Barbados: Barbados Art / Culture Profile

Orientation

Barbadians are people born on Barbados and people born elsewhere who have at least one Barbadian parent and maintain cultural ties to the country. There are emigrant Barbadians communities in Canada, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Guyana that maintain active ties with their families and friends on the island. Barbadians recognize regional identities that correspond to parish districts and distinctive regional accents.

Location and Geography. Barbados is a coral limestone outcropping of the South American continental shelf that lies in the western Atlantic Ocean, one hundred miles (160 kilometers) east of the island of Saint Lucia and two hundred miles (320 kilometers) north of Trinidad and the northern coast of South America. Barbados has low, rolling hills, and microclimate variations from rain forest to semidesert.

Demography. Additional than 260,000 people live on this island of 166 square miles (430 square kilometers), with a people density of 1,548 people per square mile (597.7 per square kilometer) in 1996. Large populations have characterized the country almost since its inception. As early as 1680, the island was home to seventy thousand people.

Until 1960, high birth and death rates generated a large number of young people. Barbadians emigrated in large numbers to the United Kingdom and in smaller numbers to the United States and Canada. Death rates and birth rates fell rapidly next 1960. Aided by continuing emigration part the young and immigration part the elderly, the people aged rapidly. By the year 2050, the proportion of the people age sixty-five and over will range between 25 and 33 % of the total people.

Linguistic Affiliation. Barbadians speak a dialect of English with tonal qualities that reflect the West African heritage of the vast majority of its people. Barbadians as well speak an English-West African pidgin called Bajan. The number of native Bajan speakers has declined in recent decades. Both languages have dialect differences that correspond with parish districts.

Symbolism. The flying fish serves as a national symbol.

History and Ethnic Relations

Emergence of the Country. Barbados was colonized by the English early in the seventeenth century. The English found the island uninhabited at the same time as they landed in 1625, although archaeological findings have documented prior habitation by Carib and Arawak Native Americans. By 1650, Barbados was transformed by the plantation system and slavery into the initial major monocropping sugar producer in the emerging British Empire, and its fortunes were tied to sugar and to England for the next three hundred and ten years. In 1651, Barbados won a measure of independence, and established what was to become the oldest continuing parliamentary democracy in the world outside England. This autonomy encouraged planters to remain on the island rather than returning to Europe at the same time as they made their fortunes.

National Identity. At the same time as West Indian sugar plantations disappeared elsewhere in the 1800s, Barbadian plantations remained productive. In the early twentieth century, the creation of a merchant-planter oligopoly ended the development in

living standards that occurred in the nineteenth century. The Great Depression of the 1930s led to massive labor disturbances. Subsequent investigations of living conditions established the grounds for fundamental political change. The vote, which until the late nineteenth century had been restricted to propertied white males, was made universal in 1943. By the 1950s, the descendants of former African slaves controlled the assembly and set in motion actions that transformed the island in fundamental ways. The island opted for full independence in 1966 but remains a member of the British Commonwealth.

Barbadian culture emerged out of the plantation slavery economy as a distinctive synthesis of English and West African cultural traditions. Regional, race, and class cultural variants exist, but all residents identify with the national culture.

Ethnic Relations. About 80% of all Barbadians are the descendants of former African slaves. Barbados as well has a high proportion of citizens with a largely European ancestry. Barbados is generally free from ethnic tension.

Urbanism, Architecture, and the Use of Space

About 80 % of the people lives in or around the capital, Bridgetown. The remaining 20 % live in rural areas in settlements that vary from dispersed homes and occasional plantations to small nucleated villages.

Food and Economy

Food in Daily Life. Coocoo (a creamy blend of cornmeal and okra) and flying fish is the national dish. Breaded and fried flying fish is a popular snack or meal. Bajan meals emphasize fish, chicken, pork, and other foods common in West Africa, such as rice, okra, and Scotch bonnet peppers. Popular fruits include papaya, mangos, guava, bananas, oranges, and pineapples. Meal components such as cornmeal, salt fish, and salt beef were supplied to the original plantation labor forces. A common meal served in rural areas called privilege blends rice, okra, hot pepper, pig tail or salt beef, garlic, salt fish, and onions. Mount Gay distillery has been producing rum since 1703. Mauby, brewed from bark, sugar, and spices, is a popular drink.

Food Customs at Ceremonial Occasions. Appropriate occasions often call for pudding and souse, the initial a spicy mashed sweet potato encased in pigs belly, and boiled pig's chief served with a "pickle" of onions, hot and sweet peppers, cucumbers, and lime. Jug, or jug jug, a dish consisting of pigeon, peas, stew and salt beef, onions, Guinea corn flour, and spices, is served with Christmas dishes such as boiled ham and roasted pork.

Social Stratification

Classes and Castes. Before 1960, Barbadian society consisted of a small merchant-planter elite largely of European ancestry; a slightly larger class of accountants, lawyers, medical personnel, journalists, and teachers of diverse ancestry; and a huge lower class of field laborers and domestic servants primarily of African ancestry. The elite remains about the same size but has grown much additional diverse in heritage. The lower class has all but disappeared. In its place, there is presently a huge middle class that encompasses everything from skilled blue-collar workers employed in manufacturing firms and hotels to a wide range of white-collar, professional, and managerial occupational groups employed due or not instantly in the manufacturing and tourist sectors.

Social Welfare and Change Programs

A national social security system began operations in 1937, providing old age and survivors' pensions, sickness, disability, and maternity benefits, and (under a January 1971 extension) employment injury benefits. People between the ages of sixteen and
An arch extends over a road in the capital city of Bridgetown. The majority of the people, about 80 %, live in or near the city.
An arch extends over a road in the capital city of Bridgetown. The majority of the people, about 80 %, live in or near the city.
sixty-five are covered. Unemployment insurance was introduced in 1982 and is funded by equal contributions from employers and employees. Sickness and maternity benefits are provided for employed persons, and all government hospitals and clinics maintain public wards for medical treatments, with costs scaled to gain.

Nongovernmental Organizations and Other Associations

Branches of international organizations include the Lions Club, Rotary Club, 4-H Clubs, Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, YMCA, and YWCA.

Gender Roles and Statuses

Division of Labor by Gender. Prior to an increase in educational and job opportunities for women in the 1960s, women depended primarily on their children for economic support. Child support paid by the father, or money earned by the children through chores and small jobs often constituted the family's sole source of gain. However, women have since entered a lot of job markets once dominated by men; for example, women held ten of forty-nine seats in Parliament in 1999.

The Relative Status of Women and Men. Although women are well-represented in all aspects of national life, women's rights advocates cite domestic violence as a critical problem. A domestic violence law passed in 1992 requires an immediate police response to reports of violence against women and children.

Marriage, Family, and Kinship

Marriage. Historically, sexual activity usually began early as women traded sex for economic support and children ("visiting" or "keeper" relationships). Visiting unions gave way to common-law marriages that for older couples may be legitimated by a church ceremony. Childbearing was an investment activity for women. In a woman's youth, children legitimated her claims for gain from men, although establishing those claims required subservience. As a woman entered middle age, her daughters took over nearly all household chores and her sons provided financial resources that could make her independent of spousal support and reduced or eliminated her subservience to an autocratic male. In old age, financial and domestic support from children meant the difference between abject poverty and a moderate or even comfortable
Children walk completed a mural in Boscobel, St. Peter Parish. Murals are a common art form for the a lot of artists in Barbados.
Children walk completed a mural in Boscobel, St. Peter Parish. Murals are a common art form for the a lot of artists in Barbados.
lifestyle. Because men could expect support from their children only if they had maintained a relationship with the children's mother, women dependent on men in their youth found that their men were dependent on them by late middle age.

Since 1960, kin relations have undergone a revolution. Barbadian women have experienced a conjunction of good job opportunities and increased educational levels. The West Indian marriage pattern of visiting, common-law marriage, and legal unions remains, but a lot of women presently receive far additional domestic help, emotional support, and affectionate behavior. Women presently have fewer children and enjoy markedly better relationships with their partners.

Domestic Unit. Households range in size from a single man or woman to mixed-gender groups that include as a lot of as fifteen people. Barbadians idealize a household that consists of a married couple and their children, and that pattern characterizes about 45 % of all households. Around 35 % of households are organized around a mother and her children. Those households sometimes encompass three generations of women and may include brothers, uncles, sons, and the sexual partners of members of the core family unit. Biological fathers and mothers are distinguished from other adults who may serve various caregiving and economic support functions for children.

Inheritance. Barbadians trace descent and inheritance through both the father and the mother.

Kin Groups. Barbadians recognize no organized, corporate groups of kin.

Socialization

Child Rearing and Education. Private and public primary and secondary schools offer educational programs modeled on those in the United Kingdom. Child-rearing traditions emphasize gender-based family responsibilities. Traditionally, women took responsibility for the home and taught homemaking skills to their daughters. Men were expected to provide gain for the family and work outside the home. Both boys and girls began to work around the home at a very young age, doing chores such as carrying water by age five. Mothers often spoiled their boys. Boys' work was at no time as continuous as that of their sisters giving boys much additional leisure time than girls had. Boys played additional often during the day and remained out later at night. Sons grew into men who were expected to protect their mothers physically, inclunding provide for their material needs.

These patterns persist, but increasing affluence has led parents to expect less of their children. Girls presently can become lawyers, businesswomen, and university professors. Working women expect their men to help with the children. Women, additional than men, help care for elderly parents.

Higher Education. Barbados supports one of the three campuses of the University of the West Indies (UWI). The local campus (Cave Hill) offers degrees in the physical, biological, and social sciences; the humanities; and law and medicine. Barbados Community College follows the practices of the California national community college system, and offers courses in technical fields and the liberal arts. Advanced education is as well available through a teacher training college, a polytechnical college, the Additional Mural Centre of the UWI, and a hotel school. The government pays tuition for all citizens who attend the UWI.

Etiquette

Barbadians are known for their politeness and civility, a legacy both of British influence and of the island's high people density—living in close proximity to others imposes pressure to avoid censure and unpleasant confrontations. Describing his homeland, well-known Barbadian author John Wickham wrote, "The inability of people to remove themselves from one an extra has led to concern for public order, a compassion for others, and a compelling sense of a neighbor's rights and integrity."

Religion

Religious Beliefs. Additional than 80 % of the people is Christian, and additional than half belong to the Church of England. A small East Indian community includes some people who practice Hinduism, and Islam is adhered to by a small number of people of diverse backgrounds. A growing number of people practice Rastafarianism. A small Jewish community with Sephardic roots attends services in a synagogue originally built in 1640 C.E.

The Apostolic Spiritual Baptists (popularly known as "Tie–heads") occupy a appropriate place in Barbados' religious spectrum as the island's only indigenous religion. Fashioned next other West Indian revivalist religions, the sect, founded in 1957 by Bishop Branville Williams, combines Christian observance with the foot stomping, hand clapping, and dancing characteristic of African religious practices. Tie–heads, so-called because of the cloth turbans worn by both men and women, sport colorful gowns in colors symbolic of particular qualities.

Rituals and Holy Places. The school day usually begins with a prayer and small revivalist churches abound on the island. Converts to the Tie–Chief faith are baptized and again sequestered for seven to ten days in the "Mourning Ground," a appropriate area of the church.

Religious Practitioners. Priests exert some influence over public policy and cultural life (one reason for the absence of casinos on the island), and a substantial all of radio air time is devoted to religious programming.