The Garifuna people (1635- ) live mainly along the Caribbean coast of Belize, Guatemala, Honduras and part of Nicaragua. They are a mix of Black African and Arawak Indian, by culture and by blood, the creation of a shipwreck – on the other side of the Caribbean!
In 1635, a slave ship shipwrecked in the south-eastern Caribbean near the island of St Vincent, north of Grenada and west of Barbados. Most of the people on board were Ibibio, from what is now Nigeria. They fled to St Vincent where the Caribs took them in. They became one people.
The Caribs of St Vincent were themselves the creation of two peoples. In about 1200, Caribs from mainland South America took over St Vincent and other nearby islands. But they did not bring their women. They married the Arawak women who lived there.
That led to the creation of the Garifuna language. Arawak mothers brought up their children to speak Arawak, but when the boys got old enough, their fathers taught them Carib. Over time the two languages became one, where men and women used different words for the same thing and even different grammar for the same words. The difference between male and female Garifuna has lessened over time, but even today there are still some differences. Since the 1600s, words have been added from French, English, Spanish and presumably Ibibio.
During the 1700s, they fought off the British and French.
In 1796, the British won. They saw the Blacker looking Caribs as the leaders, the rest as merely “misled” into not wanting British rule. They imprisoned the Black Caribs, as they called them, on the island of Baliceaux. There half of them died. Those who lived were sent into exile in 1797 on the other side of the Caribbean, on the island of Roatan, off the coast of Honduras.
It seems the British expected them to die there. But they had hid cassava roots in their clothes. They planted cassava on Roatan and it grew.
During the 1800s they spread along the coast. They fished and grew cassava, plantain, pineapple and coconut.
In the 1900s they lost much of their land to fruit companies. That meant having to look for work. After 1980, many left for the US, especially New York and Los Angeles.
Education: Their children are forced to go to schools where their language, history and culture are not taught. Most speak Spanish, English or Kriol, but not Garifuna. In the 1920s, the Garifuna language died out in St Vincent and Dominica.
Religion: Most are Roman Catholic, but it is a Catholicism with shamanistic elements, like dancing to get in touch with dead ancestors.
Music: They have different styles of music. The best known is punta, which is popular in Honduras along with reggaeton.
UNESCO has declared that their music, dance and language (but apparently not their religion or food) as Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity.
– Abagond, 2015.
See also:
- Andy Palacio: Watina – a Garifuna song
- Taino – the Arawaks who lived in the northern Caribbean.
- shaman
- Catholic
- Nigeria
- The British
- Middle English – like Garifuna, also formed by conquest and intermarriage
531
I have been to Roatan, Honduras. I admit it was interesting encountering these people there.
LikeLike
Interesting and informative learned something new.
LikeLike
Wholeheartedly agree with Mary B! This also causes me to ponder the issues surrounding Black people in the USA not possessing any of our former NATIVE languages.
.
.
Abagond, have you written a post about Amerasians… the half Vietnamese children of US servicemen once stationed in Viet-Nam?
LikeLike
@ Fan
Oh yes, I did do a post on them:
LikeLike
Hello Abagond Writer,
I have read your blog for a couple of years now, and have found it to be one of the more rewarding and well researched blogs available.
I have also followed the Garifuna people for a little while now, having been turned on to them through the music of Andy Palacio. I wonder if you have had a chance to hear his music, or anything else coming out of his people. If not, you would do well to listen, it is well worth the time. Unfortunately, I hear that he recently passed. Anyways, I don’t expect to actually hear back from you, if I do it would be an honor and a privilege. If not, please keep up the truth.
Kirk C. Watkins
Sent from Windows Mail
LikeLike
There are plenty of Garinagu (plural for Garifuna) here in Southern California, particularly in South Los Angeles. Garifuna people are seen as “too African-looking” by their fellow Belizean-Americans – the Kriols. In Louisiana, Creole Blacks had the same whitewashed mindset towards non-Creole Blacks. Interstingly, my aunt is married to Garifuna man. In Los Angeles, the Garinagu who are originally from Honduras are more accepted by Brown Latinos (Hondurans and Mexicans) – because of the Spanish language and religion. The Garinagu who are originally from Belize have more accepted by African-Americans.
Belizeans (Garinagu and Kriols) are to Los Angeles the way Jamaicans are to New York. There are plenty of Black folks from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds mixing with one another.
LikeLike
Lol..why is it that most black people in the Caribbean do not want to be associated with Africans? Its not just them. North Africans do not want to be referred to as Africans. It is really funny.
LikeLike
@ villagewriter
Cultural historian and Pan-Africanist Runoko Rashidi said it best by saying that most people of African descent (African-Americans, Afro-Caribbeans and Afro-Latinos) in the western hemisphere prefer to use the general term “Black” instead of African. (Living under the global system of White supremacy has caused “Black” people to define themselves by color.) Most Africans on the continent prefer using the general term “African” instead of Black. Nigerians or Ethiopians in North America or Europe know they’re Black but would rather be linked to a nation or continent than a color, which is understandable. Ancestor John Henrik Clarke said: “Black [as an ethnic color] tells you what you look like but it doesn’t tell you who you are.” A very profound statement by our ancestor. Ethnic color and race were invented by the polarizing and dichotomous-thinking White man. To the traditional peoples of the Earth an ethnic color (e.g., Black, Brown, Red, Yellow and White) is meaningless.
I agree with you on the fact that 99% of North Africans (dark or light-skinned) do not want to be referred to as Africans. Ethnically and religiously, most identify with the continent’s 1400-year-old invaders – Arabs. Unfortunately, most melanin-rich, kinky-haired East Africans who live along the Swahili coasts of Tanzania and Kenya prefer to be called a “local Arab” (whatever that means) than African. Unfortunately, the hunter is telling the story of the lion.
LikeLike
@Michael Cooper
I think it is more an attempt to disassociate with ”CNN’s Africa” rather than a need to identify with a country or a culture. Take for example Jamaicans who say they are not descended from Africans and even refer to Africa as a wasteland. Then some actually come to Africa then all of a sudden they are Africans and the continent is part of them. I agree the hunter’s story still reigns supreme.
LikeLike
” In about 1200, Caribs from mainland South America took over St Vincent and other nearby islands. But they did not bring their women. They married the Arawak women who lived there.”
So… should I read this as they killed the Arawak men and took the women as their “wives”?
LikeLike
@ dubcapt23
Are there any songs you recommend?
LikeLike
@ villagewriter
Black Americans used to call themselves African but dropped it in the early 1800s. As I understand it, that was because there was a movement afoot to send free Blacks back to Africa, which most opposed.
LikeLike
@ Axlone
Not necessarily. The Norman French conquered England and did not bring their women either, marrying English women. It is why English has so many French words. They did not, as far as I know, wipe out all the men.
LikeLike
@Abagond
Yes, then they switched to Negro, then to Black now African. I don’t know whether it was in that order. What I know is that some want to revert back to Black.
LikeLike
In America, I believe we went from calling ourselves “African” to “Negro” to “Colored” (primarily in the South) to “Black” to “Afro-American” to “African-American”. There is a significant number of African-Americans who prefer to use and be called by the term “Black.” In the Black conscious or grassroots community, people use and prefer to be called by the term “African” (Africans in America) as oppose to African-American. As Black people in America (or the Americas), are we suffering from an identity crisis? White people are simply White people, which denotes racial unity.
LikeLike
Once we understand that the concept of race is about power more than skin color, it will be easier to unite and have one identity. That is the only way we will beat white supremacy.
LikeLike
..For awhile now I have been really interested in learning more about the history of the Garifuna peoples, and reading this post has once again peaked my curiosity to dive even further into their culture. I wonder why their food has not been recognized as “save-worthy” from UNESCO, (as for religion, I am not too surprised if it is not supported due to their “straying” from European-style of worship, per se)? The music, dance and language sure got on their radar though, right!?
LikeLike
😊 good post.
LikeLike
Abagond @ Education: Their children are forced to go to schools where their language, history and culture are not taught. Most speak Spanish, English or Kriol, but not Garifuna. In the 1920s, Garifuna died out in St Vincent and Dominica.
Linda says,
Abagond, I’m not sure if you meant the Garinagu/Garifuna people –have died out in Dominica/St. Vincent
or do you mean the “Arawak/Carib” languages has died out in Dominica/St. Vincent
Either way, the mixed Caribs are still in Dominica– they call themselves “Kalinago”, their actual name before the Spanish re-named them “Caribs”
and the mixed Caribs/Garifuna are still in St. Vincent but both islands have lost the Arawak/Carib languages
the languages went to central America with the “black Carib” people —
Garifuna, or Garinagu, is derived from Arawak and Carib languages.
The Africans were adopted into the Arawak/Carib tribe, so the Africans adopted the languages and culture
Speaking a common language has helped the Garifuna to maintain ethnic unity, no matter which country they landed in.
Ironically, the Garifuna are the Only group in the Caribbean that has kept the Arawak/Taino language ALIVE
I’m highlighting this because of the fact that genetically, the Garifuna in Central America are more African than Arawak/Taino but culturally, without the Garifuna, the language would be lost in the Caribbean.
(Jamaican patois has more African languages in it than Garifuna by the way)
LikeLike
@ Linda
I meant the language. I made the paragraph clearer. Thank you.
LikeLike
here’s a link that discusses the Garifuna language.
It describes how the early African Garinagu speakers had learned to speak Arawak/Carib (Kalípona) with strong pronunciations in their mother languages– so they spoke Kalípona with African “accents” —
and that’s why present day Garifuna sounds so unique with hints of “Africa” but in reality, present day Garifuna language is a Arawakan/Carib language
with a few loan words from African languages and some from European languages.
“the word ‘Garífuna’ was born as a result of the African pronunciation of the word Kalipona.”
Sidenote:
The history of the Kalipona (Caribs) are known because a Spanish Dominican friar, Father Breton, spent 5 years living on Dominica with the Carib Indians. He asked them what they called themselves and they said “Kalipona”
And mentioned that their ancestors were the Galíbi people of South America, who they still communication and traded with.
LikeLike
http://www.garifunaresearch.com/garifunalanguage.html
“The fact that there is little to no African vocabulary in Garífuna and that no creole formed (a language with some vestiges of African structure based on European vocabulary, normally created by large communities of Blacks in the early stages of Caribbean settlement), shows us that the Indians must have been in control – in power and in number (by the mid 1600s, the French and British acknowledged the islands of St. Vincent and Dominica as Kalípona territories).
This social structure prevented Africans from forming an Indo-African creole. The Africans simply acquired the indigenous vernacular immediately as a second language and Indian domination would have prevented the Africans from speaking their mother tongues.
Proto Garifuna:
the Kalípona language as spoken on St. Vincent (proto-Garífuna) was indeed one Arawak language spoken by the men and the women, this language also had many Carib words and affixes (suffix, prefix, infix).
The men spoke a second “language”, when they were trading with South America; but this language was still the Arawak language with the use of even more Carib words and affixes. This pre-Garífuna language also had a handful of Spanish and a few hundred French words, as a result of early European contact.
Early Garifuna:
Garífuna language is not Garífuna language until it is spoken by the Africans, lending their unique phonological and prosodic elements to the Kalípona language.
In an environment of unlimited access to the Kalípona language and as the Kalínago were in a position of power, there wasn’t time for a pidgin to form, much less a creole. What happened with the Africans in the Kalípona society is not unlike a student learning a second language.
Through an intimate contact with the French colonists, Garífuna language became inundated with French words but with an African (Garífuna) pronunciation.
By the time the Garínagu landed in Central America in 1797, they had French names, given to them by their French and Garífuna bilingual mothers.
The inclusion of French in Garífuna language does not make it a mixed language, it is still a wholly Arawak language with a large (but dwindling) corpus of Carib lexical and affixial items, but now with the infusion of French lexical items as well. It is important to note that there are no known French affixes (prefixes, suffixes) in Garífuna.”
LikeLike
you’re welcome (Abagond)
LikeLike
@ Abagond
I so enjoyed reading and learning about the Garifuna. And all the comments, too. I must also say that is very beautiful portrait above. I can’t help but smile broadly at their infectious laughter.
@Kirk C. Watkins
Well, thank you for turning me onto Andy Palacio and Punta music. I love the sound of the Segunda, the bass drum.
LikeLike
Just read an article about bass guitarist Abraham Laboriel is what brought me back to this thread.
LikeLike
Some of the African-Caribbean-English people who originated from Xaymayca (Jamaica) do have Arawak blood in them here in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, England. I know from meeting Aboriginal Canadians in Canada.
LikeLike
Garifuna, Caribbeans, Jamaicans, Guyana, Suriname… actually are of the lineage of the Dogon, Moor, Nubian, Olmec people of West Africa. Plese research your history. The so-called “Red man, Indian” is a product of the mix I mentioned above and Chinese Mayan, Aztec, Incas, and other Indigenous natives of South and Central America and then of the European mix with the that became the product Hispanic.
Kidnapped people of Africa was a fact after the original peoples of the Americas “People of queen Sheba” ( as documented in Columbus Journal) were being deported out of the Americas to Africa and Spain, chained up like sardines in a crawl space, in feces and urine infestation that caused mortality and sickness. Africans sold Africans to the Europeans and hence the “slaves” Forced, kidnapped, free people by kidnappers who in this time carries a hefty jail sentence. But back then kidnappers were the gods.
LikeLike
Interesting outline of the history and culture of The Garifuna ethnic group. Readers of this blog posting may be interested in an annual event where mostly women of Garifuna Heritage are highlighted and honored for the difference they make in their respective communities. It’s called the Barauda Awards and is a dignified yet festive Gala, Dinner and Awards Presentation taking place in the Bronx.
If you’d like to read about this year’s Barauda Awards, taking place in early November, go to the following link. http://beinggarifuna.com/2017/10/09/garifuna-women-difference-makers-to-be-honored-at-2017-barauda-awards-in-the-bronx-on-sunday-november-5th-2017/
Interesting article which chronicles the role Garifuna women play to keep the Garifuna culture alive for subsequent generations. Readers of this article may be interested in an annual event where mostly women of Garifuna heritage are highlighted and honored for the difference they make in their respective communities. It’s called the Barauda Awards and is a dignified yet festive Gala, Dinner and Awards Presentation taking place in the Bronx.
If you’d like to read about this year’s Barauda Awards, taking place in early November, go to the following link. http://beinggarifuna.com/2017/10/09/garifuna-women-difference-makers-to-be-honored-at-2017-barauda-awards-in-the-bronx-on-sunday-november-5th-2017/
LikeLike
@ Teofilo Colon Jr
Thank you for sharing that information.
LikeLike