Won`t You Help Me Sing, Another Song of Freedom

“Won’t You Help Me Sing, Another Song
of Freedom”: Reggae Music and African
Liberation Struggles on Robben Island
Neo Lekgotla laga Ramoupi
Research Specialist
Africa Institute of South Africa
RASTAFARI: Roots &
Ideology
Barry Chevannes and
Horace Campbell,
Rastafari: Roots and
Ideology, (1994); and
“Rastafari as Pan
Africanism in the
Caribbean and Africa,”
respectively, to trace
the cultural roots of
the Rastafari
movement in Jamaica
RASTA & RESISTANCE:
From Marcus Garvey to
Walter Rodney
In this book (1997),
Horace Campbell
narrates the role of
the Rastafari in the
Caribbean Revolution,
in the struggle against
oppression in the
Caribbean, and how
this movement had
impact on the African
liberation struggles.
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
 Chevannes argues that the worldview of the
Jamaican peasantry, the direct descendants of
“those who came” after Columbus, the Africans
forced into slavery, resonates in the Rastafari.
 Horace Campbell - “Rastafari as Pan Africanism in
the Caribbean and Africa” - writes that ‘the
Rastafari movement in the Caribbean emerged as
a popular mass movement, responding to the
need for a mass based organization among the
people, free from state control.
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
Reggae as a form of communication emerged
specifically to meet the needs of a section of
society searching for self expression and self
organization. ...
Rastafari was a reference point to maintain
some form of self worth in a world where the
images of Africa were linked to inferiority.
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
 Rastafari celebrates African culture and is itself
part of a continuous tradition of Africans in the
Diaspora striving to reconnect with Africa in
meaningful ways, including repatriation.
 Rastafari culture in all its manifestations has
been popularised by the musical form of reggae
throughout the world in the past-present-andfuture. The Rastafari movement evolved in the
conditions of the Caribbean, specifically in
Jamaica in the context of the resistance to
colonialism.
His Majesty
Emperor Haile
Selassie
The elevation of an
African monarch, Haile
Selassie, was the
response to the
dominance of the
British crown in the
culture of Jamaica,
His Majesty
Emperor Haile
Selassie
In a society where
religion settled all social
questions, the
identification with the
Ethiopian monarch
could be further justified
on Biblical grounds:
“Princes come out of
Egypt, Ethiopia stretches
forth her hands unto
God”—that Ethiopia was
an early reference point
for Africans in the West.
“Meeting the Emperor himself, would be
like shaking hands with history” Mandela
Rolihlahla Nelson Mandela
His Majesty Emperor Haile
Selassie
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
CULTURE AND RESISTANCE
Jean Comaroff (Body of Power, Spirit of
Resistance: The Culture and History of a South
African People, 1985) paid tribute to Monica
Wilson for teaching Comaroff “that the
anthropology of southern Africa was about
the ‘Reaction to Conquest.’” A similar claim
could be made for Caribbean anthropology, as
there is now widespread recognition that the
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
CULTURE AND RESISTANCE
culture of the peoples of the region has been influenced
by resistance to slavery and plantation society.
 This recognition marks an important departure from
the acculturation approach by shifting emphasis from
the dominance of colonial power and control to the
resilience of the character of the subject peoples, in
this case the African.
Barry Chevannes , 1994, Rastafari: Roots and Ideology,
p.17.
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
CULTURE AND RESISTANCE
I would like to start this discussion on the Role
of Reggae Music in the African Liberation
Struggle in the Caribbean, and in Jamaica to
be exact, where this music originates or where
it is mostly associated with the islands and
region.
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
CULTURE AND RESISTANCE
At the singing of “Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika” in the
assembly hall of the University of West Indies,
Mona, on the historic visit of Rolihlahla Nelson
and Nomzamo Winnie Mandela to Jamaica in
1991.
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
CULTURE AND RESISTANCE
Many academics, white and black, not to
mention other staff and students of the
university and other visitors, their fists
clenched above their heads, sang this anthem
as a sign of their identification with the
struggles of the people whose hopes the
song—and liberation anthem, Nkosi Sikelel
iAfrika, represent
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
CULTURE AND RESISTANCE
Thus, the Mandela’s Jamaican visit had to
happen, amongst other Diasporan visits, to
thank and acknowledge the people of
Jamaica, and in particular, their culture of
resistance, including the Rastafari and the
islands’ special genre of music, reggae, for
playing such a decisive role in African
liberation struggles, including of South Africa.
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
CULTURE AND RESISTANCE
This connections of struggle, freedom and
liberation between Jamaica and South
Africa are identifiable in the study by
Carole Yawney, “Exodus: Rastafari,
Repatriation, and the African
Renaissance” (2001).
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
CULTURE AND RESISTANCE
“in an alleyway in central Kingston, Jamaica,
at the juncture of two roads, is a mural
painted on a brick wall. A large map of
Jamaica is connected by a bridge to a large
map of Africa. It is entitled Bridge the Gap o
Africa ... Nelson and Winnie Mandela. Her
attention to this mural was drawn by Barry
Chevannes, who lived at the time near this
mural.
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
ROBBEN ISLAND: CULTURE AND RESISTANCE
In the African liberation struggles in Southern
Africa, Robben Island Maximum Security
Prison, off the coast of Cape Town, was
perhaps one of the most brutal sites of our
struggle.
PhD Dissertation “Robben Island: Role of Songs
in the African Liberation Struggle in South
Africa”
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
ROBBEN ISLAND: CULTURE AND RESISTANCE
Rationale
“A Great deal has been written about the heroic struggles on Robben
Island. Little, though, has been said about the cultural struggles and
achievements of the Robben Islanders. The inhuman conditions of
imprisonment on Robben Island failed to destroy the will of artists
who wanted to voice their achievements and failures, hopes and
frustrations, and the inevitability of their release and ultimate
liberation through music.”
Mayibuye, journal of the African National Congress (ANC), September
1991,
Interviewing
Ntate James Mange
James Mange
James Mange: A
Cultural Defiance
Dreadlocks,
Reggae
Music &
Rastafari:
“The
Message of
Resistance”
Dreadlocks represent
the journey
“School
that
we
have
been
dreadlocks
on.
ban is tested
At best towards
in court,”
African
(Mail &
Consciousness...
Guardian
CONSTITUTION OF
REPUBLIC OF SOUTH
AFRICA ON CULTURE
May 28-June
3, 2010),
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
‘Wont You Help Me Sing, Songs of
Freedom’:
Dreadlocks represent the journey that we have
been on. At best towards african
consciousness, but well enough and often just
a living record of where we have been. our
struggle. some wear their locks on the inside.
some wear their locks on the outside. but if
the truth of the 'dread' in the dread locks is
the dread of african liberation, Pan Africanism,
and african nationalism, then I say it should
stay.
“GET UP, STAND
UP, FOR YOUR
RIGHTS”
HOW DO WE
CONTINUE TO
DEFEND OUR
HUMAN
RIGHTS
IN THE POST –
APARTHEID
SOUTH
AFRICA?