How to Outwit a Duppy using Jamaican Spirit Lore
The Jamaican Duppy African in origin, the word duppy has two meanings in Jamaican spirit lore. The first refers to a soul, which may manifest in either human form or animal form. The second meaning evolves from the first and references a supernatural race of...
The Dreaded West Indies Posting
Soldier of the Black Watch c.1740, colorized {{PD-US}} When Malcolm McPherson joined the Black Watch in 1735, he and his fellow enlistees “thought themselves destined to serve exclusively . . . in the Highlands."1 They had no expectation they’d do duty in the...
Pimento: A Spice for the Holidays
Pimento, a spice more widely known as “allspice,” is harvested from the berries of the Pimenta dioica, a W. Indian tree commonly found on Jamaica’s north coast. It's not the Spanish red pepper, though its name is derivative of the Spanish pepper (pimiento) and it’s...
The Race to White in the 18th-Century West Indies
A perspective on the disturbing pseudoscience behind the colonial obsession with cataloging complexions and “refining” racial mixes in 18th century West Indies.
As Rich as a Creole
In eighteenth-century Jamaica, a creole was a nonindigenous person born on the island, whether of European, African, or mixed descent. Those referenced in the expression “as rich as a creole,” however, were invariably of European descent. The phrase is a variant of...
Jamaica’s Tapestried Past
I did a double take when I saw this work hanging in a Montego Bay exhibit last year. Admittedly, my interest was more than casual. I was writing Voices Echo at the time and visiting Jamaica to flesh out my research. Many of the images in the collage echoed...
A Sticky Subtlety
Kara Walker’s “Subtlety” is Anything But Appearances notwithstanding, it's safe to say Kara Walker didn't intend to present a sugarcoated history when she created her cast of sticky subtleties in the defunct New York Domino Sugar refinery earlier this summer. Her...
Sugarcoating History
Sugarcoating the Unsavory Side of History Sugarcoat history? Of course we can, but should we? Not in my opinion. Still, it's a fine line to straddle when writing romantic historical fiction—particularly a story that takes place in brutal 18th-century Jamaica. I know...
Smithsonian Treasures
Did you know the Smithsonian is looking for Digital Volunteers? Anyone can help transcribe old and rare books and manuscripts right from home—a sentence at a time or a page at a time. I explored the site this afternoon and happened upon a treasure--an old Jamaica/Cuba...
Jamaica’s Hurricane of 1780
Was it a Category 3, 4, or 5? Jamaicans couldn't categorize the hurricane that slammed their island on October 3, 1780. Instead, they compared their losses to the losses they'd suffered in past 18th-century hurricanes. Had more or less people been swept away by the...