Carnival Plus and Minus
“IF SOMEBODY did tell me; mi woulda I say … but me see it fi mi self, water full up mi yeye. Some 25 years later, this song by Bounty Killa still jumps into my head whenever something I never expected to happen occurs.
Back in the day, as a young graduate student in the 1980s at the University of the West Indies (UWI), some of us looked forward to the geographically limited celebration of carnival, on the Mona campus. It was a time characterised by one of my senior lecturers as “a moment of gay abandon”, in the old sense of the word, where students getting ready for their final examination had a blow out that coincided with a cultural element, which though CARICOM and very popular and common in other territories, was alien to Jamaica.
Some of us, who had actually had a taste of carnival in Trinidad and Tobago, found it still somewhat enigmatic when introduced here in the early 1990s purporting to become something which was popular culture. Call me an old fogey and despite all of the road matches and displays of flesh, lumps and bumps (and sometimes clearly too much,) it really has not caught on to me.
Let me make this clear, by starting with the positive. If it is a net earner of foreign exchange, whereby it brings in American and other dollars and at the same time find a way of integrating small micro and medium-size enterprises and suppliers, as do Sumfest, the former Sunsplash, the Jazz Festival and even Calabash, then one has to give it a thumbs up for its economic impact. Moreover, if it creates backward and forward linkages, integrating small industries; then, it is a winner.
DIVERSIFYING ECONOMY
Indeed, as we still struggle to find innovative means of diversifying our economy and tourism product, if the evidence is that carnival bring in the ‘bucks’ while showing too much of the ‘does’; it might easily pay for itself and not be too ‘deer’. From confirmed earnings of around $4.6 billion in 2019, the Ministry of Tourism estimated that carnival 2024 earned more than $5 billion in revenue.
Yet the timing of this event always sits very uncomfortably with me. Looking in my rearview mirror at Resurrection Sunday, the message of salvation and redemption of mankind and the rejection of the flesh seemed to have experienced what often is literally a reversal or back stepping on the principles which are supposed to bind this society.
You see, in Trinidad and Tobago, all of this begins prior to the Easter celebration. In New Orleans, where traces of African, European, Christian, and yes, pagan elements coincide, they begin a full seven days before Lent.
Known for its football, as much as it is famous for its own carnival, Brazil begins its celebration a week before Ash Wednesday. There is some significance in Ash Wednesday, because it marks the burning of the flesh element, which of course would keep the average believer away from God.
Importantly, all of these societies, in which carnival naturally evolved out of their unique histories, are of Latin language heritage.
Never mind the fact that Easter has its origin in the Roman Pagan tradition whereby they celebrated Eastre, the goddess of fertility and debauchery, and who is represented by a hare or a rabbit, the busiest of mammals. These lagomorphs, (not rodents), are the epitome of gratuitous sex. In a classic example of joining when one can beat an adversary, the early church incorporated Easter with the resurrection of Christ and like so many other Christian celebration are really what we call syncretic.
Notwithstanding that, we have come to accept that Easter is very holy. Even holier than Christmas. Given the solemnity of Easter, it might have made better sense to have it before the Holy Week, as other countries out of whose traditions it grew.
REMOVAL OF FLESH
The word ‘carnival’ comes from two Latin words; carnis, meaning meat or flesh and levare meaning remove. Thus, ‘carnevale’ means literally the ‘removal of the flesh.’
What carnival means for all people who speak languages with majority Latin content, such as the French in Louisiana, the Portuguese in Brazil and the French and Spanish in Trinidad, is a farewell to the flesh. It is the equivalent of binging on all the unhealthy foods, which we know are not good for us, before we either go on diet or more likely get a copious dose of herb, senna or epsom salts, for our wash out when we are sent to spend time with Gangang and Grampa. They build up the ‘sins’ then let them go during the solemn celebrations, and rise clean on Resurrection Sunday
Indeed, after the build up and wanton lust, I am mischievously tempted to believe that Palm Sunday might have a significance to another demographic, with yet unfulfilled desires. What we have done is turned carnival on its head. We did the purge first and then having sanitised those souls with Easter, we stock up on the sins.
Fact is, even if we had done the carnival in the same way like the Brazilian, or the Trinidadian, it is still an alien phenomenon. Follow me here! Carnival emerged indigenously in those aforementioned ecosystems. Therefore, all kinds of other social relations and cultural facts are connected to it. True, it is now getting wider acceptance here. However, like the cane toads, mongoose and the elodea river weed, it has entered our environment, without any natural connection. As a result, even at its best, carnival is not fully connected to the rest of society.
Unlike street dances, which are endogenous, having evolved out of Jamaican cultural experience, this import does not yet have the necessary checks and balances. We have not yet evaluated the overall social impact. One thing we do know, is that it is a high-end consumption item and may very well exacerbate already strong economic disparities. Doubtless, many small men ‘eat a food’.
Nonetheless, if the majority of the earnings accrues to a small privileged minority; they win twice.
Trust me, the uncollected garbage in the aftermath of the revelries is both a practical and symbolic problem. There is still more to figure out.