Out of the Shadow of Balliceaux: From Garifuna Place of Memory to Garifuna Sense of Place in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Eastern Caribbean

ABSTRACT

The Garifuna (“Black Carib”) peoples of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG) define their ethnogenesis in the intermixing of escaped enslaved Africans with indigenous “Island Carib” or Kalinago peoples from the seventeenth century onward. Within the Caribbean context, they thus represent an unusual example of an African diaspora culture. Based upon recent fieldwork, this paper (authored by an archaeologist and a religious studies heritage specialist) examines how non-Garifuna, diasporic Garifuna and Vincentian Garifuna define what it means to “be” Garifuna, and how these often contradictory perspectives can be reconciled within the context of a sustainable community-based heritage tourism strategy.

KEYWORDS:

• Saint Vincent
• Grenadines
• Garifuna
• community heritage
• heritage tourism
• indigenous heritage

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to express their gratitude to the Garifuna Heritage Foundation for its support during this early phase of work. We have been collaborating closely with the Garifuna community on SVG since 2014, and have forged a number of friendships and connections. Special thanks go to Mrs. Zoila Browne, Ms. Sherise Browne, and Mr. David Williams. Mrs. Aldia Dyer of the Ministry of Education facilitated our workshop with teachers, as did Mrs. Descima Hamilton of the Saint Vincent National Trust. Within the Greiggs community, special thanks go to Mrs. Michelle Beache, Mrs. Margaret Jackson, and Mr. Alston Moore. Ms. Louise Mitchell and Ms. Nicola Redway both provided the initial impetus for the project. Ms. Vanessa Demirciyan very graciously allowed us to quote from her paper and provided us with copies of other papers presented at the workshop (these are in the process of being digitized and will be placed on the Garifuna Heritage Foundation web site in due course; see http://garifunaresearchcenter.org/call-for-papers-5th-international-garifuna-conference/). Our work was funded by the University of Winchester. Finally, the authors wish to thank two anonymous referees whose comments and input greatly improved the paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on contributors

Niall Finneran (PhD Cambridge 1999; Fellow of the Royal Anthropological Institute) is Reader in Historical Archaeology and Heritage Studies in the Department of Archaeology, Anthropology and Geography at the University of Winchester. He has undertaken extensive fieldwork in the Caribbean.

Christina Welch (PhD Southampton 2005) is Senior Fellow in the Department of Theology, Religions and Philosophy at the University of Winchester. With Finneran, she is co-author of a forthcoming monograph on the materiality of Caribbean religions.