Tag Archives: African

Caribbean, General T&T, Race and Identity

Emancipation: some creation myths

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By Selwyn Ryan
August 15, 2010

EmancipationI overheard someone complaining on a call-in programme during Emancipation week that people of African origin in Trinidad were a different breed from those in other islands of the Caribbean.

It was not clear whether the caller meant to say that the Trinis were a worse or a better breed. I think he meant that they were an inferior breed, since, like Prof Courtenay Bartholomew (Express, August 11) he had some critical things to say about us blacks here in Trinidad. The caller was however quite correct about Trinidad blacks being different from their Caribbean counterparts. Culture and cojuncture and not genetics were however responsible for the differences.
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Culture, General T&T, People's Partnership, Politics, Race and Identity

The Crisis of Black Youth

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By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
August 11, 2010

ChildrenWhen torrential downpours inundated north-western China on Saturday last (August 7), the Chinese government rushed in to assist the unfortunate victims of unprecedented landslides. In Zhouqu alone 1,117 persons died and 627 others were missing, a minuscule fraction of China’s 1.2 billion people. Yet the government spared not effort to assist them. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao urged rescue workers to hurry before the weather worsens. He declared: “You must race against the clock and spare no efforts in saving lives.”
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Africa, Culture, General T&T, International, Letters, Race and Identity

Emancipation Celebration?

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EmancipationTHE EDITOR: After four hundred years of shackle slavery, and the worst kind of atrocities ever inflicted on any race of people bar none, all because of their melanin and without any apology and compensation, and therapy for Post Traumatic Slavery Syndrome, I am totally puzzled and confused with the reason for the celebration of Emancipation.
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Culture, Features, General T&T, People's Partnership, Politics, Race and Identity

A Society in Transition: A Community at the Crossroads

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Emancipation Lecture 2010

By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
Posted: August 04, 2010

EmancipationThis lecture was delivered on July 31, 2010 at the Center of Excellence, Macoya, Trinidad

This evening we are pleased that Professor Maxwell Richards, the president of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, and his wife Ms. Jean Ramjohn Richards, newly elected prime minister, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, and her worthy colleague Mr. Jack Warner have consented to join us this evening at our tenth annual Emancipation Day Dinner. We are also pleased that Mr. Keith Rowley and his wife have been able to share this important day with us. I especially want to welcome Prime Minister Persad-Bissessar to congratulate her on her victory and to say to her that we at the National Association for the Empowerment of African People and most African people in this society genuinely compliment you on your elevation as the first woman prime minister of our land. We share in the sentiments of Indo-Mauritian author Leel Gujadhu Sarup who observed: “I feel good about her victory. As someone who has researched indentureship, this result bring tears to my eyes. There are no limits for an Indian woman to prove her worth.”
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Africa, Culture, General T&T, People's Partnership, Politics, Protest, Race and Identity, USA

Emancipation: When Freedom Come

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Head of the Emancipation Support Committee Kafra Kambon, Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar, Minister of Arts and Multiculturalism Winston Peters
Head of the Emancipation Support Committee Kafra Kambon, Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar, Minister of Arts and Multiculturalism Winston Peters
Emancipation Day Celebrations 2010 in pictures

Kamla: Emancipation about struggle, triumph
PRIME MINISTER Kamla Persad-Bissessar yesterday urged the nation to not only see Emancipation Day as merely a public holiday but rather to reflect on the struggles of the ancestors of Afro-Trinbagonians who rose up from the chattel of slavery to take their rightful place in a free society.
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Africa, General T&T, India, Letters, Race and Identity

Emancipation 2010: ‘Ganges and the Nile’?

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EmancipationTHE EDITOR: Possible points of confluence, and of departure between the ‘Ganges and the Nile’?

As Emancipation, T&T ’10 approaches, and considering possible choices for ongoing nationhood, three prescient thinkers, one in each of the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries, are worth citing. One is William Faulkner, the Nobel prize-winning American author; the other, George Santayana, the 19th century Spanish philosopher; and T&T’s David Rudder.
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Books, Culture, General T&T, Race and Identity

Besson’s Cruel Accusations

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By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
July 23, 2010

Part I

Abu BakrGerard Besson’s The Cult of the Will seeks to challenge the historical orthodoxy that undergirds Dr. Eric Williams’s analysis of the causes of the abolition of slavery and the slave trade and the cruelty he perpetuated against the entire society although whites seems to come out worse in the bargain. According to Besson, Williams sought “to facilitate the stigmatization of Caribbean people of European descent, or those who appear so, through the projection of negative concepts of ‘slave master’ or ‘colonial master,’ to modern-day individuals for political and ideological purposes.”
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Africa, Culture, Race and Identity, Religion

Identifying with Ancestral Home

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Emancipation Celebration
Emancipation Celebration
July 22, 2010 – guardian.co.tt

Emancipation celebrations this year, I suppose, will have added significance for those of the African diaspora who consider that their spiritual navel strings are buried on the continent of Africa, especially as the World Cup venture was a spectacular international success. Incidentally, the football extravaganza was conceivably Mandela’s parting gift to Africa as well as Africa’s final tribute to him.
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Africa, Features, General T&T, International, Race and Identity, Sports

Africa’s Decade

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World Cup Excitement in South Africa
World Cup Excitement in South Africa
By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
July 01, 2010

I don’t know who you are supporting for the World Cup but I have picked Brazil although Joel Villafana and some of the Wakka Wakka boys on Channel 6 are rooting for Argentina. When Trinidad and Tobago participated in the last World Cup my second pick was Brazil. Now that we are not there I have no qualms about supporting the samba magicians. As I marvel at the grandeur of the game and its international reach, I also rejoice at the marvelous job South Africans are doing to pull off this world event.
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General T&T, PNM, Politics

Re-Brand the PNM!

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People's National Movement (PNM)
People's National Movement (PNM)
By Bukka Rennie – April 2010
Posted: June 14, 2010 – trinicenter.com

PREFACE

This piece was first written in August, 1996 in an attempt to place on an objective basis the debate within the PNM. The aim was to have the country debate the issues, the POLITICS, before the PNM leadership election in October 1996. To facilitate this, the article was e-mailed to Lennox Grant, then Express newspaper Editor, and to Sunity Maharaj, then Editor of the Independent, but neither carried the article.
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