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Caribs, Cannibalism and Disney Films
Posted: Tuesday, February 22, 2005
By Linda Edwards
Stories of cannibalism could well have come from people trying to preserve an area from outside intruders.
In Belize, in 1993, I heard stories of African people living on the Atlantic coast of Honduras, who had kept their African traditions. Of course I was interested and asked further questions. "Dey eat people" I was told, and found not one Belizean whom I could have contacted to go with me at a further time to see these people. Who would explore a place where people eat people? So, such stories can preserve boundaries.
Documented cases of cannibalism in recent times include and expedition crossing the Rocky Mountains in the late 1800's, who ate the members of their party who had already died, in order to survive. Piers Paul Read in his book Alive, tells the story of the Andean survivors of a plane crash who ate some of their dead friends to survive. This was well documented, in the 1970's, and caused consternation because the survivors were Christians and white.
Walt Disney Studios could make movies about those stories.
The savages in the Caribbean were the Europeans who raped and pillaged and murdered their way across the islands. When Sir Walter Raleigh went looking for "some Indian gold" in south Trinidad, he was not carrying any gold mining or prospectors tools. They were carrying guns to mine the bodies of the indigenous people. They captured some of these people as specimens and took them back to England, just as you would do with strange butterflies or fish.
Telling stories to the detriment of a non-white group is not confined to the Caribbean and Africa. It is reported that during World War 11, English girls were told that African-American soldiers had tails. Of course, they wanted to see this, girls being fascinated with what is different. The location of the "tail" was another matter entirely.
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