Customer Reviews

The Story of the Jamaican People

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3 star:		(1)
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In any history the selection of the important points which make up that history will make or break the work. Philip Sherlock and Hazel Bennett have written a work which selects people, places and events from the Afraican-Jamaican point of view rather than from a European point of view. The normal list of government officals and events is either not contained in this work or is played down. At the same time the African-Jamican is showcased. For example, Columbus gets about five pages in this book while Gargey has his own chapter and many additional pages. As the authors point out, this work differs significantly from other histories, most of which have been written from the perspective of the coloniser. The book presents a new perspective on Jamaican history which needs to be read and understood but done so with the other works. Only then will the failues of each type balance out to give the reader a total picture of Jamaican history.

This book's Jamaican-African perspective seems to run out of steam about the time of Independence (1962). Coverage of the 20th century revolves around Marcus Garvey, Alexander Bustamente, and Norman Manley. The six post-Independence Prime Ministers appear in photos, but only Bustamente is discussed. There is no mention of the 1970s social unrest, nor of the rivalry between Michael Manley and Edward Seaga. Considerable attention is given to athletics and the creative arts, but very little to political economy. "Development," we learn, "is a state of mind" (410), and Jamaica's biggest development problem is not the lack of gainful employment (a view attributed to the Rastas and a group of women writers), but the Eurocentric, colonial system of education (402). This deliberate evasion of any possible controversy and of contemporary history suggests this book was written as a secondary school textbook.

Sherlock does a lengthy look at Jamaican history from a Jamaican point of view, with a special emphasis and sympathy to the enlsaved majority of Jamaica. Although most of the material in the book is not new, the interpretation is fresh, and from a perspective that has not been heard from often in works dealing with Caribbean history.

I very much appreciate the thoughtful and deliberate way the text invites you into the human experience. There are plenty of histories that detail dates of events and leaders names. This work effectively draws the reader into the people's story in an engaging way.

Worth every penny and more. I wish all my fellow Jamaican could get a copy, as well as well wishers of the islands.

Let me begin by saying that this was a very informative, well-researched, and highly readable. While reading it I found it sadly ironic that a book which explicitly states that one of its goals is to reclaim a non-colonialist history of Jamaica that is from the perspective of the African and other non-whites, can so easily fall into the trap of maintaining the historical invisibility of women.

Quite often the language is exclusively male when it intends, I believe, to be universal. Repeatedly the word mankind is used rather than humankind. Nor is this usage consistent - on page 40 the language keeps skipping back and forth: "the human being... early man... human history began... the feet of mankind."

On page 37, religion is defined as "the communion of God with man." On page 26 "the African" is referred to as "he" - do women not pray? Are women not also Africans? On page 92 the hypothetical "traveller" becomes "he." On pages 94 and 99 "The African" is again a "he." On page 150 the "West Indian" is searching for "his roots and his heritage..."

All this serves to render women and their experiences invisible. One gets the impression that women don't even exist. It is over a hundred pages into the text before more than a line or two is devoted to women.

The text mentions that too often the perspective of the African has been missing/obliterated from "imperialist" history but so too has the female perspective. Sadly, this book perpetuates this erasure and silencing of female voices by failing to even acknowledge their existence except with a few select passages about "women's issues" and a grand total of ten lines in the index.

Lastly, on page 353 the text explains that in these histories the people of Africa and Asia are seen as wards or victims of Europeans "but seldom, if ever, in their own right, as people with histories and cultures of their own." Sadly, the same can be said of women.

This book challenges traditional modes of historical writing, but in ignoring the lives of women, it perpetuates them too. If you are doing research on Jamaican history that includes women's experiences you will need supplementary texts.