Black History : Female Fertility Rituals In Jamaican Dancehall Culture...

Isaiah

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Jun 8, 2004
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http://www.jouvay.com/interviews/carolyncooper.htm

Jamaican dancehall culture is commonly disparaged as a homophobic, homicidal, misogynist discourse that reduces both men and women to bare essentials: skeletal remains. In this dehumanizing caricature women are misrepresented as mindless bodies, (un)dressed and on display exclusively for male sexual pleasure. And men are stereotyped as dog-hearted predators stalking potential victims. It is the animal nature of both genders that is foregrounded. It is true that sex and violence - basic instincts - are recurring themes in the lyrics of both male and female deejays. Understandably so. The dancehall is, essentially, a heterosexual space (some would say heterosexist) in which men and women play out eroticised gender roles in ritual dramas that can become violent.

But sex and violence, however primal, are not the only preoccupations of Jamaican dancehall culture. There is a powerful current of explicitly political lyrics that speak to the struggle of the celebrants in the dance to reclaim their humanity in circumstances of grave economic hardship that force the animal out of its lair. Indeed, Jamaican dancehall culture privileges dance as a mode of theatrical self-articulation in which the body speaks eloquently of its capacity to endure and transcend material deprivation. And the politics of the dancehall is decidedly gendered: it is the body of the woman that is invested with absolute authority as men pay homage to the female principle.

For More, click on the web address up above...

Peace!
Isaiah
 

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