Table Of Content®
Chris Searle
WORDS
UNCHAINED
Language & Revolution
in Grenada
Words Unchained:
Language and Revolution
in Grenada
Chris Searle
Frontispiece: Prime Minister Maunce Bishop
Zed Books Ltd., 57 Caledonian Road, London N 1 9BU
i ,·
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Contents
Wordf Unchained was first published by Zed Books Ltd.,
57 Caledonian Road, London Nl 9BU in 1984. Map
vii
Glossary
Copyright e Chris Searle and individual authors, 1984. ix
Dedication
Typeset by Forest Photosetting X Ill
Proofread by Mark Gourlay
Cover design by Lee Robinson Foreword by Ngiigi wa Thiong'o
XV
Photographs courtesy of Wayne Carter, Pablo Sylvester,
Introduction
Chris Searle, Kevin Williams and Arthur Winner xvu
Printed by The Pitman Press, Bath
All rights reserved 1. Language Against Language 1
2. Bilingualism: Language Plus Language
23
3. Language for Literacy
43
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Searle, Chris 4. Language and the Teachers 69
Words Unchained. 5. Language and Revolutionary Democracy
87
l. English language - Political aspect -
Grenada 6. Language and the People 103
I. Title
7. The People's Poets
121
427'.9729845 PE3319.G7
8. The People's Commentators
ISBN 0-86232-246-4 179
ISBN 0-86232-247-2 Pbk
Afterwords: Caribbean Writers Speak
231
US Distributor References 257
Biblio Distribution Center, 81 Adams Drive, Totowa,
New Jersey 07512.
Glossary
Antilles: Radio Antilles: a private radio station in
Montserrat transmitting imperialist propaganda
hostile to progressive change in the region.
A.K: Automatic weapon.
Alister: Alister Strachan: Grenadian martyr, killed by
Gairy's Police on 19 June 1977, as he tried to
swim to safety in the sea, having been chased
from the Market Square, where an N.J.M. meeting
had been violently broken up.
Bacchanal: Making merry.
Baccra: White man, planter.
Baku: Mythical dwarf.
Ban' your belly: To stand firm in time of hardship.
Beast from the east: Reference to E.M. Gairy.
Belvedere: Name of Fedon's estate.
Bernadette, Laurice, Three young women killed by the counter
Laureen: revolutionary bomb blast at rally, Queen's Park,
St. George's: 19 June 1980.
Biko:
Steve Biko: Black South African militant and
intellectual, murdered by racist authorities.
Bishop, Rupert: Grenadian martyr, gunned down by Gairy's police
while protecting children at a demonstration,
21 January 1974.
Block-o-rama: Afternoon dance, accompanied by selling drinks
and ice cream.
Bluggoe:
Strain of green banana.
Bois-bois:
Mythical skeleton spirit that blocks the road.
Bon-jay:
Oh God!
Bon-jay-say-met: God is good.
Boo-boo:
Ugly.
Maurice Bishop welcomes Mozamb. Brambling: Fooling, deceiving, purposely delaying.
Liberation Day, Grenada, May 19B~que President Samora Machel on Africa Brave:
Saucy, rude, audacious.
Briguh:
Imperious, bossy, arrogant.
ix
Tu
.,._-'"-"'-""-:"'~
Words Unchained
Glossary
li,
Cal/aloo: Leaf of dasheen, which makes a nutritious base Lalsee: Stephen Lalsee: victim of counter-revolutionary
for soup. murders, November 1980.
Catching tail: Working very hard. Ligarou: Vampire.
Charles, Evon: A young militiaman murdered by counter- Lime: To loiter, to relax by the roadside.
revolutionary violence, November 1980.
Choirboys and Macawel: Species of snake.
choirgirls: Reference to U.S. stooges in the region. Maccoo: Foolishness, lies, stupidity.
Cocoa monkey: An ominous sign. Macmere femme: Effeminate man.
Cool: Fine, okay. Mafoo-die: Testicles.
Courtney:
Andrew Courtney: victim of counter-revolutionary Making marse: 'Making mas": celebrating, making merry, or
murder, November 1980. causing a disturbance.
C.P.E:
Centre for Popular Education: Grenada's Literacy Mama Malady: Ghost-woman, child-thief who comes in the night.
and Further Education campaign. Manicou: Wild rodent that makes a sweet meat.
Crey-crey: Mashed up. Maroon: Act of collective voluntary work.
C.S.D.P:
Community-School Day Programme. Mar-zet: Weak.
Massa day: Era of slavery and colonialism.
Dema-say-lat:
Tomorrow is others'! Mize-warb: Miserable, wicked.
Dhal:
Curry, inside unleavened bread. Popular snack in Moko: Devil.
Trinidad and Grenada. Mookman: Peeper, eavesdropper.
La Diablesse:
Mythical devil-woman, with pig's feet. Moo-moo: Fool.
Donkey pee on wee:
Dou-dou: To be the victim of a curse. Morocoye: Turtle.
Sleep.
Eat from bramble Nancy story: Tale of Anansi, the spider-man from West African
to timber: folk mythology.
To be taken for a ride.
Efantgras: Nenen: Auntie.
Wicked child.
Fast: NISTEP: National In-service Teacher Education
Cheeky, precocious.
Fete: Programme.
Party, dance.
FRELIMO: N.J.M: New Jewel Movement: Vanguard Party of the
Mozambican Liberation Front: now the Vanguard
Grenadian people.
Party of the People of Mozambique.
Normal: Fine, okay.
Gartapurl: Catapult. Nu-bur-pear: We are not afraid.
Green Beasts: Gairy's troops. N. W.O: National Women's Organisation.
Groo-groo: N. Y.O:
Very hard kernel of a wild nut. National Youth Organisation.
1-la-loo:
Obeah:
Pun on Rastafarian expression to put prefix 'I' Obscurantist practices, superstitious beliefs.
before words. Oui-joo:
'You mad!'
Jola: Oui-kai-wai: 'You go see!'
Jook: iarge. bag carried by Grenadian peasant farmers. Overhanging: Overhanging branches, impeding the road.
o pnck, peck.
Jookootoo:
Jrunbie: ~imple worker, unschooled labourer. Pappyshow: Farce.
Jllpt!r. host, s~pematural spirit. Peau-cabrit: Goatskin.
Hut, bas1c dwelling. Pesh:
Money.
Kaiao: Picong:
Calypso. Gossip, frivolous talk.
~ingarse: Having a hard time, working like fury. III PPw.Ra.hA :m aniwe/1: CPeuorspele, 'os rRigeinvaollluyt itoon darryiv eA romwyls. away.
!
I
xi
~~
,,
. -~ ~ ' '
Words Unchained
Dedication
Pwea-pu-me: Pray for me.
Pwee-j-jays!: 'Squeeze his eyes!'
Quay-zai: Junction of roads where people congregate.
Rodney, Walter: Guyanese scholar and militant: murdered by
imperialism in June 1980.
Romero: El Sa1vadoreon Archbishop, murdered by fascist
death squad in 1980.
Sand-dancing: Beating around the bush, prevaricating.
Saw-oui-santi: 'What you smell?'
Silk-cotton tree: Large tree, traditionally haunted.
Soucouyant: Malignant spirit.
Stanislaus: Donald and Dennis Stanislaus: two brothers who
were victims of the counter-revolutionary
violence, November 1980.
Strachan, Harold:
Grenadian martyr: gunned down by Gairy's police
on Boxing Day, 1973.
Stiff: Formidable.
Tattoo:
Tatou, Caribbean armadillo. Popular wild meat.
Todi-say-slaw: 'Today is yours!'
Troumaca:
,; Neglected village in St Vincent.
l' Trust: To give credit.
i
Twar-mal-e-wears:
'God turn his back on you!'
Vex:
To become angry.
Wine:
Wild, voluptuous dancing.
Your-moon:
Not one person.
Maurice Bishop and Jacqueline Creft: the opening of
the Mini\"tf}' of Women's Affairs. August 1982
This book is dedicated to the life and work of Maurice Bishop, Prime
~inister of Grenada ( 1979-83) and Jacqueline Creft, ~inister. of Educa
tion (1981-83 ), dear revolutionary brother and revolutionary stst~r, foun
der members of the New Jewel Movement and Caribbean patnots and
martyrs, who died serving with One Love the struggling people of G~enada,
the Caribbean and the world, alongside their comrades Umson Whiteman,
Norris Bain, Fitzroy Bain and Vincent Noel.
Forward ever, backward never!
j. xii
I
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xiii
Foreword
Words Unchained deals with the energy and the new life unleashed in the
ordinary people of Grenada by the 1979 revolution led by the New Jewel
Movement. This energy and life came out of the people's involvement in the
changing of their lives. Development was not being done for them; they were
themselves the objects and subjects of their own development. They were
becoming a force highly conscious of their unlimited powers to change their
environment and hence change themselves. This new consciousness was clearly
reflected in language - both as a means of communication in the process of
creation of a new life and as a carrier of a new culture of confidence and
revolutionary hope.
Reading this manuscript. which treats language as a totality of a people's
experience. one is painfully conscious of what the USA and their puppets are
trying to destroy hy their criminal invasion and occupation of Grenada. But
they will not succeed. Words Unchained is a dream unchained. the dream of an
awakened people. and no power on earth can stop the march forward of such a
people. They will struggle to unchain their hands. their mind . their collective
soul.
~ords Unchained is now a testimony to the world the people of Grenada were
tryi~g to build under the leadership of the New Jewel Movement. It is also a
testJmony to what US imperialism is trying to destroy. Although written before
th.e US invasion it is a testimony to why US imperialism and its local puppets
Will not succeed. How do you kill a dream remembered? How do you defeat a
peo~le whose history as reflected in their language is one of relentless struggle
a~amst slavery in all its forms. colonial or neocolonial? The people of Grenada
Will seize back the tools of their self~definition!
Ngugi wa Thiong'o 1984
XI\'
XV
J/
Introduction
The ordinary people, the ordinary, the men and women who go
to work every day - out of them comes excellence, not only can
come but comes excellence. In the ordinary is the excellent. So if
you're occupied with words you must drench yourself with
words, you must take ordinary words and out of ordinary words
you make beauty, you make glory, you make the song of the sons
of God when the morning stars first broke out!
Peter Blackman
This book is primarily the outcome of interviews conducted with many
Grenadians and other writers and scholars of the wider Caribbean, during
1980-82, while I worked as a tutor of the National In-service Teacher
Education Programme (NISTEP) in Grenada. My intention has been as
~uch as possible to present the words of the Caribbean people themselves,
m particular the Grenadian people, and my own contribution has largely
been in the role of commentator and compiler.
Some of these interviews, or extracts from them, were printed in The
Free West Indian, the national newspaper of Free Grenada, during the four
and a half years of the Grenadian Revolution, and others in the various
publications of Fedon Publishers, the Revolution's publishing house. To
b.o th these institutions I am indebted ' as I am also to the writers, poets and
smgers whom I have quoted. I would also like to thank the photographers
whose work is included in this book: Arthur Winner, Kevin Williams,
Wayne Carter and Pablo Sylvester.
Readers will soon become aware that this book was compiled prior to the
events of October 1983 when serious divisions within the leadership of the
R~volution became evident, and led directly to the deaths of Maurice
B~shop, Unison Whiteman, Jacqueline Creft, Norris Bain, Fitzroy Bain,
Vmcent Noel and other Grenadians, on 19 October 1983, and the subse
quent US invasion a few days later. As I write this introduction I write in the
knowledge that some of those whose words are quoted in this book are dead,
and others are detained by the US occupying forces.
xvii
Words Unchained
Introduction
Despite these tragic events, I decided that I would not contrive to al~~r
tions of the struggling Grenadian people with crude imperialist grafitti. As
what I had written over the previous year. I wanted to hold fast to the spmt
the words painted by the US 82nd Airborne Division put it: 'Eat shit, com
of the Revolution during the years of its strength and unity, for its successes
mie faggot!'b and such dignified declarations are heralded by US pro
will continue to be a source of inspiration to the struggling people of the Car
paganda teams from the battalion of' Psychological Operations', producing
ibbean, as its flaws and failures must become a point of instruction and pre
posters and traversing the island on loudspeaker tours, condemning and
caution for future struggles. The ideas and words which were messages of its
vilifying the very cause of the progress of the people.
popular dynamism cannot be murdered by any imperialist enemy, despite
Of course such exercises will have an effect, but they will not smother
the blood that enemy spills and the machinery it brings to bear in its futile
the words and ideas of the years of the Revolution. They cannot, because
attempts to roll back progress. The words quoted in this book are truly
the words were not empty, they were the accompaniment to concrete
'tongues of a new dawn', as the anthology of Grenadian poetry was called
that celebrated the first anniversary of the Revolution. economic change and social benefits. They were also the messengers of a
new dignity self-confidence and becoming one with the rest of the world
For the Grenada Revolution spoke eloquently and proudly to English
never achie~ed before by the common people of a small Caribbean island.
speaking people all over the world, especially to the administration of
Ronald Reagan-and with particular persuasiveness to the working people Three weeks after the invasion, the Barbadian journalist, Henderson
and crucially the black people of the USA. This was a point emphatically Dalrymple, wrote of his meeting with a young Grenadian soldier who had
made by Prime Minister Bishop: been seriously injured in his arm while resisting the US marines:
The Grenada Revolution has a facility of speaking directly to, and appealing As one boy in the hospital said to me: 'I believed in the Revolution, it was
in their own language to the people of the U.S.A. overall, but more so to the good for the people and in spite of my arm I will not desert the Revolution'. In
exploited majority. Then in the case of black Americans, meaning something all I had seen and heard in Grenada nothing brought me closer to tears than
like 27 million black people who are a part of the most rejected and oppressed that. If after what he had gone through he could still support the Revolution,
section of the American population, U.S. imperialism has a particular dread then I knew all was not lost, the Revolution may have suffered a temporary
that they will develop an extra empathy and rapport with the Grenada setback but it will resurface again. c
Revolution, and from that point of view they will pose a threat to their own
u.s.•
continuing control and domination of the blacks inside the For it was Grenadians like this young man, the working people, the
''l youth, the women, the peasant farmers, the urban workers, the agricultural
!I The English language, now the vehicle of the advances and transformations labourers, who took hold of their language and gave it a new resonance an~
!
o~ a small ex-colonial island in America's so-called 'backyard', became a power. In transforming their own reality in response to the challenge of their
:~ direct chal~enge to US imperialism with a similar impact to the volcanic 'Revo' in Education, Health, Agriculture, Housing and People's Demo
words and influence of another English-speaking Caribbean giant Marcus cracy, they found their own words:
Garve d hi U · '
Y an s ruversal Negro Improvement Association half a century
~fore. effr~ntery ~fa ~mall
The black nation speaking out proudly through
Its ?wn rev~lutionary mstitutions, developing its own policies and inter-
. ' national friendshi d · · fi · The brilliantly blazing sun
. . ps an strivmg or Its own economic and cultural
Now shines for all
~v~retgnty was mt~lerable to the world's largest and most aggressive
mill~ and eco?o~c power, ~d was bound to be seen as a continual pro All who were wretched
~tion re~e ~D:tent Each and everyone
to a on remtroducing, with added force and vulgarity,
be the hegemoruc spmt of theMo n roe Doctrine. The merest pretext would It is you:
~.rn
e':'OOgh to propaganda attacks, economic and diplomatic isolation, Old time fisherman
con~uous
mthtary manoeuvres and intimidation off the coasts and over Old bend back farmers
the atr-space of the offending nation and a man -ti
Who love the land
nentdestabilisation, intooutrightmillt Y e~ed s~ategy ofperma It is you:
climax of 26 October 1983 It alary alttack and mvaston, the eventual
. . · was so c ear that the Am · · d Worn out housewives
WReOvUoldlu utinonm aenddia steeelyk tboe gwiinp ea ocuutl tthuerawl 0 fdtis enths.t ve a881.. nst the iennflcuaenn cme voaf tehres That now drink honey
..... _, __ • 011 at were Its testam t d ali From liberated beehives
--. &ts slogans and its murals, replacing the bold d hen ~ re ty' Little schoolboy
an ero1c concep- With your Education
niii You now enjoy,
xix
-----~----------~--""_"------~-----"----~-...-"
Words Unchained Introduction
It is all of you evidence from my own experience of teaching English in the Caribbean in
That the dawn smiles upon. 1968-69, in The Forsaken Lover: White Words and Black People.
The basic flame of freedom Yet at the time of writing that book, I had not fully understood that what I
Is burning in this Grenada land saw happening to the children of the neo-colonial Caribbean was also hap
And would you believe it pening to the majority of our English children in London: that their language I
The poor simple folks
and culture and that of their parents, was being systematically suppressed
Are feeding and fanning it!
as the labour power of their entire class was being exploited. And this while
Forever we will cherish
they were being denied access to a full development of their intellects, ~kills
The hope in our garden
and language power through an inferior education with lowly expectations.
With an intensity so feverish
As I saw 700 of my own East London students on strike from school on
The life in our dawn
behalf of their 'Stepney Words', their own poetry and creativity in 1971,
Forever we will cherish
standing up for its publication and singing massively 'We hate the gover
The red flower growing
In the rubbish nors!', I realised that there was an obvious connection between the children
For in our hearts we know, of the Caribbean who had been forcibly underdeveloped and alienated
We are totally sure from their own w~rds of labour and resistance by British colonial schooling
That our babies will no longer and 'worship', and the experience of my own English pupil~. .
Perish It had taken the Caribbean people to begin to lead me to this conclusiOn,
as it has taken the Caribbean people, some 12 years later, to show me what
Garvin Nantambu Stuart a real seizure and liberation of language really means. The Grenada
Revolution which began on 13 March 1979, set free the 110,000 G.rena
dian people to create their own political, economic and cultural dens1ty: It
was the first sustained anti-imperialist revolution of the Engl~sh-speaking
..T h~se w~re ordinary people, poor people who were speaking and par
world, and its impact upon the English language was. pr~vm.g to be a.s
ticipating With a greater security, personally and socially, than they had
transfonnational as its impact upon many other of the mstitutiOns that 1t
eve~ known before. They were speaking and organising from within the
inherited. The model of the Westminster parliamentary system had been
achievements of the Revolution, from within free medical care and more
replaced by a revolutionary democratic alternative, and with it had also
d~rs and den~sts than their country had known in its entire history, from
gone the imposition and model of the 'Queen's English'. For during th.ose
Within ~ew ho~smg programmes and house repair schemes, free secondary
ed~catio~, a ht~racy and further education programme, a marketing and four and a half years the Oxford Dictionary sat with the masses for rad1cal
national ~portmg board, a public transport system, over 300 university amendment with a re-created lexicon, forged according to the needs and
~holarships, grea~er ac~ess to electricity and pipe-borne water, massive aspirations of the Grenadian people, and as a result of their. visti?o n of.them
projec~ selves. Language was in their hands to be moulded accordmg the1r pr~
infrastructural like the construction of a new international airport
~e cess and resources, to release all the history, energy and gemu s of the1r
and Eastern Mam Road, more farm schools, agro-industrial and
people's lives and creativity which had been dammed underground for
fishenes development, free milk distribution free school uniforms and
centuries.
:ehool books, a lowering of unemployment fro~ 50% to 13 ~%. The words
~scp::oe ke were C?ncrete and real, common to all and arose from a con- .This book seeks to show something of how this process happened. In
=
~at matenal progress was happening all around them domg this, it also seeks to show to my own countrymen and co~ntrywome.n
%
tax. IS much a Part of the English language as its gramm~r and syn- and the suppressed peoples of the English-speaking world, how Important IS
neo-co1 e~ .e l~guage exists and is used in the context of colonialism or language in changing society, how it contributes to cha~ge, ~esponds to
orualism 1t has the add d d' · · · d change and contributes to change again in an ongoing d1alect1c of words
imperialist h tred fr e. Imens1ons of VIolent racism an
and actions.
fro m th e coI ao ru. se•d toom h it he colomser to the colonised ' and successively For the English language has been a great and intern~tional force. ~or
decades as a result f th s own people and himself. Over the last three
truth of ~ltural and ~pec~fi s:J~... .e fo~ ~~ proc~s~ of decolonisation, the ~uman liberation: it has also been the medium of oppressiOn and hu~uha
tion on a monumental scale. Those who were enslaved, colonised, wh1pped
times in Africa, America .;d mguistic •mpenal1sm has been put many
the Caribbean genius of F Sia da nd no .more powerfully than through an? exploited through blood-soaked words, now us.e. th~ sam: ~ords to
Bnt~sh
anon an Lammmg. I attempted to add to the build. freedom. The language of four centuries of •ID:pe_nal•sm was
English: the language of 20th Century multinational1mpenahsm and the
xxi
