African event was chosen for this purpose. The first part of the response to this is that any event of African extraction or origin that has grown up in Guyana, that is practised in Guyana and has been influenced by elements from Guyanese society is Guyanese, not African. The same goes for any tradition of Indian extraction or origin. Any ethnic tradition in these circumstances, including the Portuguese and the Chinese (though these are rare) as well as the Amerindian, can be put forward as representative of Guyana. The second part may be found in the fact that Mashramani is not really African, while the third challenges the judgement of vulgarity.
Trinidad's Calypso King, The Mighty Chalkdust, made the statement in one of his very early calypsos, that "you can't judge culture." There is no 'pure' or 'impure' race or culture. Moral judgements become problematic, and it is extremely difficult to find criteria by which to declare a people's culture 'vulgar.' Guyanese of different races in the past have come out in loud public condemnation of violent crime only when the victims belong to their own ethnic group. Is any of them 'pure'? We are quite familiar with the history of crimes against humanity committed by Europe, but Africans in Africa have been guilty of inter-ethnic genocide and Indians in India and Pakistan have similarly massacred each other over religious and ethnic differences. Which of them is 'impure?'
Attitudes of purity, superiority and inferiority entertained by one race about itself and about others, are the basic ingredients of racism, and Guyanese are well advised to avoid them. Then, because of the way cultural factors operate in a multi-ethnic society, no culture remains pure. Any art form or cultural expression in Guyana that has remained exactly as it was when taken out of India, for example, is indeed rare. The very language has revolutionized. There are Hindi-speaking communities in Suriname, but they have not survived as communities in Guyana. To go further, linguists have discovered that the best speakers of Guyanese Creole (Creolese) may be found among rural East Indian communities. Yet, 'Creolese' is a language first developed among the descendants of Africa. It is a telling blow against the negative racial attitudes.
On the other hand, few 'Okus' among Black Guyanese remember a single word of Yoruba; a Congo who can tell the meaning of libation is a rare find. Yet the tradition of libation is not even exclusively African, as it is well known among Guyanese Indian communities.
It is another telling blow that these two 'tribes' share several similarities in cultural traditions. Of equal interest is the way Africans gravitated towards the Hosay or Tadjah performed by East Indians in the late nineteenth century.
So just how African is Mashramani? There is no festival in Guyana, or in the Caribbean that does not have its roots in one or another of the different ethnic traditions, yet none of them ceases to be Guyanese or Caribbean because of that. It therefore makes little sense to try to find one to represent the nation that is free of any such ethnic origin, and none of them can be disqualified because of it. None can be found that has no root, and it is an unrewarding exercise to try to manufacture such a one to be a 'national' festival.
Cultural fusion cannot be imposed, but it is a natural part of social development. In contemporary times in particular, dynamic change is driven by the popular culture, and this is as much a feature of Mashramani as it is of other traditions. One of the truly excellent examples of cultural fusion is the chutney, a musical tradition with Indian origins which took shape in bhojpuri communities in Guyana and Trinidad. Its language, rhythms and topics have changed over several decades. Today, while it is still a predominantly Indo-Caribbean art form, reflecting the East Indian popular culture, it has such strong Afro-Caribbean inputs that one could ask seriously whether it is African.
The popular culture has also made its mark on Diwali. While this festival remains a religious Hindu event, it goes beyond the Hindu community. It has a number of public, even popular elements, including the motorcade and the public concert at LBI Community Centre where it ends. These attract an extremely large non-Hindu audience, including multitudes from the Black population. While the lighted images and symbols in the motorcade remain strictly religious, the popular culture has influenced the performances on the concert stage, which have several secular items aimed at the wider audience.
In similar fashion, Mashramani took its initial shape from the African traditions of carnival and masquerade. But these have, over two centuries, become more Caribbean than African in the way they have evolved. Then, in turn, the heritage has taken on many local Guyanese characteristics. The festival has evolved in its own Guyanese way. As it is in Barbados, the costumed bands on the street have been played down and one will be surprised to find that it is the minority of persons who actually don a costume and join a band. By far the vaster majority take part in other ways on the street. It is not quite the same in Trinidad or in Rio where several thousands play mas in costume, and bands are the premier showpieces.
A different look will certainly need to be taken at what Mashramani really is, how the different racial groups participate, and why it is inaccurate to call it African. Those will have to be pursued on another occasion.
Mashramani has been subject to cultural transformation
These recent arguments which question Mashramani's acceptance as a national event on the premise that it is 'African' are not the most constructive or helpful at this time. This is so because, to begin with, the premises are unsound and, to go further, they exhibit a limited understanding of the nature of these cultural and social developments, while re-introducing racial and political divisions to split an event that has outlived similar divisions and impediments to become a Guyanese tradition.
It must be remembered that any cultural event, practice, expression or tradition that has developed in Guyana belonging to any ethnic group native to Guyana is Guyanese. Any such cultural expression as it is may be held up as representative of Guyana. To be representative of Guyana an expression does not have to be racially integrated, fused or mixed; it does not have to attempt to represent the whole ethnic spectrum of the nation all at once. If it belongs to any one of Guyana's peoples it is Guyanese.
However, Mashramani as it is, is not an ethnic festival; it is not exclusive to any one racial group. It is not fusion, it is not an integration of different ethnic items. Despite adopting as its title a name coined from an Arawak word, it is not Amerindian. But neither is it 'African.' Its adoption of a name and a concept of celebration after work taken from Guyana's indigenous people suggests the intention to base an event on the country's indigenous cultural heritage. As it is now, it still has notable and important imperfections and might not even have reached where it wants to go, or where it ought to, but has certainly developed into a national Guyanese tradition that does not seem about to dissipate.
In Guyana today, as in several societies, politics can move one way but cultural phenomena move another. Although one may have ideas where they ought to go, they tend to resist prescription and are driven to change by the popular culture. In Guyana these political forces have been and are once again destructive, while Mashramani as a minor cultural force is now constructive and even uniting as far as the growing popular culture is concerned. There are, indeed, popular cultural forces that are socially hostile, but those that drive Mashramani's present complexion are not among them. No one can claim that they unite the races of the country, but they have forged a festival of genuine mass participation that has outgrown racial segregation.
Mashramani has also outgrown its own roots. All cultural events have roots in a particular culture, but most of them do not remain there because culture is dynamic, not static, and change takes place under influence from other cultures. Mashramani is just like other popular national festivals such as Carnival in Trinidad, in the Eastern Caribbean or in Rio de Janiero; Crop-Over; Caribana; and Carnivals in Notting Hill, New York or Canada in terms of basic origins. Their roots can be found in African masquerade traditions involving street parades, masquing, play-acting, dance, costumes and symbols. These elements continued when masquerade and carnival developed in the New World during plantation slavery and were advanced because of plantation events.
But none of them remained pure; they retained little of their African roots. They have been swamped by countless elements from their host societies, including the prevailing popular culture and traits from other ethnic groups in the same societies.
To add to that, Mashramani follows the pattern and takes its form from carnival, and it might be a surprise to many people that the carnival form that is common across the Caribbean is as much European in origin as it is African. This carnival tradition started among French settlers in the Eastern Caribbean and grew out of the Negres Jardins masquerade and its surrounding revelry first played by the white plantocracy in Trinidad, somewhere between 1783 and the beginning of the nineteenth century.
So is carnival European? And is Mashramani European?
Carnival, whether in Trinidad or in Rio, Brazil, and Crop-Over have grown away from those African or European beginnings to be the grand national events that they are today. Unencum-bered and unhindered by Guyana's brand of race politics they are not branded by their roots, are regarded unequivocally as 'national' and have gone on to be major tourist attractions and mammoth money earners.
There are yet other reasons why Mashramani is national and not African. Cultural transformation is an extremely efficient editor, adding new elements, changing or discarding others, to make a tradition fit its environment. That has been happening to the Guyanese festival. It is argued that East Indians are not to be found in the floats and the costumed bands, and that these are dominated by government ministries and public-sector agencies, while private-sector participation is minimal.
This, however, does not define the festival. It is an error to limit Mashramani to the floats and costumed bands, because that aspect of it is no longer its focal point. This particular element has definitely weakened and has been reduced and de-emphasized. While it is the main spectator element, it is now relegated to a minor role in the whole festival. It is the minority of persons of all races who participate in this activity of Mashramani. The overwhelming majority of persons on the road participate as spectators while they turn their attention to other activities.
It is important to note that while the number of floats and bands has diminished, the size of the crowds on the streets has vastly increased. Also, these crowds do not go out merely to look at the floats. Several thousands of persons out there are not even in a position where they can see the bands, and they do not disperse after the bands have all passed. The festival is the occasion for a grand picnic at the sides of the roads, in the avenues and in the malls. Families of all races and descriptions participate in Mashramani in this way. Then as the afternoon passes into evening the multitudes increase and certain sections of the streets are literally jam-packed with people, mostly of the younger generation of all races. They participate in another growing aspect of the festival: the huge lime, driven by the popular culture, that has become a national phenomenon.
Far from being divided by race, the festival is now more popular and better organized than it has ever been. The renewed effort by the state has been matched by a marked popular response, which cannot be judged by the number of persons in floats and bands, because that aspect of it is changing.
I have pointed out before that Mashramani is emerging from an unfortunate political history. Under the PNC there was a period of too much state control and many public servants participated by decree. The size of the crowds on the streets and the number of persons arriving from overseas were exaggerated in the state media. Then it was further politicised with a spin put on it that the 'massive' turn-out was a great show of support for the ruling party. This alienated many. Then there was steady deterioration into poor organization and general shabbiness.
On taking over, the PPP/C's attitude to Mashramani was lukewarm. They saw it as a PNC invention to celebrate Forbes Burnham's birthday. There was a failed attempt to privatise it, which only led to further mismanagement, diffusion and a loss of identity. They temporarily removed state sponsorship from all except the children's activities and alienated many by removing the traditional flag-raising from midnight on February 22. The PNC retaliated by holding their own flag-raising at Congress Place, which was their own failed attempt to divide the festival.
The PPP/C government, however, quite likely influenced by popular sentiments, abandoned their former indifference and threw energy into Mashramani with positive results. Now these revised arguments threaten renewed divisiveness. But the festival itself seems intent on exhibiting the opposite. Although much of the children's performance suffers from poor administration, it is in the schools and children's exhibitions that most of the existing creativity, art and imagination are to be found. Also, in 2004, it seemed racially integrated.
Mashramani, therefore, cannot remain stuck in the mire, weighted down by its past political baggage. If it can avoid the quicksand of contemporary ethnic politics, it stands a chance of becoming a major money earner, as is the case in Barbados, Trinidad and Rio, and as is demonstrated by the mushrooming of carnivals around the UK, USA and Canada. It is a dream that Mashramani will ever rival any of those for tourist arrivals, but already domestic tourism is building around it in Georgetown and in New Amsterdam.
It is ironic that while members of the more mature generation are re-introducing racial arguments, even more multi-racial participation is growing among the youth. This is obvious during the day, but more pronounced between nightfall and midnight when it becomes even more difficult to see race and one cannot find Mashramani's 'Africanness.'
Then the festival begins to look very Guyanese.