International Conference - “What is Postcolonial Thought?

International Conference - “What is Postcolonial Thought? Panel: Mémoires et Historicité. 

 University of the Antilles Schoelcher Campus, Martinique from November 23-25, 2015. 

 Caribbean Historic Memory: The Restoration of Indigenous Performance Practices

Abstract: A direct result of colonialism has been the erasure of the colonial subject's historic memory. The most evident form of physical erasure has been the myth of decimation of the Caribbean indigenous subject, but also the known historic practice of making the indigenous invisible to the area, the respective countries, their inhabitants and the indigenous subject him/herself. This is why in the last few decades; communities of indigenous descendants in the Caribbean have been involved in a process of memory restoration in the subjunctive, meaning how indigenous performance practices could have been, as opposed to how they really were. This process has been activated, mainly, through the re-enactment of performance practices believed to be extinct until they became visibly active. However, the erasure and invisibility has been true only because the indigenous voices have been systematically silenced by dominant exogenous ideologies. This paper looks at the gaps between what has been said and what has been embodied, between what has been published and what has remained part of the repertoire of Caribbean indigenous performance practices. This study proposes new ways to engage Caribbean writers, artists and cultural workers with restoring cultural and historic memory in order to clear a colonial past that remains an obstacle in building new indigenous historicities. The process, documented in the paper: the areito, the lace dance, the dance restoration and its performance, reclaims new spaces for indigenous communities to demand cultural reparations, historic memory and embodied spirituality.