[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ _builder_version=”3.27.3″ custom_padding=”||0px|||” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.9.10″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”3.27.3″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_blurb url_new_window=”on” image=”https:\/\/usablehistory.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Audra-Dipte\u0301e-Photo-scaled.jpg” icon_placement=”left” image_max_width=”48px” content_max_width=”1100px” _builder_version=”4.9.10″ header_font=”Cardo|700|||||||” header_font_size=”17px” body_font=”||||||||” body_font_size=”17px” body_line_height=”1em” link_option_url_new_window=”on” border_radii_image=”on|70px|70px|70px|70px” box_shadow_style_image=”preset1″ locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_blurb][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.10.8″ text_font_size=”20px” text_orientation=”justify” max_width=”600px” module_alignment=”center” text_text_align=”justify” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n
As someone born in the Caribbean but who lives in Canada, I relish opportunities to read and listen to Caribbean perspectives on global events.\u00a0 For that reason, whenever I travel to the region, I try to read local newspapers and make an effort to engage with local radio and television programing.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n A few years ago, in 2017 to be exact, I was in Tobago for the annual conference of the Association of Caribbean Historians.\u00a0 Much to my dismay, there were no local television channels available at the hotel which hosted the conference.\u00a0 Most of the stations, if not all, were from the United States.\u00a0 It was a moment of absolute frustration once I realized that I would \u00a0actually be standing on Caribbean soil for the next week but would be unable to access television content that reflected Caribbean perspectives.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n This concern over greater access to Caribbean content on Caribbean soil is nothing new.\u00a0 I was recently reminded of this when I saw the documentary And the Dish Ran Away with the Spoon<\/em>, which was produced in 1992.\u00a0 Directed by the prolific filmmakers Christopher Laird and the late Anthony Hall (both from Trinidad & Tobago), the film was an attempt to raise awareness about the impact of foreign television on the region.\u00a0 It suggested that an overexposure to narratives produced outside the region was contributing to a distorted worldview among people of the Caribbean.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][dssb_sharing_buttons icon_placement=”icon” columns=”3″ icon_color=”#FFFFFF” icon_bg=”RGBA(0,0,0,0)” use_sharing_title=”on” sharing_title=”Share this article!” _builder_version=”4.10.8″ _module_preset=”default” sharing_title_font=”|700|||||||” sharing_title_text_align=”center” width=”100%” module_alignment=”center” min_height=”100px” height=”100px” global_colors_info=”{}”][dssb_sharing_button social_network=”linkedin” _builder_version=”4.10.8″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/dssb_sharing_button][dssb_sharing_button _builder_version=”4.10.8″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/dssb_sharing_button][dssb_sharing_button social_network=”twitter” _builder_version=”4.10.8″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/dssb_sharing_button][\/dssb_sharing_buttons][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/usablehistory.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/magazine-18.png” _builder_version=”3.27.3″ custom_margin=”49px||50px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.11.1″ text_font=”Cardo||||||||” text_text_color=”#2a2a2a” text_font_size=”42px” text_line_height=”1.4em” custom_margin=”||69px|||” text_font_size_tablet=”36px” text_font_size_phone=”24px” text_font_size_last_edited=”on|desktop” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n The mission was to provide \u2018Caribbean people with the means to tell their stories to one another without influence from the outside world<\/em>.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.10.8″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”20px” text_orientation=”justify” max_width=”600px” module_alignment=”center” min_height=”1137.2px” custom_margin=”||68px|||” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Keep in mind that when this film was produced in 1992, most people in the Caribbean only had access to one or two television channels.\u00a0 With few exceptions (such as Cuba), the television stations were locally owned but ran with a majority of foreign content.\u00a0 Today, of course, the situation is quite different.\u00a0 Telecommunications companies now offer cable packages with over two hundred channels – the vast majority of which are foreign owned.\u00a0\u00a0 On the website of one popular telecommunications company in the English-speaking Caribbean, it informs readers that customers can access \u2018premium content\u2019 such as the American stations HBO and Fox.\u00a0 In the French Caribbean the problem is similar.\u00a0 Although there are efforts to produce local content in places such as Martinique, Guadeloupe, and French Guiana, the majority of the content comes from France and elsewhere.<\/span><\/p>\n The situation is even further complicated by all the content available on the internet \u2026<\/span><\/p>\n <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Banyan:\u00a0 The Counter-Archive<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Of course many Caribbean artists, cultural architects, and intellectuals have long been participating in a David and Goliath battle over the Caribbean imagination and challenging those hegemonic narratives that are ubiquitous throughout the region. In fact, it was precisely because of these efforts that I was able to watch And the Dish Ran Away with the Spoon<\/em>. \u00a0This documentary is part of a digital collection called the Banyan Archive which is now available on a streaming platform by Alexander Street<\/em> \u2013 a ProQuest Company.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n In my opinion, the Banyan Archive should really be thought of as a counter-archive<\/em>.\u00a0 It is a response by Caribbean people to collect, organize, and make available cultural products that reflect Caribbean perspectives and showcase Caribbean voices.\u00a0 According to the website description, the Banyan collection contains more than \u20181,100 hours of music, dance, interviews and cultural programing\u2019 that were produced by Banyan Productions in Trinidad & Tobago.\u00a0 Founded in 1974, it was the first local television producer that provided programing \u2018for, about, and by the Caribbean people<\/em>.\u2019 The Banyan mission was to provide \u2018Caribbean people with the means to tell their stories to one another without influence from the outside world<\/em>.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.10.8″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n History and Dreams (and everything in between) – Christopher Laird<\/strong><\/p>\n TEDxPortOfSpain (2013)<\/strong><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_video src=”https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=BWWb7vA8HfE&feature=youtu.be” _builder_version=”4.10.8″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_video][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.10.8″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”20px” text_orientation=”justify” max_width=”600px” module_alignment=”center” min_height=”920px” custom_margin=”0px||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Fortunately, building counter-archives has always been considered an essential element in the arsenal used to fight colonialism and imperialism.\u00a0 For that reason, there is a very long history of\u00a0 Caribbean people who not only challenged the imposition of Eurocentric hegemonic narratives but who also strove to counter them<\/em>.\u00a0 Artists, intellectuals, and politicians have all left traces of the various ways in which Caribbean people understood their reality.\u00a0 In so doing, they were creating counter-archives for, about, and by the Caribbean people<\/em> \u2013 to borrow from the Banyan mission statement.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n As a historian of, and from, the Caribbean, it comes as no small irony that I have spent most of my professional life relying on documents housed in a variety of archives and libraries in the United States, the United Kingdom and France.\u00a0 For reasons that will be obvious to most historians, the majority of the primary source documents accessible to me were produced by agents serving the projects of colonialism and imperialism.\u00a0 In contrast, the voices of the colonized were rarely present and even when this was the case, they were heavily mediated, as Michel-Rolph Trouillot would argue in Silencing the Past<\/em>, through the systems of power imbedded in historical production.<\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.9.10″ min_height=”98px” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”3.27.3″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/usablehistory.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/1_Signature_-HR-BLACK.png” align=”right” _builder_version=”4.10.8″ _module_preset=”default” width=”74%” min_height=”100px” height=”264px” max_height=”100px” custom_padding=”1px|||||” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][dssb_sharing_buttons icon_placement=”icon” columns=”3″ icon_color=”#FFFFFF” icon_bg=”RGBA(0,0,0,0)” use_sharing_title=”on” sharing_title=”Share this article!” _builder_version=”4.10.8″ _module_preset=”default” sharing_title_font=”|700|||||||” sharing_title_text_align=”center” 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Dipt\u00e9e.” title_text=”Audra A. Dipt\u00e9e” _builder_version=”4.10.6″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”2_3″ _builder_version=”4.10.6″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_code _builder_version=”4.10.6″ _module_preset=”default” background_color=”#000000″ text_orientation=”left” width=”70%” module_alignment=”center” min_height=”100px” custom_padding=”30px|30px|30px|30px|false|false” link_option_url_new_window=”on” border_width_all=”1px” box_shadow_style=”preset1″ global_colors_info=”{}”]Interested in more articles like this?\u00a0 Don’t forget to subscribe!<\/h2>\n