Calypsonian Women: a Mode of Resistance That Empowers Femininity Davina Battistelli
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Calypsonian Women: A Mode of Resistance that Empowers Femininity Davina Battistelli Introduction Trinidadian women have a long and fraught relationship to Calypsonian music; a relationship characterized by both injustice and empowerment. The titles of songs written by Calypsonian women, such as Run Away, Hostage, You’re Hurting Me, Ah Done Wid Dat, Don’t Put Your Hand on Mih Property, and Who’s the Boss, highlight this history.1 In this paper, I demonstrate how calypso culture has been a key site in Trinidadian society to negotiate power relations that intersect gender, class, and race. The main occasions during which calypso music is performed are Carnival, a seasonal festival of music and dance, and calypso competitions, which occur in venues where artists perform and are judged. These occasions are significant sites for the negotiation of power relations due to their historical relationship to the slave trade within Trinidad. For instance, both Carnival and calypso competitions were places where freed slaves could express resistance and cultural values in times of oppression.2 Calypso’s role as a means for social commentary and cultural expression made it a target for colonial powers as a critical venue through which to enforce European gendered mores and norms. Importantly, this involved the colonial imposition of a model of respectability for Trinidadian women that valued a conservative, domesticated model of femininity. Femininities that were alternative to the European model – women who were strong, vocal etc. – were condemned in calypso songs as a means for the lower and middle classes to align themselves with the elite class’ norms. Women in Trinidad and Tobago, prior to colonial influence, knew a position in calypso music culture as lead singers, dancers and “fighters”, in the literal and figurative competition that characterizes calypso music. After colonization, however, they were excluded from this scene as a patriarchal trend usurped Calypsonian songs. These songs denounced and abused women, painting them as manipulative and deceitful. At the same time, they prized her as a sexual object to be conquered in a demonstration of masculine control and prowess.3 The capacity of calypso music as a genre to produce culture, 1 Cynthia Mahabir, “The Rise of Calypso Feminism: Gender and Musical Politics in the Calypso,” Popular Music 20 (2001): 409-430. 2 Jocelyne Guilbault, “Audible Entanglements: Nation and Diasporas in Trinidad’s Calypso Music Scene,” Small Axe 9, no. 1(2005): 44-45. 3 Hope Munro Smith, “Performing Gender in the Trinidad Calypso,” Latin American Music Review 25 (2004): 37. 64 including gender, through social commentary is allowed for this shift in gender dynamics in Trinidad. In other words, those who control calypso also have control over cultural and gender norms. It has been used primarily to assert the gender identity of the male Calypsonian who is representative of “the man in the street”, an economically unsatisfied Afro- Trinidadian man. The very nature of calypso and its particular influence on the larger culture gives it power to change society. Though it has been used as a means of oppression, women have taken it and transformed it into a mode of resistance. Description In order to properly situate this research, it is important to look at the overall status of women in Trinidad and Tobago more generally. Though this paper uses an historical approach, looking at the status of women in Trinidad today gives us insight into how much has been achieved in terms of gender equality, as well as into how far we have to go. According to the Human Development Index (HDI), Trinidad is a high development country, with a correspondingly low Gender Inequality Index (GII), where women have equal education rates and fairly low maternal mortality, among other indicators.4 Female participation in the labour market is estimated to be 54.9%, compared to men’s at 78.3%. Furthermore, women hold 27.4% of parliamentary seats.5 These statistics demonstrate a relatively high participation of women in economic and political ventures. Nevertheless, there is still a large gap between men and women in Trinidad and Tobago. These indexes, however, although helpful in understanding macro-level phenomena, may obscure the actual lived-experiences of women. We need to be wary of “formal equality masquerading as true equality.”6 A clear example of the way that formal equality doesn’t always lead to lived equality is found in the enactment of the Domestic Violence Act. Although it looks good on paper, it is faulty in its execution: most applications for protection are not carried through and even in instances where they are carried out, they result in minimal punishment for the man but require enormous effort, time and money from the woman.7 4 “The Rise of the South: Human Progress in a Diverse World (Trinidad and Tobago),” http://hdrstats.undp.org/images/explanations/TTO.pdf 5 Ibid. 6 Michele Alexandre, “Dance Halls, Masquerades, Body Protest and the Law: The Female Body as a Redemptive Tool Against Trinidad’s Gender-Biased Laws,” Duke Journal of Gender Law and Policy 13, no. 177 (2006): 191. 7 Alexandre, “Dance Halls, Masquerades, Body Protest and the Law,” 191,199. The domestic violence situation in Trinidad is described by development agencies as a “significant problem…[with] high incidents rates” and women’s groups reporting that 20-25% of women suffered abuse in 2011, most from the working and lower 65 Additionally, in many cases, the laws themselves are very weak in their level of protection for women, setting aside the obviously fraught question I raised above about enforcement and punishment: marital rape has only recently been outlawed, the age of consent is 12 years old, and abortions are illegal and have a higher maximum punishment than statutory rape.8 In general, then, what these indicators tell us is that women face laws and social norms that do not acknowledge the possession or control of their own bodies, despite also being permitted access to a variety of fields of employment. It is in this social context that calypso culture grants women a venue to exert control, voice social commentary and fight for the overall empowerment of women. As discussed above, however, women’s participation in calypso has not been a consistent feature of the genre. The general trend of women’s participation in this genre is high participation at the end of the 19th century, followed by a disappearance of women from the scene in the early 20th century, and a slow resurgence beginning in the 1950s and 60s.9 The disappearance of women from the scene was largely due to the emergence of a new formulation of masculinity in colonial era Trinidad. In a society where “Euro-American bourgeois respectability”10 was being enforced, there was a disconnect for the Calypsonian male who had qualities that did not fit into this model. The Calypsonian man was characterized as a “sweet man”, macho or “the man in the street”, often supported financially by woman, though in control of her.11 The model of masculinity introduced by colonial powers was that of male as dominant provider, which the economically marginalized Calypsonian could not live up to. The Calypsonian man, therefore, turned to alternate ways of expressing this formulation of masculinity: through aggression and control over women, as well as overt sexual behaviour.12 In turn, this alternative masculinity enforced a certain femininity that was in keeping with the cultural values of the colonial administrators. So where calypso had been a venue for men to resist and reformulate European norms of masculinity, it also became a means for the oppression of women. This colonial imposition of normative European gender roles, along with its institutions of slavery and indentured labour, also created a highly complex terrain of inequality in terms of class and race. In terms of middle-classes (Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada 2012). 8 Ibid., 197-8. 9 Mahabir, “The Rise of Calypso Feminism,” 409-30; Smith, “Performing Gender in the Trinidad Calypso,” 32-56. 10 Mahabir, “The Rise of Calypso Feminism,” 411. 11 Mahabir, “The Rise of Calypso Feminism,” 411; Smith, “Performing Gender in the Trinidad Calypso,” 36, 38. 12 Mahabir, “The Rise of Calypso Feminism,” 411. 66 calypso culture, the “coloured” middle-class controlled the calypso competitions and venues, with black men as performers, and white colonial administrators as regulators of Carnival and the competitions (when they can occur, how long etc.).13 Women in calypso became present only through their representation in songs written and performed by male artists. “Landing” a white woman was presented in calypso as a sort of ideal, speaking of her implied economic standing, and unattainable status due to social class barriers. Following this, Indian women as indentured labourers had some economic standing and were desirable, but largely unattainable due to cultural barriers, and finally the Afro-Trinidadian women were presented as loose, unfaithful, and poor, but attainable because of their low status, and thus disposable in a way.14 Explaining the gender injustice that takes place in and through calypso culture will help us understand how women have actually used these same circumstances to empower themselves. Women’s calypso culture reconfigures gender, class, and ethnic boundaries through the use of music to inform and mobilize mass audiences. Denyse Plummer, a prominent Calypsonian, calls this “the power and charisma of this art form…”15 Analysis I will analyze this phenomenon of female empowerment through calypso culture using a historical approach that appeals to certain elements of gender performative theory. The key turning points in calypso culture for women will be treated, primarily colonial rule and Trinidadian Independence. In Smith’s article entitled “Performing Gender in the Trinidad Calypso”, she writes: “gender identity is contested within the calypso arena”.16 This statement indicates both the constructed nature of gender and the nature of the calypso arena as a means of gender construction.