We are a region with such variety of experience and such particular history that it warrants study. As the cultural pioneer and visionary Stuart Hall so often put, we are a region of people 'from elsewhere' - that idea of a lack of origin is in part what sets us apart from the rest of the world.
"One of the senses in which the Caribbean can be considered modern is as a space of what I would call 'cultural translation.' Most of the people in the Caribbean were not originally from that area.... It's not a question of what is in people's consciousness so much as the constitutive space they are obliged to address, whether they want to or not." (Hall, Introduction to 'The Caribbean: A Quintessentially Modern Zone,' 2002)
And with Hall being counted as one of the 'founding fathers' of cultural studies, it would only make sense that someone from our beautiful little pocket of the planet would be so keenly interested in culture and identity to try to give it form in language and literature.
The Caribbean Studies Association (CSA) convenes for the 42nd annual conference this year here in Nassau at the Melia, under the theme 'Culture and Knowledge Economies: The Future of Caribbean Development?', taking place June 5th - 10th. This gives us a moment to think of just where we see ourselves going, or where we want to go as a nation and as a region. Thinking of the future here is almost a kind of Afro-Futurism, imagined black futures - except this isn't Sci-Fi, it's our very real, very near future.
'We don't think of the future!', 'this plan is too myopic, too close-minded - we need to think out the box!', or 'this is only a short-term fix, how is this helpful for the long-term?' These utterances are all too common in many a new venture springing up in this country, be it government-driven or privately owned. There is a clear need not only for forward-thinking but for lateral thinking too, for thinking about things that exist just outside of what is directly in front of us and outside of the obvious. The possibilities emerging are exciting and vibrant as they can lead to possibilities that extend outside of the norm.
This is why the CSA has teamed up with the NAGB to bring the creative arts purposefully into the fold this time around. With visions of an exhibition and a collection for the association in the future, CSA President 2016-17, Keithley Woolward, is truly bringing the sentiments of the association's mission forward. "In the long term, I envision the CSA building a collection of artwork, with a view to exhibiting works from this collection to serve as a visual introduction to each conference that can travel as the conference travels. We can build a body of work that will allow us to track the history and evolution of art practices in the places that we've been to. I'm sure if we had started this from the beginning of our existence we would see intriguing trends in the visual and cultural arts."
This collaboration has brought forth a competition for the book cover of this year's conference, with the deadline coming up February 28th - with a prize of $1000 for the selected artwork. This does not, however, render the work selected as a mere illustration for the branding of the competition - quite the contrary.
Seeing how people engage with their life here in a visual way provides just as much value as the scholarship and literature around the same subjects, and CSA is making a concerted effort in showing the value in the visual culture and how that operates in the wider economies and culture of the region. This begins with using the arts as a way to provide a more holistic way of thinking about the topic at hand, and with treating the chosen artist appropriately by compensating them for their work and providing an appropriate vehicle for display and dissemination of the work to wider Caribbean and global audiences.
Woolward shares, "The CSA executive some years ago made a commitment to have an impact in the communities that welcome us for our annual conference above and beyond just occupying hotel beds and contributing on the level of economic advancement either by booking hotels and paying for taxis, etc. We wanted to actively engage the artistic and creative communities in ways in which we organize our conferences."
This ethos of integrity to ourselves as Caribbean subjects is, and has been, the driving force behind the organization and, I daresay, behind Caribbean Studies as a subject of study in and of itself. For the NAGB's Chief Curator, Holly Bynoe, this is by no means her first experience with the CSA, as she recalls her experience in 2012 as the conference met in Grenada, totally transforming one of the forts - Fort Matthew in St. Georges - to set the appropriate environment for this exchange of ideas. "As somebody who was operating as a curator, instigator and a publisher thinking about activating the Small Island Developing States, it was essential for me to gather a different understanding of how artists from these smaller spaces are playing into the picture of what Caribbean art is and how we can build experiences to make the work be more of an experience than anything else."
The conference includes all manner of Caribbean thinkers, from the institutional academic to the investigative blogger - and all of it is vitally important. Bynoe continues: "Professionals like Yvette Romero who runs the cultural blog Repeating Islands - she's been a pioneer in publishing, blogging the Caribbean experience but also looking out and rooting for the underdog. She scours, she's really in there getting information in places that are even black holes to me." This cross-pollination of Caribbean experience and ability to provide open spaces for dialogue and engagement is the lifeblood of this kind of work - be it visual or literary - in understanding ourselves as Caribbean people, through our similarities and our differences, through shedding light on practices that might not ordinarily be quite so visible to us. It's a sharing of local knowledge
to engage on the wider regional scale, with a view to helping us understand not only who we are but also how this informs how things like art museums should function in the region - and for whom?
"So thinking about these parameters, I think it becomes really important for us as an institution to define that Bahamian-ness because it's something we also come up against in the institution or its something we have to reckon with over and over, the alienation of who belongs where?"
Conferences like this help us to get away from our national insecurities of identity, from feeling threatened by the idea that we aren't individual as a country, that we are too similar to other countries in the region to feel a sense of distinctiveness. We have such similar histories that we can't help but identify with our other Caribbean sister islands, and the beauty of this similarity is that we still hold such a multiplicity of experience. We can even see this diversity of experience in our countries, one look at the NE8 (8th National Exhibition) can show you that. So then opening up the lens to the area just around us, looking regionally instead of locally - looking laterally, can help to reinforce the projecting and building of this image and thereby our identity.

Click here to read more at The Nassau Guardian