Carnival As a Transnational Cultural Phenomenon

CARNIVAL AS A TRANSNATIONAL CULTURAL PHENOMENON Carnival under British rule covers a period that is marked by an imperial culture of domination and an ever-growing culture of resistance and claim to national power. In small countries like Malta, foreign presence domi- nated any form of local society long before the arrival of the British. Colonisation was a reality that the inhabitants had to contend with for the larger part of their history. The British period started out with the eager delivery of the islands into British hands in 1800, and ended with Independence in 1964. The acquisition of Independence constituted a major political turning point in Malta’s history; it paved the way for Malta’s social and economic growth that enabled the country, forty years later, to join the European Union. Within the colonial context, Carnival in Malta may be seen as part of a more general phenomenon that foregrounded culture as the key driving force in the negotiation between local and colonial identity. However, this cultural practice was played out differently according to the particular histories and socio-political concerns of the various countries celebrating Carnival. Consequently, the different cultural manifestations of Carnival have to be examined first and foremost in relation to the individual cir- cumstances of the particular country, which may then be paralleled to similar happenings beyond. The fact that Carnival on the islands has lasted from before 15201 to today traces a long cultural lineage in the celebrations and their uninter- rupted continuity up to the present. Malta’s Carnival has remained very © The Author(s) 2018 269 V. A. Cremona, Carnival and Power, Transnational Theatre Histories, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-70656-6 270 CARNIVAL AS A TRANSNATIONAL CULTURAL PHENOMENON much a local affair, unlike those in the Caribbean which have been ‘exported’ to more than sixty cities in North America and Europe, creat- ing ‘the world’s largest transnational celebration of popular culture’ (Ho and Nurse 2005, vii). However, Malta’s cultural responses to the challenges posed by colonial power link its Carnival to other similar processes across the colonised world. In these instances, culture provided the means for a continuous reaffirmation of local identity that underpinned local claims vis-à-vis colonial will and its imposed structures. Wherever the worth and validity of local reality could not be affirmed through political channels, it could be fully asserted through local cultural expressions, particularly those which had no real equivalence in the lifestyles of the British colonisers, and could not be measured by any foreign yardstick. Cultural difference, therefore, marked socio-political identity. Carnival, although celebrated over a brief period of time in the year, constituted a major indi- cator of cultural difference with respect to the British, and of cultural identification within the individual colonies that celebrated it. The double aspect of latent seriousness and manifest play embodied by Carnival expressed socio-political concerns that provided cultural links with other nations through the various modes of resistance that were adopted, developed or discarded in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries to confront, or emerge from, colonial rule. Moreover, they also expressed efforts to assert power among local political groups, providing local examples of a transnational cultural phenomenon. Under British rule, Malta and other colonised countries shared in the very experience of undergoing adaptation to colonisation, as well as adjust- ment to the end of colonialism. Popular culture reflects local identity, but, as Osterhammel points out: ‘personal and collective identities change at the cultural frontier of an advancing empire’ (2014, 464). In the affirmation of the rule of empire, identity became a site of ‘categorisation and stereotyping’ (465) by the colonisers, and adaptation as well as contestation by the colonised. The way the different peoples constructed and represented identity may be seen as a critical feature of colonial relations globally. In an age which saw the rise of nationalism and the formation of nation-states, colonial societies were torn between imperial absorption— which allowed a small section of society to move upwardly thanks to the colonial bureaucratic structures that ensured the governance of the empire—and national distinctiveness—which was linked to social realities such as religion as well as to cultural manifestations such as Carnival. On a transnational level, this festivity represented a brief moment where the CARNIVAL AS A TRANSNATIONAL CULTURAL PHENOMENON 271 public celebrated itself, and seized the opportunity to critique the foreign colonisers as well as local society and local politics. Transculturally, Carnival has given rise to a struggle between spontaneity and containment which articulated political concerns over the affirmation of power and resistance to the celebration itself. In this book, we have seen how outdoor celebration thriving on spontaneous action and move- ment created a meeting ground for all classes. It was generally developed through altered appearance and behaviour, which also allowed masqueraders to indulge in socio-political criticism and caricature. This paidean behaviour, characteristic of various street Carnivals across the world, attracted fear and suspicion by higher authorities or upper echelons of society. Their riposte was to create organised spectacle that encouraged passive watching and was easier to control and channel. The Carnival com- mittee became the mainstay of this type of spectacle, which often included limits in space through enclosures. This ludic type of Carnival led to the flourishing of playful forms of amazing spectacularity, but marginalised spontaneity and purged socio-political criticism. In contrast, indoor celebration, which was always highly organised, established class difference through the type of participation selected, especially with regard to private and, up to a certain extent, public balls. However, even in this privileged context, the play of power created political distinction and underlined hierarchy. Carnival generates ambivalence; it provides ground for both the blur- ring and affirmation of social status as well as political identity. The various chapters in this book have illustrated different kinds of identification and participation in outdoor and indoor carnivals both in Malta and beyond, as well as the cultural changes and adjustments that took place due to socio-political exigencies. They have shown how the Maltese public celebrated Carnival both collectively, particularly in the street and in the public balls, and within their social categories, particularly in the private balls. It has also discussed satire and public contestation of imperial will, but has focused on power sites of struggle and resistance among the Maltese themselves. It has shown how political confrontation could take on spec- tacular proportions in Carnival, or in the adoption of Carnivalesque char- acteristics at other moments of the year. Many countries have shared the feeling of uncertainty in the construc- tion of a new independent identity that was generated at the twilight of colonialism. People in the newly-forming nation-states had to come to terms with each other in ways they never had had to do when all were 272 CARNIVAL AS A TRANSNATIONAL CULTURAL PHENOMENON under the same ruler. Carnival echoed the challenges and obstacles to this formation. This book has discussed the different courses of action that were pursued politically in the endeavour to create a national status within or beyond the structures of empire, and how this was reflected in the Carnival or in other manifestations that included elements directly inspired from this popular celebration. Carnival culture across the world reasserts the feeling of ‘belonging’ to a cultural community. Carnival, for its brief few hours, transforms the society into one festive community—different social classes or institutions are, up to a certain extent, merged into a single human reality. The dimin- utive size of the Maltese islands renders the brief experience of unity more intense than in larger and more dispersed communities. More importantly, the quality and intensity of participation in Carnival in various countries across the world continues to foreground the role of culture in affirming links beyond national borders that can foster new modes of transnational communication and exchange. A NEW TRANSCULTURAL BEGINNING? I would like to close this book by opening a little window to provide a glimpse into a nascent socio-cultural transnational process that is currently being established between two former colonised countries—Maltese exportation of Carnival to Tunisia. Local float-makers and dancers go to Tunisia in the summer to develop a Carnival in one of the seaside resorts; this is slowly becoming a local attraction. The interest of the process lies in its hybrid nature—Carnival as a cultural phenomenon is even more unfa- miliar to the Muslim Arabo-Berber Tunisian culture than it was to the Protestant British Europeans. Yet this new transcultural process is taking place at the behest of Tunisian local authorities, and was primarily dictated by commercial concerns linked to tourism. However, it is attracting a Tunisian public who willingly goes to watch the celebrations. It is to be hoped that this will provide an example in embryo

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