"All Ah We Is Not One"

Scott Marchack This blog post is meant to be a submission for a critical thinking project I have been tasked with for my Caribbean Civilization course. I have been asked to reflect on the statement “All ah we is one” and give my perspective on it while keeping relevant themes of the course in mind; in particular, the theme of Caribbean identity. I will attempt to discuss this in two parts. Firstly, from the aspect of identity and whether there truly exists a Caribbean identity. Secondly, I believe the term in question is often used as a signifier of Caribbean unity, which is another aspect I intend to explore. On this note, I believe that as a people we can hold a sense of “Caribbean-ness” rather than lay claim to the existence of a Caribbean identity. Furthermore, I am unconvinced of the idea of unity that this term suggests. Instead, I am in favour of M.G Smith’s theory of a plural society inhabited by many groups with little tolerance for one another. 

Before attempting to examine the idea of Caribbean identity, it is important to first understand what is an identity? Within my Caribbean Civ course, we are taught that an identity comprises of characteristics and traits that are salient to our identities. We are taught that identities are fluid and are a result of various factors and institutions in our lives such as gender, race, religion and politics to name a few. From this, we can gather that the term identity is quite complex and within the Caribbean there exist several different identities. So then how can we proclaim that there is just one Caribbean identity that we all fall under? Instead, I would like to pull from the work of Benedict Anderson who posited that a nation is a socially constructed community imagined by the people who perceive themselves as being a part of it. These persons may have shared interests and ideologies that shape their narrative, and the narrative that has prevailed and that is common to the Caribbean nations is one that is deep-rooted in our colonial past. It is one that speaks of our struggle for autonomy and our defence against the homogenizing effect of globalization (Brereton, 218). In her essay titled “All ah we is not one”, Bridget Brereton notes that it is this struggle that is at the forefront of all post-colonial identities, however, the internal divisions that exist are often ignored (219). Outside of this, how can we claim the existence of a Caribbean identity when there is so much evidence of plurality? Take for instance the cultural divide among the Anglophone, Francophone and Hispanophone Caribbean. Moreover, at the end of the day, most of us probably identify with our own country at default. We are quicker to find ourselves saying “I am a Trini” before we would ever say “I am Caribbean”. How can we make a claim to one identity when we would put our sense of nationalism before our sense of Caribbean-ness? 

Not only do these examples deny the idea of one specific Caribbean identity, but they also serve to demonstrate a division among the Caribbean peoples. Even within our individual nations there exist internal divisions that continue to offer an argument against oneness. Again, how can we claim a sense of unity when historically our nationals exist together but were and continue to be very intolerant of one another. This is the basis of Brereton’s main argument. In her essay, she notes that within Trinidad, the division among colonial and anti-colonial persons (220-222). That is the white, planter class who preferred to retain the status quo versus the rest of the population. Among the anti-colonial population there existed further division which was understood by the racial divide between Indo-Trinidadian and Afro-Trinidadian political movements. The Indo-Trinidadian demographic was then subdivided into religious categories of Hindus and Muslims. Brereton also posits that it is the Afro-creole nationalist view that became the hegemonic narrative of the nation’s past after 1962, with the formation of the People’s National Movement (PNM) and the publication of Eric Williams’ “History of The People” (222). This gave rise to historical and cultural forms concerned with attempting to create a Creole identity specific to the Caribbean people and rather than an identity concerned with being African. For this reason, Williams received criticism from Pan-Africanist nationals. The Afro-Creole narrative helped to shape the pure cultural expressions such as carnival, steelpan and calypso which we know today. The creation of unique creole expressions in the Caribbean has also led theorists like Kamau Brathwaite to take this to mean that there is a strong unity among the Caribbean people, and it plays a central role in theorizing creole society. Although this seems to suggest some extent of unity, we find that Creole Society Theory has been critiqued for being too simplistic, Afro-centric and does not describe the reality of the Caribbean but instead, a collective hope of its people.   

Even within these cultural expressions, we see a clear divide. We may like to think that the festival of Carnival is a signifier of our togetherness but as Jean Antoine-Dunn  writes in an opinion piece for the Trinidad and Tobago Newsday, “Carnival is the symbol of the capacity of the Trinidadian person to ignore the hierarchies of historically embedded ideas...” When we look beyond the surface of carnival festivities, we might find that contemporary carnival bands serve as a distinguisher of one’s status in society and some artists have devoted their bands to critique this. Robert Young is one such artist who channels this critique into his band, "Vulgar Faction," by allowing persons to create inexpensive costumes to make a statement (Bagoo, et al.) against high cultured, main-stream carnival bands. High-cultured in this sense may not necessarily refer to elite classes of persons but speaks to the fact that not everyone has the means to access this type of carnival.

Dylan Kerrigan speaks further to this in his paper titled “‘Who ent dead, badly wounded’: The everyday life of pretty and grotesque bodies in urban Trinidad.” Here, Kerrigan asserts that there has been a shift in carnival in the last few decades from what was once comprised of small-scale family enterprises that made the festival accessible to all, to what is now an all-inclusive and exclusive performance of status and wealth. In this regard, he even makes a passing reference to Earl Lovelace’s (1978) “The Dragon Can’t Dance,” as he states, “there was no fee to be a dragon or a bat” (9). Today, the carnival experience is rooted in neoliberal values and accumulation by dispossession (10). What was once a cultural expression meant to resist oppressive hierarchies and build solidarity, has now been privatized and commercialized and is performed and marketed under the guise of oneness. What if we recall the countless songs being fed to us every year to convince us that “we are one,” which also happens to be the title of the 2020 Soca from Olatunji and Destra. But the discussion so far leads me to believe the opposite. The narrative of oneness is further contradicted by countless artists producing content that often objectifies and portrays women as sexual capital. How many times can we count Kes shouting “gyal” in his songs? What about the non-heterogenous portrayal of body types at band launches? Are we meant to believe that all men who partake in carnival appear muscular and hyper-masculine while the women resemble the flat-bellied, hyper-sexualized cosmopolitan image of beauty we are all familiar with?  Kerrigan also goes a step further and highlights the highly eroticized and seemingly homogenous advertisement of what are often light-brown bodies by some bands (6). I even took it upon myself to do a quick google image search of Yuma carnival costumes to see to what extent this was true. How does this reflect our nation’s own standards of beauty and how does this further contribute to feelings of inclusion and exclusion?  

 And what about the countless other ways that stigma, prejudice and stereotypes come together to facilitate societal divisions. What if we were to look at the lack of representation and resources to aid those who are differently-abled in our nation? Is this a sign of oneness? How about the lack of understanding of gender and sexuality combined with the pervasive ideologies of homophobia and hegemony at an institutional level that makes same-sex marriage illegal. Until 2018, consensual sex between same-sex persons was made illegal. These laws are archaic ones, rooted in the fear of difference and Judeo-Christian beliefs and they portray the state of being a non-heterosexual as a crime which further fuels discrimination and segregation. What if we turn our attention to the current global COVID-19 pandemic? Many have commented on the ways that this situation has brought not only our nation but all nations worldwide to recognize inequalities and prejudice. On this note, I am reminded of an incident I witnessed three days after Trinidad received its first confirmed case of the virus that I created a Facebook post about. I was waiting for a food order from a Chinese restaurant when another customer came to place an order. He quickly asked that he be refunded after he found that one of the workers had not been wearing a face mask. He remarked “I in my country, not yours! Doh treat me like no dog,” before he stormed out. I took this as a blatant display of xenophobia and a demonstration of his limited knowledge of our colonial past. These instances certainly serve to solidify my stance on the idea that “all ah we is not one.” 

"Historically, pandemics have caused humans to
break with the past and imagine their world anew.
This one is no different. It is a portal, a gateway
between one world and the next. We can choose
to walk through it, dragging the carcasses of our
prejudice and hatred, our avarice, our data banks
and dead ideas, our dead rivers and smoky skies
behind us. Or we can walk through lightly, with
little luggage, ready to imagine a new world. And
ready to fight for it."

-Arundhati Roy

 In the final review of this post, I have concluded that the concept of one Caribbean identity is complex and elusive. Currently, I believe the only factor that ties the Caribbean nations together is our common history of colonialism. The Caribbean is often referred to as a melting pot of various religions, languages, cultures, ethnicities, races, and many other things that come together to create multiple individual identities and sub-groups. This is another reason as to why it is difficult to come to terms with the idea of one Caribbean identity. With regards to the question of unity, it may shine true in some ways that we hold the ability to put our differences aside in order to come together, especially when we take the tangible and intangible expressions of our creole culture into mind, but ultimately we remain divided as a people. The idea of unity is but a collective hallucination and a hope rather than reality as made evident by this discussion; and although this has been one mainly concerning the unity of our Trinidadian nationals, I propose these two questions.

If we cannot even become unified as one nation, then how can we claim to be unified as Caribbean people?

How can we claim “all ah we is one,” when there is so much to suggest that contrary to popular belief,  ”all ah we is not one?"

References

Anderson, Benedict R. OG. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Verso, 2016.

Antoine-Dunne, Jean. “All Ah We Is Not One.” Trinidad and Tobago Newsday, 5 Feb. 2018, newsday.co.tt/2018/02/04/all-ah-we-is-not-one/.

Bagoo, Andre, et al. “70/50 Mas Band Reflects on 1970 Black Power Revolution.” Trinidad and Tobago Newsday, 4 Feb. 2020, newsday.co.tt/2020/02/04/70-50-mas-band-reflects-on-1970-black-power-revolution/.

Brereton, Bridget. "“All ah we is not one:” Historical and Ethnic Narratives in Pluralist Trinidad." Global South, The 4.2 (2010): 218-238.

Google Images, https://i.ytimg.com/vi/VZq-K9T2L5o/hqdefault.jpg.

Kerrigan, Dylan. "‘Who ent dead, badly wounded’: The everyday life of pretty and grotesque bodies in urban Trinidad." International Journal of Cultural Studies 21.3 (2018): 257-276.

OJO World TT. Olatunji x Destra - We Are One (Official Music Video). Youtube, 11, Feb. 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTMlLKIQaRg