tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10254497730174439782024-02-21T21:16:14.461-05:00Urban CelebrationLisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.comBlogger33125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-11523648576396378302010-05-30T18:15:00.000-04:002010-05-30T18:15:53.190-04:00Transition<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The process of this Blog is now complete. My Thesis is done and uploaded and I'm starting new things. </span></span><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">If you'd like to follow my work further, please check out this website: </span></span><a href="http://lisajumbie.blogspot.com/"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">http://lisajumbie.blogspot.com/</span></span></a></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">If you'd like to see the end result of the thesis document, you can download it at this site: </span></span><a href="https://uwspace.uwaterloo.ca/handle/10012/5161"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">https://uwspace.uwaterloo.ca/handle/10012/5161</span></span></a></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Thank you to everyone who followed this blog and all the best to those who are continuing with their own research. </span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Lisa</span></span></div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-722908779030343862010-04-02T20:36:00.001-04:002010-04-02T20:37:01.395-04:00sign-off<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Ladies and gentlemen of the cyber world, my thesis nears its end. I got sign off on Wednesday and am in the process of printing copies for people. It's final tally is some 263 pages! I can't believe that this is almost over. </span></span>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-42751900713873078452010-03-24T21:43:00.005-04:002010-03-24T21:47:41.186-04:00Leela<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;">‘Līlā (Leela) is a Sanskrit noun meaning “sport” or “play”. It has been the central term in the Hindu elaboration of the idea that God in his creating and governing of the world is moved not by need or necessity but by a free and joyous creativity that is integral to his own nature. He acts in a state of rapt absorption comparable to that of an artist possessed by his creative vision or to that of a child caught up in the delight of a game played for its own sake…[i]</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><br />
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After the British Slave Emancipation Act was passed in 1833, many African ex-slaves moved off of plantations, leaving a deficit of labour in a still thriving sugar industry. The British colonials brought indentured servants to the Caribbean who were paid wages and contractually obligated to stay a minimum of 5 years in the Caribbean. A range of different races were brought to the Caribbean including Chinese, Portuguese, Madeirans and free Africans from the United States[ii]. The largest racial group of indentured labourers to stay in the English speaking Caribbean islands were Indians from Utar Pradesh, Bihar and Tamil Nadu (called “coolies”, though the term is now considered derogatory). They spoke Bhojpuri-Hindi, a dialect common to Uttar Pradesh and lived on the plantations in conditions that were little improved since the end of slavery. The Indians arrived on a ship called the Fateh Rozack[iii] which departed from Calcutta in 1845, travelling across the kelapani[iv] (black waters) to Trinidad. Between 1845 and 1917, a total of 25 to 30 000 East Indians of both Muslim and Hindu faiths travelled to the Caribbean[v]. Thousands of Indians also went to Jamaica, Suriname and Guyana. Today, descendents of indentured Indian labourers constitute 40% of Trinidad’s population, while the rest of the population is 37.5% African, 20.5% mixed race and 2% unspecified[vi]. When Indians came to the Caribbean they brought their language, their religious customs and even plants and herbs. The fusion of different cultures in Trinidad therefore can be seen in culinary flavours, the tone of Trinidadian dialect, artistic expression and national festivals. Some of the most prolific Indian festivals in Trinidad are Divali (Festival of Lights), Phagwa (derived from India’s Holi) and Hosay (derived from a Shiite Islamic festival).<br />
<br />
Before considering the physical manifestations of Indian iconography in the Caribbean, we must first consider the basic underlying principle of Hindu religious thought: that of Līlā (leela). This guiding concept of sacred play underscores the day to day life and festivities of Hindu practitioners. Leela also refers to divine theatre, where mythological stories are ritualistically acted out.<br />
</span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;">“The entire cosmos is a leela, a dance of energy, a drama staged by Brahman, the Absolute. Leelas are also specific celebrations, the most important in Trinidad being Ramlila , the story of Ram (Rama), the god-warrior-king as told in Valmiki’s Sanskrit Ramayana…” [vii]</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><br />
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These plays are presented through dances, drama and songs of narrative poetry[viii]. As is the case of Ramleela in Trinidad, this re-enactment of sacred text becomes a public spectacle which represents communities. Like Carnival, the leela is a way of reinstating sacred narratives in a profane world. The ludic nature of Carnival may indeed be the most formative condition of Hindu thinking that has been translated into Carnival and Trinidadian culture at large. Although a sense of playful buffoonery is reminiscent of the Feast of Fools, leela suggests a depth of purpose through ludic masquerade characters that might lead to a kind of transcendence. The divine theatre and the festival are two of the strongest ways in which this sense of leela is communicated in the broader community. The proliferation of Indian festivals throughout Trinidad has surely contributed to a nationalistic impulse to reclaim public space through festival. This is perhaps why Carnival is so fiercely upheld each year as a cosmogonic re-telling of the nation’s identity.<br />
<br />
There are two Indian festivals that are practiced in Trinidad which are strongly reminiscent of Carnival. The first is Phagwa (a Hindu celebration) and the second is Hosay (an Islamic celebration). Phagwa is the Bhojpuri word for Holī, which is a vernal festival that is celebrated throughout India. This practice came to Trinidad with Indentured labourers, regaining popularity in the 1980’s particularly. Holi in India takes place before the spring harvest. In an article on the practice of Holi in India, Crooke considers that:<br />
</span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;">‘We have seen that the festival marks not only the close of one of the seasons, but also the end of the year in its older form. It is thus a crisis, a No Man’s time, a rite de passage, as M. van Gennep terms it. It is at such times for instance, during intercalary months, that festivals in the nature of the Saturnalia, accompanied by ribaldry and obscene rites, very commonly occur… On the principles of mimetic magic, orgiastic rites are supposed to recruit and re-invigorate the exhausted energies of the year that has passed, and to promote fresh and healthy activity in the coming season.’</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><br />
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The similarities between the Saturnalian Holi or Phagwa and Carnival are quite strong ideologically. Phagwa is a joyous gathering of people where they play and throw brightly coloured dye called abeer at each other. It is a community based festival that is conducted in a mutual public space. Another component of the festival is the pichakaaree competition in which Indian songs are sung, mostly in English. Burton Sankaralli describes these songs as “Indocentric calypsos”[ix] since they are rooted in social commentary. Although there is not a great deal written on the interrelationship between Phagwa and the form of J’ouvert, there are obvious physical similarities between the two in the flinging of paint or mud in a crowd and the joyous revelry of bodies at play. The main difference between the two is that J’ouvert is a procession through the city whereas Phagwa typically occurs in one compound or public square. The similarity between Carnival and Phagwah as saturnalian things is furthered by Hein’s consideration of devotees of the child god Krishna:<br />
</span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;">‘Their sportiveness has manifested itself in cultic matters that are marginal to social ethics: in the exuberance of their religious assemblies, in the easy emotionality of their pathway of salvation through devotion, in the madcap behaviour that they tolerate in their saints, and in the spirit of abandon that pervades their fairs and pilgrimages and a few saturnalian festivals like the licentious Holī.’[x]</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><br />
Both Carnival and Phagwa are known for their inherent joy. In both cases that joy and abandon is not confined my masquerade form or religious programme, rather the experience of freedom that they incite arises out of leela; that playful fascination with paint and mud that is exuberant, ecstatic and almost child-like.<br />
<br />
[i] Norvin Hein,The Gods at Play, Līlā in South Asia, pg 13<br />
[ii] The Trinidad Carnival, Errol Hill, pg 9<br />
[iii] Freedom, Festivals and Caste in Trinidad After Slavery, Neil A. Sookdeo, pg 11<br />
[iv] Kelapani refers to the Bhojpuri word meaning “black waters” it describes the oceanic voyage from Calcutta to the Caribbean. It is typically insinuated that this was a one way voyage. Indian Presence in Carnival, Burton Sankeralli, pg 77<br />
[v] Indian Presence in Carnival, Burton Sankeralli, pg 76<br />
[vi] http://www.indexmundi.com/trinidad_and_tobago/demographics_profile.html, information based on 2000 National Census<br />
[vii] Indian Presence in Carnival, Burton Sankeralli, pg 76<br />
[viii] The Gods at Play, Norvin Hein, pg 16<br />
[ix] Indian presence in Carnival, pg 83<br />
[x] Thee Gods at Play, pg19</span></span></span>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-34025727184211709242010-03-16T17:24:00.002-04:002010-03-16T17:26:07.366-04:00The Extraordinary City<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmSaX-dzC9yVS5y54V2aRGxZwM5WPDjGf8xkoDHQwQfqfTPiF9DresYsdQqoQv1p8wLhfizObw8OiEmhr7toDgHRsi0BSDB-fsf3UcyARv_Zhh0jR0hOOSrEFWwv88SH9nYk24L6ITFNs/s1600-h/composite+south+quay+small.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmSaX-dzC9yVS5y54V2aRGxZwM5WPDjGf8xkoDHQwQfqfTPiF9DresYsdQqoQv1p8wLhfizObw8OiEmhr7toDgHRsi0BSDB-fsf3UcyARv_Zhh0jR0hOOSrEFWwv88SH9nYk24L6ITFNs/s320/composite+south+quay+small.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: black; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Although the most tangible experience of Carnival in Port-of-Spain is seen during January and February, a substantial amount of planning, designing and contemplation of Carnival occurs throughout the year. When Ash Wednesday arrives, the passing of Carnival is marked by fetes and a proliferation of magazines and videos of the year’s spectacles. From July to September Trinidadian Mas Camps launch their costumes for the following year while Steelbands prepare their line ups and calypso artists develop their material for the following year. Each years Carnival represents the coming together of artists, mas camps, pan yards, government institutions and independent entrepreneurs, many whose entire lives revolve around the Carnival industry. Similarly, certain sites in the city have also evolved to be dedicated to Carnival. Some pan yards and mas camps for example have been in the same location for many years. </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Invaders Pan Yard</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> for example, has been situated opposite to the Queens Park Oval since the 1930’s when they were called </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">‘The Oval Boys’</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">. Its original members were some of the first to experiment with steel drums in the world. Elliot Mannette, for example, working in an iron foundry, was particularly adept at molding the drums and was one of the first to experiment with fifty gallon oil drums, creating six of the nine types of steel pans in existence. Today, Invaders Pan Yard has grown to be an iconic site within the city because of its pivotal role in the development of </span></span><st1:place w:st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Trinidad</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">’s Carnival. <o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Because of the interwoven relationship between the growth of Port-of-Spain and the persistent celebration of Carnival since the city’s inception, the city and the festival have become two intertwined entities. The Ordinary city of </span></span><st1:city w:st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Port-of-Spain</span></span></st1:city><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> is the financial capital of the Caribbean while the Extraordinary city represents the hybridization of the varied social, cultural and political influences that have shaped the </span></span><st1:place w:st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Caribbean</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">. Carnival is the vehicle of expression that reaches out of the extraordinary city of myth, ritualistically transforming the streets of the city. The Extraordinary city is a living propensity for ecstasy that undulates just below the city’s Ordinary face. Although visible for only two months each year, the Extraordinary city is an ever-present life force that invisibly measures, mocks and occasionally overtakes the year round city. Cuban novelist Antonio Benitez-Rojo states that carnival rhythm is deeply rooted in the </span></span><st1:place w:st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Caribbean</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">: <o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">‘…carnival, the great Caribbean celebration…spreads out through the most varied systems of signs: music, song, dance, myth, language, food, dress, body expression. There is something strongly feminine in this extraordinary fiesta: its flux, its diffuse sensuality, its generative force, its capacity to nourish and conserve (juices, spring, pollen, rain, seed, shoot, ritual sacrifice – these are words that come to stay). Think of the dancing flourishes, the rhythms of the conga, the samba, the masks, the hoods, the men dressed and painted as women, the bottles of rum, the sweets, the confetti and coloured streamers, the hubbub, the carousal, the flutes, the drums, the cornet and the trombone, the teasing, the jealousy, the whistles and the faces, the razor that draws blood, death. Life, reality in forward and reverse. Torrents of people who flood the streets, the night lit up like an endless dream, the figure of the centipede that comes together and then breaks up, that winds and stretches beneath the ritual’s rhythm, that flees the rhythm without escaping it, putting off its defeat, stealing off and hiding itself, imbedding itself finally in the rhythm, always in the rhythm, the beat of the chaos of the islands.’ </span></span></span></i><i><sup><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">4</span></span></span></sup></i><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </span></div><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The proliferation of Carnival throughout the Caribbean and </span></span><st1:place w:st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Latin America</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> has arisen from the overlaying of similar threads of history. </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; line-height: 20px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">When analyzing the art and literature that has come out of the Caribbean and </span></span><st1:place w:st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Latin America</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> a common thread of Magical Realism dominates these expressions. Magical Realism is a genre of literature that has emerged from these territories being popularized by Latin American authors like Isabel Allende and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Looking at painters like Frida Kahlo and even Trinidadian painter Che Lovelace, a world of dual perception becomes apparent. As a genre of literature, Magical Realism is typified by its hallucinatory imagery and dizzying combination of modern reality in an often animistic world. Stephen Sleman in his essay on </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Magical Realism as Post Colonial Discourse</span></span></i></span><i><sup><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">5</span></span></span></sup></i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> states that history in the magical realist novel, engages in a kind </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">of ‘double vision’</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> or </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">‘metaphysical clash’</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> between notions of imperial history and the view of</span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> ‘real’ </span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">history based on the </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">‘marginalised and dispossessed voices’</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> of the colonial encounter. Kumkum Sangari</span></span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">in </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Politics of the Possible</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> describes Magical Realism as occupying a </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">liminal space </span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">between the reality of physical experience and the mythological underpinnings of a multilayered cultural experience</span></span></span><sup><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">6</span></span></span></sup><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">.</span></span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> Derek Walcott says about the art of the </span></span><st1:place w:st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Antilles</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> that:</span></span></span></span></span><br />
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</span> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; tab-stops: 5.5in; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">‘</span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Break a vase, and the love that reassembles the fragments is stronger than that love which took its symmetry for granted when it was whole. The glue that fits the pieces is the sealing of its original shape. It is such a love that reassembles our African and Asiatic fragments, the cracked heirlooms whose restoration shows its white scars. This gathering of broken pieces is the care and pain of the </span></span><st1:place w:st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Antilles</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">… Antillean art is this restoration of our shattered histories, our shards of vocabulary, our archipelago becoming a synonym for pieces broken off from the original continent... This is the basis of the Antillean experience, this shipwreck of fragments, these echoes, these shards of a huge tribal vocabulary, these partially remembered customs, and they are not decayed but strong. They survived the Middle Passage and the Fatel Rozack*...’</span></span><sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">7</span></span></sup></i></span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; tab-stops: 5.5in; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; tab-stops: 0in; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">This re-assembly of cultural fragments in a liminal space between physical and mythological is physically represented through Carnival in the </span></span><st1:place w:st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Caribbean</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">. The Extraordinary city represents the temporary unity of these fragments. It is a second urban condition within the city of </span></span><st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Port-of-Spain</span></span></st1:place></st1:city><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> that is part of a regional cultural condition. Carnival can in this way be seen as the regions attempt to make sense of its complex history and cultural experience. The effect of Carnival therefore is to create a sense of belonging to the city, re-grounding ones relationship to that space. It is as Mircea Eliade describes, that the power of this masquerade lies in mans need to periodically re-align himself with the sacred in the profane world. Eliade states, <o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 120%; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 120%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri; line-height: 120%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">‘The sacred reveals absolute reality and at the same time makes orientation possible; hence it founds the world in the sense that it fixes the limits and establishes the order of the world.’</span></span></span></i><i><sup><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri; line-height: 120%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">8</span></span></span></sup></i><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri; line-height: 120%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The principal way in which the festival makes the city sacred again is thorough the physical pathway that it takes. On Carnival days it is not only the undulating band that shapes the borders of ones experience. The parade route although physically nothing more than a series of barricades and stands which leave the streets free for masqueraders, still dictates the form and order in which thousands of revelers will experience Port-of-Spain. The Carnival route is the melody that moves through the Extraordinary city, reaching a crescendo at the judging points. The morphology of the city also shapes ones experience since sites hold personal memories as well as socio-political ones. Different neighborhoods have different widths or streets and heights of buildings. The masqueraders’ experience of movement, the density of the crowd and the psychogeography of the area are all dictated by the Carnival route. It is the single largest organizational element in the festival, though its significance is largely underestimated. <o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.0pt; mso-hyphenate: none; mso-layout-grid-align: none; text-align: justify; text-autospace: none; vertical-align: middle;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #cccccc;"><br />
</span></div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-45355853620474901352010-03-08T20:06:00.000-05:002010-03-08T20:06:26.276-05:00premise<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><i>' I have a premise: Of all possible sociocultural practices, the carnival - or any other equivalent festival - is the one that best expresses the strategies that the people of the Caribbean have for speaking at once of themselves and their relation to the world, with history, with tradition, with nature, with God.' </i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The Repeating Island, Antonio Benitez-Rojo, pg 294</span>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-65459397252274569402010-03-03T00:00:00.001-05:002010-03-03T00:00:56.714-05:00Route<div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I had a meeting on Friday past that finalized The List. In order to defend before the end of April, it seems that I must complete all of the items on The List by the end of March. March... ironic that that would be my militant month of working. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Most importantly though, I figured out how I am going to do my Chapter 3. I ad tried a few things but nothing stuck. The question was - how do I show the ways in which the permanent Extraordinary City expresses itself? How does the spatial form of the city inform Carnival? And inversely, how does Carnival inform city space? The way I've decided to tackle this analysis is to consider the parade route step by step. The way I figure, when you walk through the city (or dance through it), your experience is unavoidably framed by the places you move through. So I am going to use the path on one band I followed in Carnival 2009, from its camp, to each judging point. I will look at the spatial qualities of each neighborhood the route passes through and consider the relationships between each judging point and their immediate environment and the historical events which have shaped those spaces into the urban artifacts they are today. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtALohLBHdv6FGuo3VV6buPxD99G7jQ8fcoZN-muLR3Yh5ZILT7u7tboeCPHzf2nmFRx9PdSQArRir15avUDvxtwbh9uyEkyEtnSW9eFmZc-mzXaEKdZX5afHM7kjqA3XKQ9GBo9VK7no/s1600-h/composite+small+flat.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="174" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtALohLBHdv6FGuo3VV6buPxD99G7jQ8fcoZN-muLR3Yh5ZILT7u7tboeCPHzf2nmFRx9PdSQArRir15avUDvxtwbh9uyEkyEtnSW9eFmZc-mzXaEKdZX5afHM7kjqA3XKQ9GBo9VK7no/s320/composite+small+flat.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The point of all this is simple. The Carnival route evolved from the interconnection of different competitions. In a sense the route itself is a true hybrid between the French tradition of pageantry and the African street masquerades. The route does both and leaves room for both. A simple organisational tool. I think I see some Architecture in this after all...</span></span></div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-30558408946312583942010-02-15T19:00:00.000-05:002010-02-15T19:00:05.549-05:00<a href="http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/02/carnival_2010.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/02/carnival_2010.html</span></a><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">really cool article showing loads of carnivals around th world. all pictures taken in the last week or 2. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Happy Carnival All! </span>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-5947277668242081732010-02-07T15:14:00.005-05:002010-03-03T16:21:55.883-05:00Three Histories<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"></span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">‘…the Caribbean is not a common archipelago, but a meta-archipelago (an exalted quality that <st1:place w:st="on">Hellas</st1:place> possessed, and the great Malay archipelago as well), and as a meta-archipelago it has the virtue of having neither a boundary nor a center. Thus the Caribbean flows outward past the limits of its own sea with a vengeance, and its ultima Thule may be found on the outskirts of Bombay, near the low and murmuring shores of Gambia, in a Cantonese tavern circa 1850, at a Balinese temple, in an old Bristol pub, in a commercial warehouse in Bordeaux at the time of Colbert, in a windmill beside the Zuider Zee, at a café in a barrio of Manhattan, in the existential suadade of an old Portuguese lyric.’<a href="file:///C:/Users/Lisa%20Carmen/Documents/LISA%20DOCUMENTS/SCHOOL/MArch/THESIS/M5/history%20intro.doc#_edn1" name="_ednref1" title=""><span class="MsoEndnoteReference"><span class="MsoEndnoteReference"><b><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: orange;">[1]</span></span></b></span></span></a><o:p></o:p></span></i></div></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">The mythic history of the <st1:place w:st="on">Caribbean</st1:place> is richly layered with a diversity of cultural motifs. These islands were home to different Aboriginal Indian tribes like the Arawaks and Caribs alongside visiting tribes from the mainland. When the Spanish met this archipelago it was already a diverse region. From the 15<sup>th</sup> century when Christopher Columbus sailed to the New World to modern times when Trinidad is a thriving industrial nation, the <st1:place w:st="on">Caribbean</st1:place> has become a bricolage of cultural expressions. Carnival in this sense is the ultimate syncretic celebration of this region, which temporarily creates an experience of the city which makes visible its differing mythologies. <o:p></o:p></span></div></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">Three Histories</span></i></b><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;"> presents the separate founding mythologies of the festival and the people who inhabit <st1:place w:st="on">Trinidad</st1:place>. This analysis will lend clarity to the significance and potency of each cultures belief system in order to understand their confluence in <st1:place w:st="on">Trinidad</st1:place>’s Carnival. These histories are assembled according to their relative impact on the festival as it is seen today. The first history is titled <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Shango: God of Drums</i></b>. Here, the world of Yoruba in West Africa is revealed in order to understand the mythological and ideological underpinnings of African religious masquerade within contemporary <st1:place w:st="on">Caribbean</st1:place> cultural expressions. The second history, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Dionysus: God of Ecstasy</i> </b>traces the origins of ecstatic pagan celebrations. This analysis thereby considers the attitudes and traditions which underscore the European Carnival, brought to the <st1:place w:st="on">Caribbean</st1:place> by French colonials. Finally, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Leela: Sacred Play </i></b>considers the societal role of festivals within East Indian culture. Through looking at some of the festivals which still occur in Trinidad today alongside Carnival, this history will uncover the integration of East Indian beliefs into modern <st1:place w:st="on">Caribbean</st1:place> cultural expressions. <o:p></o:p></span></div></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">Although there are many other influences which have passed across <st1:place w:st="on">Caribbean</st1:place> waters, the three histories presented here are main anchor points of the festival. These myths have founded the physical articulation, the cultural significance and the form of celebratory characters today, making Trinidadian Carnival unique from most other Carnivals around the world. The basic thread that is shared between these disparate histories is ecstatic joy and the cultural imperative to engage in festivals to create that communal joy. It is this mutual acceptance of the need for communal celebration that has made the festival as prominent as it is today. <o:p></o:p></span></div></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
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</span></span></div></div></div><div style="mso-element: endnote-list;"><hr size="1" style="text-align: justify;" width="33%" /><div id="edn1" style="mso-element: endnote;"><div class="MsoEndnoteText"><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="file:///C:/Users/Lisa%20Carmen/Documents/LISA%20DOCUMENTS/SCHOOL/MArch/THESIS/M5/history%20intro.doc#_ednref1" name="_edn1" style="mso-endnote-id: edn1;" title=""><span class="MsoEndnoteReference"><span class="MsoEndnoteReference"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 10pt;">[1]</span></span></span></a> <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The Repeating Island </span></b><span style="font-family: Calibri;">by Antonio Benitez-Rojo, pg 4</span></div></div></div></div></div></span></span>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-49651083397635990412010-01-28T15:19:00.001-05:002010-01-28T15:19:38.316-05:00Jesus and Dionysus<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: small;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: medium;"><i><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-size: 15px;"><span style="font-style: normal;">This passage describes the death of the God of Ecstasy in order to facilitate the birth of Christianity in Ancient Rome. </span></span></span><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">‘In what as been called ‘one of the most haunting passages in Western literature,’ the Greek historian Plutarch tells the story of how passengers on a Greek merchant ship, sometime during the reign of Tiberius (14-37BCE), heard a loud cry coming from the island of Paxos. The voice instructed the ship’s pilot to call out, when he sailed past Palodes, ’ The Great God Pan is dead.’ As soon as he did so, the passengers heard, floating back to them from across the water, ‘a great cry of lamentation, not of one person, but of many.’<o:p></o:p></span></i><br />
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<div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">‘Pan, the horned god who overlapped Dionysus as a deity of dance and ecstatic states, had to die to make room for the stately and sober Jesus. Only centuries later did Plutarch’s readers fully attend to the answering voices of lamentation and begin to grasp what was lost with the rise of monotheism. In a world without Dionysus / Pan / Bacchus / Sabazios, nature would be dead, joy would be postponed to an afterlife, and the forests would no longer ring with the sounds of pipes and flutes.’ Pg 57</span></i><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: medium;"><span style="font-size: 15px;">Dancing in the Street: A History of Collective Joy, Babara Ehrenreich</span></span><br />
</div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-70063313312360216422010-01-26T13:26:00.001-05:002010-01-26T13:26:50.861-05:00Savannah Spirits<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7IiVs16451jIKj8nUUGQTA3_x7j2VJUZGmUVIFKQNWEnUAwn6_zQ0WGTmh4ls39BnKs8OMj0wK5AMa_LVwoV00Wa-6SVObNAIOnzGV99gQlsnazCzYn7RFB8MRjKfgCN4JfD8AAofIOE/s1600-h/savannah+spirits.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="248" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7IiVs16451jIKj8nUUGQTA3_x7j2VJUZGmUVIFKQNWEnUAwn6_zQ0WGTmh4ls39BnKs8OMj0wK5AMa_LVwoV00Wa-6SVObNAIOnzGV99gQlsnazCzYn7RFB8MRjKfgCN4JfD8AAofIOE/s320/savannah+spirits.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Savannah Spirits</span><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">24 x 36</span></span><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">conte on paper</span></span><br />
</div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-6875434800063081002010-01-25T16:55:00.000-05:002010-01-25T16:55:37.544-05:00Form & Structure<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 16px;"></span><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0pt; margin-right: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>A City with Two Faces</i> is organised in four chapters. Its configuration allows the reader to consider festivals quite broadly at first, then moving toward a specific analysis of Port-of-Spain’s Carnival. In turn this allows the reader to understand Carnival from it</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">s most permanent forms</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> toward its most evane</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">scent. Within this</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> structure, I have also placed four collections of images. </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Three of them are groups of paintings that I have completed within the past two years. The last collection is a sequence of photographs that show the individual experience of Carnival. These paintings have arisen out of a need to represent the festival experientially. Consequently, each of these pieces in some way build upon the sensual experience of Carnival in </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Port-of-Spain</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">, from a very personal expression, into a more mythic idea of the festival and the city itself. The first collection is </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">called </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">J’ouvert</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> which refers to the early morning festival that occurs in the d</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">awn of Carnival Monday morning. Using cont</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">é</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> on paper, t</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">hese pieces give an impression of the more dark and</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> primal celebration of Carnival</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. The second collection is called </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">Farewell to Flesh</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">, which is derived from the meaning of the word Carnival. These pieces focus on masquerade in the city, reflecting on the feeling of being in Port-of-Spain during Carnival. The last collection is called </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">Last Lap</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. This title refers to the closing procession on Carnival Tuesday when masqueraders dance in the streets for the last time that year.</span></span><br />
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</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0pt; margin-right: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">The</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> f</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">irst chapter </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">in this thesis </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">is called </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">City space and Festival space</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. Within this chapter, I analyse the for</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">m and expression of three </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">major international </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">festivals in order to establish a set of parameters with which to analyse Carnival in </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Trinidad</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. The celebrations I have </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">chosen</span></span> <span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">to analyse are</span></span> <span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">Il Palio</span></i></span> <span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">in Sienna</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">, </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">Gion Matsuri</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> in </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Kyoto</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> and </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">Las Fallas</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> in </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Valencia</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">My analysis of these festivals brings to light repetition of archetypal forms between folk festivals. Each festival manifests in similar and differing ways the way the current city is affected by a celebration of the city’s myths. With the example of Il Palio, the structure of the society in historic neighbourhoods is fundamental to the festival as is the square in which the race in enacted. Similarly, in the Gion Matsuri the massive wooden floats are based on events centuries before and reminiscent of neighbourhoods that no longer exist in the same way today. Las Fallas shows the incredible impact of collective celebration through its simultaneous spectacles throughout </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Valencia</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. This chapter conceptually outlines the nature of urban ephemera in order establish a way of understanding the transformative power of Carnival in </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Port-of-Spain</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">.</span></span><br />
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</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0pt; margin-right: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">The</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> second chapter is called </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">Three</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;"> Stories</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. This chapter traces </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">three</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> strands of history that have led to the present manifestation of Carnival in </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Trinidad</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. The first story follows the ancient orig</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">in of Carnival from its Pagan roots</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">, into its integration with</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> the Catholic calendar</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> and its emigration to the </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Caribbean</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> through French colonialists</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. The second story follows the African tradition of religious masquerade, most specifically through West African Yoruba culture and its transition through slavery into the </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Caribbean</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. The third story reflects on the integration of Indian ideas of </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">lila</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> or sacred play</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> into the current form of Carnival in </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Trinidad</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">It is necessary to trace all of these stories separately</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> in order</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> to understand the </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">impact of their confluence within the </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Caribbean</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">.</span></span><br />
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</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0pt; margin-right: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">The</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> third</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> chapter, titled </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">A City with Two Faces</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> focuses on the permanent manifestation of </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Carnival</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> in </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Trinidad</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. Here, I have used the Carnival route as a means of simultaneously looking at the Ordinary and Extraordinary faces of </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Port-of-Spain</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">.</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> By considering each neighbourhood’s year round usage next to it’s manifestation during Carnival, the spatial narrative of the festival will become more apparent. To assist in this expression, I have also included personal narrative which reflect on the reveller’s movement along the </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Parade Route</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. Finally, this chapter looks at the anatomy of Masquerade Camps and Steel Pan Yards in </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Port-of-Spain</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> as permanent spaces from which the festival emerges. This chapter shows the way in which the festival has become integrated into the city fabric. It highlights the permanent infrastructure within the city which makes the festive period possible.</span></span><br />
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</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0pt; margin-right: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">The final chapter is </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">called </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">Anatomy of the Festival</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">. This</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> is a largely graphic dissection of t</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">he festival.</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"> Through an analysis of photographs taken along the </span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">Parade Route</span></span><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">, this chapter isolates the repeated elements which constitute the festival’s form. By reflection on masquerade types, audience, the movement of music</span></span> <span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;">and the location of government erected stands and barricades, I outline the way in which each of these phenomena transform public space. This chapter considers the small parts which make up the festival that are often overlooked.</span></span><br />
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</div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-65145601040055233222010-01-21T17:01:00.001-05:002010-01-21T17:06:13.884-05:00What I've been up to<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Yes, I have been missing in action for some time now. At the end of last term, I was able to put together some 100 pages of information. It's all still rough of course, but it's out there which is great. Since the beginning of the year I have been working on my Introduction. At first I thought this would be a 'do last' sort of thing, but now I understand it's importance. I wonder if I should post some of it, but since it sums up my intentions within this thesis, it might be a bit repetitive on here. That and I have yet to finish it. We'll see how it goes. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">I have done a few more pieces since last I posted. Two Acrylic and one Conte. I will post a couple pics when I take some. The paintings will be included in my thesis in 3 collections: punctuating each chapter. Each collection will have about 5 pieces. This means that I have to complete 2 more Acrylics (24 x 36). </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">My hope is to finish a proper first draft by the end of February, aiming for sign off in the end of March. This is of course very optimistic. But what's life without a little optimism. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Will update when I have something more. </span></span>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-44683829418233807692009-11-27T22:13:00.002-05:002009-11-27T22:19:22.893-05:00Chapter 1 begins...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 15px; font-style: italic;">‘The urban festival provides a bridge between the ordinary city of everyday experience and the extraordinary city- projected in part by the festival – of idealistic and technological urbanism; of utopian hopes, projects and illusions.’</span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;"><b>Alan J. Plattus (1987)</b><o:p></o:p></span><br />
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</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;"><div style="text-align: center;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">‘The urban environment is constantly changing. Permanent alterations are the result of new buildings going up and others being demolished, streets being widened or straightened, new neighbourhoods being developed. No less significant, however, is the way in which the shared public space of the city is altered on particular occasions, such as for festivals of ceremonies, when temporary effects transform the familiar to underline the significance of given events. This process of temporary and permanent change is true to all cities.’ <o:p></o:p></span></i><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;"><div style="text-align: center;"><st1:city w:st="on"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;"><b>Siena</b></span></st1:city><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;"><b>, Constructing the </b><st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on"><b>Renaissance</b></st1:placename><b> </b><st1:placetype w:st="on"><b>City</b></st1:placetype></st1:place><b>, Introduction, pg 1.</b><o:p></o:p></span><br />
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</div></div><div class="MsoEndnoteText" style="text-align: right;"><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoEndnoteText" style="text-align: right;"><div style="text-align: center;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">‘Parades let people reclaim urban spaces not just as a place of work but to renew their relationship with the environment. By animating all senses, parades change people’s relation to the city, letting them look at the city in a new way. Parades allow all different groups of people to get together in public in an important way, crossing all political, economic, religious and ethnic barriers. There are very few events in the city that do that.’ <o:p></o:p></span></i><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoEndnoteText" style="text-align: right;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;"><b>Wishes Come True, J. Kugelmass</b><o:p></o:p></span><br />
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</div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">As human beings, we have created a physical world that is nuanced by the collective legacies to which each of our cultures cling. Our cities, though physically little more than cells of combined activity and habitation under a set of accepted codes, also hold a higher ideological significance to each inhabitant. The city in a more enriched sense is the modern plain upon which man exerts his desires and actions. The city contextualises the life of the inhabitant, pulling on the basic propensities within each individual and making their life somewhat different than it would be anywhere else in the world. This is the power of the overlaying of city histories. In older cities centuries of collective experience shape the city as well as the behaviour of the individual within it. This isn’t an altogether mystical idea of invisible magic that lives beneath the cobble stones although that metaphor comes close to it. Rather, as Rossi discuses in Architecture of the city, urban artefacts can contribute to the locus of the city, and eventually affect the overall identity of the place. <o:p></o:p></span><br />
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</div></div></div><div class="MsoNormal"><div style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">‘One can say that the city itself is the collective memory of its people, and like memory it is associated with objects and places. The city is the locus of the collective memory. This relationship between locus and the citizenry then becomes the city’s predominant image, both of architecture and of landscape, and as certain artefacts become part of its memory, new ones emerge. In thi entirely positive sense great ideas flow through the history if the city and give shape to it.’ </span></i><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">Aldo Rossi, <i>The Architecture of the City</i></span><i><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></i><br />
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</div></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt;">This is also true of urban celebrations. In certain situations, where the festival and the city have grown together, infused with one another as in Port-of-Spain’s Carnival, the festival is a breathing and moving action that yearly reanimates the place. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">‘Signature ephemera’</i> as discussed by J. Mark Schuster, are urban events which come to directly inform the identity of a city. These types of celebrations are often deeply linked to the myths underlying each place, taking on the weight of a kind of civic religion.</span><br />
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</div></div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-91310555929843667512009-11-18T17:23:00.001-05:002009-11-18T17:24:47.694-05:00Fallas<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">I found a 3rd case study. It's on Las Fallas in Valencia, Spain. It's a fire festival to St Joseph, the patron saint of carpentry. It culminate for one week in March of partying, fireworks and exhibition of Fallas (large, grotesque monuments), which at midnight of the last day of the festival are simultaneously set on fire in public squares all around the city. These Fallas are up to 30 meters in height! So you see it's no small flame. </span></span></span><br />
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</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">It's interesting to see the recurring themes in each festival. I am getting a clearer understanding of the Extraordinary city. I'm also gaining confidence that my claim of two simultaneous cities is not that strange. </span></span></span><br />
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</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">I'm particularly taken with Las Fallas at the moment. I really want to go there for it. It's such an offense to a Western perspective - burn the damned things down! There is also an intricate social infrastructure that surrounds the celebration. That's one of the recurrent themes in these case studies - this dense informal networks that organize the events. In all of the cases it is apparent that this system, though invisible for most of the year, is actually extremely active in the social structure of the city year round. </span></span></span><br />
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</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">Good things these case studies. </span></span></span><br />
</div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-48058403572707643832009-11-16T12:00:00.004-05:002009-11-16T12:02:15.091-05:00City and Space<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD9IgL1K4pVvEUN1okFIuZxEIGfdH95CBYKW_CUbqWWd5jcA36BuplbR0weyVu-3TE9l4hZ-XOK66H3xBf7oB-gla5LW3uE1W7TWvHNQA0Ok1TEVKn5mqX2D6_QO-Ai5CXqeDSn-DNSNE/s1600/sketch1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD9IgL1K4pVvEUN1okFIuZxEIGfdH95CBYKW_CUbqWWd5jcA36BuplbR0weyVu-3TE9l4hZ-XOK66H3xBf7oB-gla5LW3uE1W7TWvHNQA0Ok1TEVKn5mqX2D6_QO-Ai5CXqeDSn-DNSNE/s400/sketch1.jpg" /></a><br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">This week I am working on 2 case studies of festivals as well as my Lit Review and Introduction. The 2 case studies are of festivals that in some way define the cities in which they take place. The first is the Palio in Sienna where the race has significantly shaped the social relationships of the neighborhoods or </span></span><i><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">contradas </span></span></i><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">while also shaping the international persona of Sienna.The second festival I will be looking at is the Gion Matsuri Festival in Kyoto. This festival dates back to 896AD and occurs at the beginning of the summer. Huge boat like wooden floats are pulled through the city, their enormous parts sometimes coming off of buildings themselves. Certain parts of Kyoto have become identified by their participation in the festival. Both of these festivals are examples of cities that have become completely identified by a second face of the city that lies separate from the Ordinary or Rational one. I hope that through these case studies I will be able to illustrate an underlying human behavior to do with celebration and space. I'm looking around for a 3rd case study. The Aboriginal </span></span><i><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">'Walkabout'</span></span></i><span style="color: #cccccc;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> is interesting as a means of ritualistically re-imagining the world. But I wonder since it isn't exactly a festival if it is still applicable. We will see where this goes. </span></span></span><br />
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</div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-56798980890973722792009-11-06T16:36:00.006-05:002009-11-12T17:14:22.680-05:00Beginings<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="font-size: small;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">This thesis began about 8 years in </span><st1:city st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">San Fernando</span></st1:city><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">, </span><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Trinidad</span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">. It was the year after I finished high school and the first time i played J'ouvert. I didn't really know what to expect. Filled with curiosity and the flush of first times, I joined 3 friends in </span><st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">San Fernando</span></st1:place></st1:city><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> at around 4 in the morning. I had never seen the town that way. I grew up and went to primary and secondary school in that small town but I had never walked its streets in the twilight hours. That one morning of ecstasy on those streets transformed the way that I interacted with the place. It hit me, dancing in the early morning light on the Promenade, past the entrance to my high school, past the public library, past the Catholic Church and the police station, that I realised what I was doing. I was declaring myself to these places and people - I was dancing out of my skin and into the mud that coated my body in a kind of public exaltation of freedom. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> So this thesis starts on that day - in that moment: half clothed and covered in mud. </span></o:p></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> But was there something before that that made that revelation possible? Yes. I cannot say for every little girl, but for my 5 year old self, my mornings and afternoons were inspired by walks with my father. My dad would take me into downtown </span><st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">San Fernando</span></st1:place></st1:city><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> on Carnival Tuesdays every year, since I was about 5 or 6 until I was a teenager. When I was small enough to get lost in a crowd, I would be safely seated on his shoulders. Best seat in the house! From that young age I chased colourful feathers on the street and was completely captured by Wild Indian Mas even then. My dad showed me Mas Camps and explained what they were when we saw people emerging from them. He showed me while we walked through </span><st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">San Fernando</span></st1:place></st1:city><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> where the different camps were and would even tell me about how some things were made. So you see, although he may regret inciting this passion in me, he showed me the way into this Carnival world. </span></o:p></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> During my Undergrad, I kept my fascination limited to my infrequent canvases. Those 5 years are a painful blur. In my year off before starting Masters, I worked in Port-of-Spain. Port-of-Spain is a 2 hour drive away from my hometown of </span><st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">San Fernando</span></st1:place></st1:city><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">. It was such a painful trek every morning in rush hour traffic that I moved to Port-of-Spain for the first time. I didn’t really know the place that well. There were a few places that I went to and those were the only little bits I knew about. Carnival time started to dawn on the city in the beginning of January after Christmas was over. I would be playing J’ouvert in Port-of-Spain for the first time. I had organised with my boyfriend and his family to go into town with a band that the family knows.</span></o:p></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> We played Blue. We all convened at a friend of the family’s house in </span><st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Belmont</span></st1:place></st1:city><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> and we walked into town. We danced through Port-of-Spain all morning long and it was again magical. I was more hesitant than I was in </span><st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">San Fernando</span></st1:place></st1:city><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">, but from that day forward, I knew Port-of-Spain in a new way. From that day on I owned a little piece of town and those streets I danced on, I felt I had a right to.</span></o:p></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> So there it is: the personal legacy behind the thesis. To answer my own ‘Why bother?’ question, I am doing this thesis because as a growing artist and designer, I have for many years seen the unique</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">power of masquerade to unite the person with the place in an exalted form. It’s not about taking you somewhere else or making you something you aren’t. Masquerade brings you closer to your ‘other self’. This thesis is therefore a peep into the other city that lies behind the one we think we know. </span></o:p></span><br />
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</div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-61974091524476031852009-10-26T17:49:00.006-04:002009-11-12T17:15:38.009-05:00Moan<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #0000ee;"><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #666666;"><span style="font-size: small;">Moan, Acrylic on Canvas, 24 x 30 in</span></span></span><span style="color: #666666;"> </span><br />
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</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #cccccc;">This is the painting that I mentioned in previous posts. I've tried some new things with it. </span></span></span><br />
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</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #cccccc;">I have also started doing a set of diagrams for the chapter I am working on. Below is a panorama of Independence Square. It's a base for the diagram I am about to do. </span></span></span><br />
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</div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-12066274049500519952009-10-23T14:14:00.008-04:002009-10-23T19:38:12.171-04:00Reorganized<div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';color:#330000;"><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:Calibri;color:#993300;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">I'm reorganising my thesis. kind of...</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:Calibri;color:#993300;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">It's the same stuff but framed in a different way. I suppose thats good. That way I move away from a general story about Carnival toward an actual Thesis...</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:Calibri;color:#993300;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">I've reorganized my chapters and have now begun to reframe the text itself. I've been advised to represent as much information as I can visually, rather than through a terrifyingly vast and boring essay.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify"><span style="font-family:Calibri;color:#993300;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">My paintings, I have reconsidered in this version with more intentional purpose and placement. Also, I have finished my the painting I mentioned in the previous post. It's 24 x 36". I've titled it "Moan". Will take pics shortly. </span><o:p></o:p></span></p></span></div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-28378700849976749082009-10-15T14:20:00.007-04:002009-11-30T14:36:57.729-05:00thoughts on paintings<span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Throughout this thesis process, I have envisioned myself using my paintings. I have not been entirely sure where they would go in. In my life I have never actually painted as much as I am doing now, and especially not with the idea of using them for a particular collection. I also didn't foresee my Conte drawings becoming what they are to me now. It’s strange how even when you don't think you have a fixed idea of what your own creativity is, you actually do. I feel confused pretty often about what the particular artwork is - whether it should mean something particular and if it should be of a particular place. But the good stuff never really comes out of strategy. I have to keep fighting my desire to make something beautiful and relevant in order to bring out stuff that are behind my eyes and without my knowing. I am discovering a darkness in my work that I haven't seen before. It surprises me when I see some of the things that I draw and paint and they make me wonder...</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Oh well. So it goes. I have a canvas up in my room at the moment. The sketch I have on it now is inspired by a passage in </span></span><i><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">The Famished Road</span></span></i><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;"> by Ben Okri. It's a book about this Nigerian boy who is part human and part spirit. He can see both worlds and his visions are totally incandescent. I have to stop and breathe every few pages and let the images settle. This passage I'm painting from is an image of a huge masquerade / demon thing that charges through the streets during a riot. I haven't started the actual painting of it yet (it’s still a sketch). I want to try something new with it. Will post it when it’s done.</span></span></o:p></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">'</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;"> </span></span><i><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">‘I wandered through the violent terrain, listening to the laughter of mischievous spirits. There was a crescent moon in the sky, darkness over houses, broken bottles and splintered wood on the road. I wandered barefoot. Fires sprouted over rubbish heaps, men were dragged out of cars, thick smoke billowed from houses. Stumbling along, looking for mum, I found myself in a dark street. There was a solitary candle burning on a stand near an abandoned house. I heard a deep chanting that made the street tremble. Shadows stormed past, giving off a stench of sweat and rage. Drums vibrated in the air. A cat cried out as if it had been thrown on to a fire. Then a gigantic Masquerade burst out of the road, with plumes of smoke billowing from its head. I gave a frightened cry and hid behind a stall. The Masquerade was terrifying and fiery, its funereal roar filled the street with an ancient silence. I watched it in horror. I watched it by its shadow of a great tree burning, as it danced in the empty street.</span></span></i></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;"> </span><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">Then the darkness filled with its attendants. They were stout men with glistening faces. They held on to the luminous ropes attached to the towering figure. Dancing wildly, it dragged them towards the rioting. When it strode past, sundering the air, I crept out of my hiding place. Swirling with hallucinations, I started back towards the main road.’ </span></span></span></i><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #cccccc;">p 11</span></span></span></span></span></o:p></span></i><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 150%;"><o:p> </o:p></span><br />
</div></span>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-80756419731525477392009-10-05T12:17:00.005-04:002009-10-15T14:38:44.118-04:00A Rant<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDHApgBlwjTYDFzCtHpgeXH7z2TEFQWg7BYlYE0pknWRlWiJHFqbmqNZ7kms-2kTk8yaheCLMlmvLzk6ROp-yHIsQD3JJF8cizQz_sNTDxqHwLxbeFIrqYWjoyBm8NqcOVCKyJYp4u9yw/s1600-h/IMG_1244.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDHApgBlwjTYDFzCtHpgeXH7z2TEFQWg7BYlYE0pknWRlWiJHFqbmqNZ7kms-2kTk8yaheCLMlmvLzk6ROp-yHIsQD3JJF8cizQz_sNTDxqHwLxbeFIrqYWjoyBm8NqcOVCKyJYp4u9yw/s320/IMG_1244.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5389154448826327026" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Maybe its okay that people continually have tried to gentrify Carnival. maybe that's where it gets its beauty - through rebellion and vulgarity. If everything were embraced and allowed there would be no breaking through. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Perhaps it is that kind of general acceptance from society that makes Pretty Mas so simplistic and bereft of creativity. It is an accepted activity lacking in the euphoria of rebellion but rather embracing the simple ecstasy of showing one's sex and skin. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I won't hide my contempt for Pretty Mas. And i admit that I am extremely biased having not played it myself. My attraction has never been to bikini Mas. I see no transcendence through that than egotism. For myself I see true transcendence in the man who play his dragon each year and the bands that build their Indian mas over and over again. It's a livelihood then and a neighborhood and a real kind of love. Buying a costume one year that you don't build your self and that you toss out after 2 days seems such a strange parody of a great thing. Such a missed oppostunity to create someting phenomenal. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The great thing about designing mas is that you aren't just designing a costume or a head dress or a bodice. No. You are designing an experience. You are framing a story in city space. It's a chance for the people you are designing for to see themselves, their city and their bodies in a brand new way. This isn't about 'look at me, look at me'. No! This drama goes far beyond sexy. This is possession. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><br /></span></span></div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-11605934232833760542009-07-14T11:25:00.009-04:002009-11-30T14:36:17.022-05:00A Ballet of Spatial Form<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">In many ways I see Carnival as a massive ballet of spatial form. Forms morph and stretch. They repeat and engulf you, blind you and release you. Let's think about it for a moment. </span></span></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">Where i am standing - in the middle of the street on Carnival Tuesday afternoon - this is my ground. It is ground I do not conquer at any other time of year. My ground is baptised in paint, feathers and sequins from J'ouvert and the days of dance. </span></span></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">My walls have moved. The limits of me experience have shifted. The houses and businesses that I have occupied in past stand silent witness to my passing. Now lining those silent walls are a parasitic strip of aromatic foods, cold drinks and local crafts. A Service belt on the pavement - strapped to fences. Even these silent walls of year round businesses wear their own ephemeral mask for these days. Closer around me though, my vision undulates. At one moment i cannot see anything but people around me: in masks and ecstatic behaviours. But the next moment a feathered arm has lifted and I can see </span></span></span><st1:street st="on"><st1:address st="on"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">Adam Smith Square</span></span></span></st1:address></st1:street><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">. This movement and shifting and dancing and jostling hypnotises me. My city I see through these frames. For release I look to the sky above me. I see blue blue sky and wings of a Carnival queen extending above me. </span></span></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">But it's not only the undulating band that shapes the borders of this experience. The morphology of the city differentiates attitudes. The rooms of the city are its neighbourhoods. </span></span></span><st1:street st="on"><st1:address st="on"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">Ariapita Avenue</span></span></span></st1:address></st1:street><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #eeeeee;"> is a place of beginnings – where people trickle onto the road from their camps. It is a long and narrow corridor into the old city. There is a momentum that gathers there – shooting toward Lapeyrose. Lapeyrose cemetery is surrounded by high yellow walls. It creates a threshold between Woodbrook and Downtown Port-of-Spain. The streets of downtown Port-of-Spain are narrower, with historic buildings and stories rising above. It is a confined, intense and multi-layered space of powerful re-imagination: Re-imagining the Red House and </span></span></span><st1:street st="on"><st1:address st="on"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">Woodford Square</span></span></span></st1:address></st1:street><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">.</span></span></span><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><span style="color: #eeeeee;">To be continued…</span></span></span><br />
</div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-42368286312312466392009-07-10T16:07:00.003-04:002009-07-10T16:09:42.270-04:00<div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Excerpt from </span></span><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Another Life</span></span></b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> by Derek Walcott : </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>begin again,</i></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>from what we have always known, nothing, </i></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>from that carnal slime of the garden...</i></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i><br /></i></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>by this aurgery of ibises</i></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>flying at evening from the melting trees,</i></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>while the silver-hammered charger of the marsh light</i></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>brings toward us, again and agains, in beaten scrolls</i></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>nothing, then nothing, </i></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>and then nothing. (286-87)</i></span></span></div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-1233044823247529212009-06-15T17:41:00.007-04:002009-06-15T18:17:57.140-04:00Anatomy of a festival<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjesMwicMlDjK63XExp7ZVkTy_Y80dtUTpwIdA-02UTu-5FmoD_H09uREtQOe1AGmltsx0AWB8IYB6IPwTJDl-9AIN8XwaEMODcDSn7IhlZD2jaFiZ_kx8l2iC92gEOEG-a_PNd4m6Z2Nk/s1600-h/2_Page_2.jpg" style="text-decoration: none;"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 207px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjesMwicMlDjK63XExp7ZVkTy_Y80dtUTpwIdA-02UTu-5FmoD_H09uREtQOe1AGmltsx0AWB8IYB6IPwTJDl-9AIN8XwaEMODcDSn7IhlZD2jaFiZ_kx8l2iC92gEOEG-a_PNd4m6Z2Nk/s320/2_Page_2.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5347681680091656770" /></a><div style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div></div><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuzn2M0S8UTmaaR4s0h2jWA6xM6S6fNxMCdPpIFluRnz095FlgNdAktmSocFuOiXq_fWnPDY6r9HA65Fd6mMNHqsE056qTBeKW0h_Q1EdM-JTxDzrhzzUgpVWPaoca9LSOqxoJnGI76W0/s1600-h/2_Page_1.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 207px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuzn2M0S8UTmaaR4s0h2jWA6xM6S6fNxMCdPpIFluRnz095FlgNdAktmSocFuOiXq_fWnPDY6r9HA65Fd6mMNHqsE056qTBeKW0h_Q1EdM-JTxDzrhzzUgpVWPaoca9LSOqxoJnGI76W0/s320/2_Page_1.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5347680985126564322" /></a><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">With this set of diagrams, I have attempted to dissect the main urban characteristics of <st1:place st="on">Trinidad</st1:place>’s Carnival. The photographs follow the main carnival route, as shown in the key map in red.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">By separating the individual parts that are specific to the festival, it’s anatomy becomes quite clear. The next stage of this set of diagrams will be to add a layer of information about the places in the city in which theses images are taken. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">These 12 diagrams walk you through <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Port of Spain</st1:place></st1:city>. The places they are taken are listed below, in order of appearance: <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><st1:street st="on"><st1:address st="on"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">Ariapita Avenue</span></st1:address></st1:street></p><p class="MsoNormal"><st1:street st="on"><st1:address st="on"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">Adam Smith Square</span></st1:address></st1:street></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><st1:street st="on"><st1:address st="on"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">Park Street</span></st1:address></st1:street><span style="font-family:Calibri;"> (outside of Lapeyrose cemetery)<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><st1:street st="on"><st1:address st="on"><st1:place st="on"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">St.</span></st1:place><span style="font-family:Calibri;"> Vincent Street</span></st1:address></st1:street><span style="font-family:Calibri;"> upper<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><st1:place st="on"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">St.</span></st1:place><span style="font-family:Calibri;"> Vincent Street Lower<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><st1:street st="on"><st1:address st="on"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">Independence Square</span></st1:address></st1:street><span style="font-family:Calibri;"> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><st1:placename st="on"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">Twin</span></st1:placename><span style="font-family:Calibri;"> <st1:placetype st="on">Towers</st1:placetype><span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>(outside Central Bank <st1:place st="on">Trinidad</st1:place>)<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">South Quay lower<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">South Quay Judging Point <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">Rosary Junction <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><st1:street st="on"><st1:address st="on"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">Charlotte Street</span></st1:address></st1:street><span style="font-family:Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><st1:placename st="on"><span style="font-family:Calibri;">Queens</span></st1:placename><span style="font-family:Calibri;"> <st1:placetype st="on">Park</st1:placetype> <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Savannah</st1:place></st1:city><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Calibri;"><br /></span></p>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-91408665724444180842009-05-15T16:27:00.000-04:002009-05-15T16:29:18.858-04:00a begining<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify"><span style=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Guinea John</span></span><a style="mso-footnote-id:ftn1" href="file:///C:/Users/Lisa%20Carmen/Documents/LISA%20DOCUMENTS/SCHOOL/MArch/THESIS/M3/4%20Stories.doc#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character:footnote"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">[1]</span></span></span></span></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> went to the East Coast of Trinidad and climbed up a cliff in Manzanilla. He put 2 corn cobs under his arms and flew back to </span></span><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Africa</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">; leaving behind his children and grandchildren to fend for themselves. It wasn’t that </span></span><span style="mso-spacerun:yes"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Guinea John did not care about his descendents, but he knew that they had eaten too much salt on the island; and that they were too heavy to fly back to </span></span><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Africa</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">. So rather than burden them with the wisdom of flight and levitation that they could never use, he took it back with him to Africa, leaving them now bound to </span></span><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Trinidad</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">. Two hundred years ago Gang Gang Sarah tried to fly home too. She was a witch who was blown from her home in Africa to </span></span><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Trinidad</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">. She had a long life in </span></span><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Trinidad</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> where she became known for her kindness to the villagers. When her husband died, she climbed to the top of the tallest silk cotton tree</span></span><a style="mso-footnote-id:ftn2" href="file:///C:/Users/Lisa%20Carmen/Documents/LISA%20DOCUMENTS/SCHOOL/MArch/THESIS/M3/4%20Stories.doc#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character:footnote"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">[2]</span></span></span></span></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> in Tobago to try to fly back to </span></span><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Africa</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">.</span></span><span style="mso-spacerun:yes"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Gang Gang Sarah fell to her death when she jumped from the branches – too heavy with salt to fly home. So now Totoben and Maisie</span></span><a style="mso-footnote-id:ftn3" href="file:///C:/Users/Lisa%20Carmen/Documents/LISA%20DOCUMENTS/SCHOOL/MArch/THESIS/M3/4%20Stories.doc#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character:footnote"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">[3]</span></span></span></span></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> have become Trinidadian and their fractured history, a part of their reconstructed reality. </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></p> <div style="mso-element:footnote-list"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"><br /></span></span> <hr align="left" size="1" width="33%"> <div style="mso-element:footnote" id="ftn1"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="mso-footnote-id:ftn1" href="file:///C:/Users/Lisa%20Carmen/Documents/LISA%20DOCUMENTS/SCHOOL/MArch/THESIS/M3/4%20Stories.doc#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">[1]</span></span></span></span></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> From the novel </span></span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Salt </span></span></b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">by Earl Lovelace, pg 3.</span></span></p> </div> <div style="mso-element:footnote" id="ftn2"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="mso-footnote-id:ftn2" href="file:///C:/Users/Lisa%20Carmen/Documents/LISA%20DOCUMENTS/SCHOOL/MArch/THESIS/M3/4%20Stories.doc#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">[2]</span></span></span></span></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> The silk cotton tree is known locally as a tree in which spirits reside. It is supposedly difficult to find someone who will cut one down. This particular tree, relevant in this myth still stands today. </span></span></p> </div> <div style="mso-element:footnote" id="ftn3"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a style="mso-footnote-id:ftn3" href="file:///C:/Users/Lisa%20Carmen/Documents/LISA%20DOCUMENTS/SCHOOL/MArch/THESIS/M3/4%20Stories.doc#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote"><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">[3]</span></span></span></span></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> Totoben and Maisie; main personas in the publication </span></span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Caribana: African Roots and Continuities</span></span></b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">, by Nourbese Philips</span></span></p> </div></div>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1025449773017443978.post-16043167785528592892009-05-12T16:19:00.003-04:002009-05-12T16:36:53.862-04:00voice<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">I’m struggling to begin writing my individual stories. I know that the way in which I articulate these stories will be crucial in representing where each persona stands in the world. For example, for the Colonial narrative, it seems natural to me that it is simply a historical account; perhaps written as so many accounts are from that time, as letters between governors and officers; speaking from a cool, Christian, separated experience of the New World. The African story however is much more problematic. The spirit of Carnival in </span></span><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Trinidad</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> itself needs to come through. Also, given the power of oral tradition within Yoruban society, it seems most reasonable to me that that story is articulated through personas and experiences. It’s very important though that that story is very thorough and remains focused on forming a picture of </span></span><st1:place st="on"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Trinidad</span></span></st1:place><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> now. The Pagan story will probably be the most difficult. I’ve narrowed down the scope of that experience to look at the evolution of Dionysus into Bacchus and into Pan. Through looking at the celebrations that occur in honour of this character, I hope to create an understanding of the ancient beginnings of celebration that through the rise of Christianity becomes crystallised into Carnival. </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">In the end the entire point of this chapter is to give the reader a significant insight into the simultaneous stories that co-exist and form Trinidad's Carnival. But it’s extremely difficult to keep each voice steady in my head. I confuse myself before I even begin to write! I really need to start writing though – so my next post will be part of my 1</span></span><sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">st</span></span></sup><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';"> story.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms';">Someone please hold me to that! </span></span></p>Lisa Carmenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11765535173378251049noreply@blogger.com0