Rupert Lewis
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- September 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780813049090
- eISBN:
- 9780813046693
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813049090.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, African-American History
This chapter examines how Black Power activism developed in 1960s Jamaica, highlighting the contributions of Walter Rodney, the Abeng group, and lesser known grassroots activists. It shows how ...
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This chapter examines how Black Power activism developed in 1960s Jamaica, highlighting the contributions of Walter Rodney, the Abeng group, and lesser known grassroots activists. It shows how Jamaican Black Power drew on multiple streams of resistance to British colonial legacies and to the neo-colonial rule of the independence era, including Garveyism, Rastafarianism, and a strong identification with Africa. The chapter reflects on the response of the Jamaican state to Black Power, revisiting the demonstrations of October 1968 (the “Rodney riots”) and their political and cultural repercussions. It argues that the political agenda articulated through Black Power in the 1960s and 1970s has been only partially accomplished, while the need to address socio-economic deprivation remains an ongoing issue.Less
This chapter examines how Black Power activism developed in 1960s Jamaica, highlighting the contributions of Walter Rodney, the Abeng group, and lesser known grassroots activists. It shows how Jamaican Black Power drew on multiple streams of resistance to British colonial legacies and to the neo-colonial rule of the independence era, including Garveyism, Rastafarianism, and a strong identification with Africa. The chapter reflects on the response of the Jamaican state to Black Power, revisiting the demonstrations of October 1968 (the “Rodney riots”) and their political and cultural repercussions. It argues that the political agenda articulated through Black Power in the 1960s and 1970s has been only partially accomplished, while the need to address socio-economic deprivation remains an ongoing issue.
Brian Meeks
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- September 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780813049090
- eISBN:
- 9780813046693
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813049090.003.0013
- Subject:
- History, African-American History
This chapter offers personal reflections on the forty years since the upsurge of Black Power in the Caribbean. Four nodal points of the period are examined from the perspective of an analysis of ...
More
This chapter offers personal reflections on the forty years since the upsurge of Black Power in the Caribbean. Four nodal points of the period are examined from the perspective of an analysis of radical politics in the Caribbean: the Rodney events of 1968 in Jamaica; the 1970 Black Power uprising in Trinidad and Tobago; the period of PNP government in Jamaica under Michael Manley; and the rise and fall of the Grenada Revolution. The chapter assesses the significant but ambiguous impact that the Caribbean Black Power movement had on subsequent social and political events in the region. It argues that the Caribbean movement must be located within the broader global wave of resistance of the late 1960s as part of a wave of anti-systemic insurrection that challenged the authority of dominant states and systems.Less
This chapter offers personal reflections on the forty years since the upsurge of Black Power in the Caribbean. Four nodal points of the period are examined from the perspective of an analysis of radical politics in the Caribbean: the Rodney events of 1968 in Jamaica; the 1970 Black Power uprising in Trinidad and Tobago; the period of PNP government in Jamaica under Michael Manley; and the rise and fall of the Grenada Revolution. The chapter assesses the significant but ambiguous impact that the Caribbean Black Power movement had on subsequent social and political events in the region. It argues that the Caribbean movement must be located within the broader global wave of resistance of the late 1960s as part of a wave of anti-systemic insurrection that challenged the authority of dominant states and systems.
