tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post2488205879043327694..comments2023-10-05T09:42:27.834-07:00Comments on Pamela Mordecai @ Jahworld: Beating books...clarabellahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18046264094193801260noreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-90206803662796133722008-08-18T19:29:00.000-07:002008-08-18T19:29:00.000-07:00fsjl: So have you written on this, anywhere? As fa...fsjl: So have you written on this, anywhere? As fact or fiction? Do you plan to?clarabellahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18046264094193801260noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-24412928654926791342008-08-17T16:00:00.000-07:002008-08-17T16:00:00.000-07:00My mother? Quite a bit, and I know quite a bit abo...My mother? Quite a bit, and I know quite a bit about the history of the village of Callobre in the municipality of Miño in the province of A Coruña in the 1930s and 1940s.FSJLhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15803079547494458258noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-35555959388070611392008-08-17T15:08:00.000-07:002008-08-17T15:08:00.000-07:00How much have you talked to your mother? She must ...How much have you talked to your mother? She must be a gold mine of rare social history...clarabellahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18046264094193801260noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-53440024912738795892008-08-17T14:43:00.000-07:002008-08-17T14:43:00.000-07:00This was the 1906 Handbook. My father was born in ...This was the 1906 <I>Handbook</I>. My father was born in 1919, to a peasant family in Mountainside (granted, his mother was halachically Jewish which meant that he and all his siblings were Jewish). I meant the man who at the time owned that farm. My father bought what was left of it (most of it was bought by Reynolds Jamaica Mines in the 50s) in 1968, by which time it had already passed through the hands of another family (a brown, rather than a white one).<BR/><BR/>History has a tendency to be written by the person who owns the printing press. As we know all too well.FSJLhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15803079547494458258noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-41547905274663533822008-08-17T14:35:00.000-07:002008-08-17T14:35:00.000-07:00fsjl: Yes, the Handbooks are extraordinary documen...fsjl: Yes, the Handbooks are extraordinary documents, aren't they? We worked for a long time in the 1990s on an effort to revive the Handbook that eventually came to naught – as far as I know, that is. Your time to clarify: was it your father who was a nominated member of the Legislative Council, or the man from whom he was to buy a farm? For if it was your father, im wuz a big piipl an yu is wan to! I couldn't agree with you more about how complex and nuanced reality is, has always been. Mintz and Price's The Birth of African-American Culture: An Anthropological Perspective was a book that I found eye-opening when I first read it. One of the reasons for my little skirmish with the scholars is that we in the oh-so-honest-and-true Western world are as capable of rewriting history – whether by means of genuine errors, deliberate tweaking or determined overhauling – as the folk in the Kremlin. Consider the recent military encounters (?) in the Middle East, as reported by North American media embedded with the fighting forces. (As you know better than me, newspaper reports are often, down the road, important primary sources for scholarly research.) It is the scholar of rare talent who engages with material and allows it to incubate and then to birth its truths. Bias, sometimes aka wishful thinking, occurs more often than we think.clarabellahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18046264094193801260noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-24685011879077539522008-08-17T11:54:00.000-07:002008-08-17T11:54:00.000-07:00Pam: I would never call you stupid. (Nor do you lo...Pam: I would never call you stupid. (Nor do you look stupid. Good grief!) I'm finding the 1906 <I>Handbook</I> fascinating reading; it contains a potted, year-by-year history of the island that says a lot about the preoccupations of the powers that were at the time. And 'Nosworthy' is one of the names that crops up. So is the name of the person who at the time owned the farm that my father was to buy (he was a nominated member of LegCo). I was struck by the fact that the surgeon attached to the General Penitentiary was a Dr Grabham (he was also the surgeon at Victoria Jubilee, and on the board of the Institute).<BR/><BR/>I'm currently reading <I>Rastafari and Other African-Caribbean Worldviews</I> in which the theme of <B>resistance</B> plays a major role, and I'm having a hard time buying some of it. This is because reality, as I keep finding out is complex and, ahem, nuanced, not simple and straightforward the way I'd like it to be. Certainly, there was resistance. There was also accommodation and interpenetration. And DNA has been both shaken and stirred, a lot.FSJLhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15803079547494458258noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-12809809070117825702008-08-17T10:54:00.000-07:002008-08-17T10:54:00.000-07:00fsjl: Lawd, I'm not really as stupid as I look. No...fsjl: Lawd, I'm not really as stupid as I look. No, the children of the children (of the children?) of those slaves who WERE named by slave masters, hence the need for the SUBSEQUENT disentangling of Nugents and Nosworthys (names I have picked arbitrarily). I also know that the process of slaves and ex-slaves taking surnames was a complicated matter, but I'm aware of the case of which I speak. Remember, it was you who called the names. And yes, some of us are very mixed up, but nation-family DNA is a powerful thing, as is the disposition of some folks to resist 'miscegenation'. I'm not sure where the stories about heroic African resistance to oppression fit in, but I count on you to tell me, since it's my impression that, at least here and there, there was indeed resistance of that kind...clarabellahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18046264094193801260noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-33022018072546098852008-08-17T10:13:00.000-07:002008-08-17T10:13:00.000-07:00Slavemasters? In 1906? (How ex-slaves took surname...Slavemasters? In 1906? (How ex-slaves took surnames was a complicated matter, not always a matter of imposition either. And, of course, we also have to deal with the fact that quite a few of us are not of unmixed African origin and that stories about heroic African resistance to oppression are just that, stories.)FSJLhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15803079547494458258noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-2154860429260157692008-08-17T09:36:00.000-07:002008-08-17T09:36:00.000-07:00Aha! fsjl: It was the habit of slavemasters, as yo...Aha! fsjl: It was the habit of slavemasters, as you know, to call their slaves by their surnames, which of course necessitates subsequent disentanglements... There are therefore various Nugents and Nosworthys. Besides which, that is my name by marriage, nuh?clarabellahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18046264094193801260noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-91738349643559762722008-08-17T09:24:00.000-07:002008-08-17T09:24:00.000-07:00Pam, you just have to have an eagle eye -- and a s...Pam, you just have to have an eagle eye -- and a sense of humour.<BR/><BR/>A who mi a call big piipl? Yu si mi dyin trial? Coo pon di <I>Anbook</I> fram 1906 an si how many Mordecai mention inna it? Plenty-plenty. An Ledgister? Nat wan deggeh wan. :-)FSJLhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15803079547494458258noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-54763404427744716542008-08-17T09:16:00.000-07:002008-08-17T09:16:00.000-07:00fsjl: A oo yu da call 'big piipl'? Cudda neva mi! ...fsjl: A oo yu da call 'big piipl'? Cudda neva mi! Mi did edumacate a wan smaal smaal likl kalij we no eevn de inna Gad worl no langa. Tru, it wuz inna farin, but stil, it no belang inna de aagyument! So ef yu did go a U-bline, me neva go a no U- tall tall: no U-see, no U-aaf-bline, no U-bline.clarabellahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18046264094193801260noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-68427259925207188952008-08-17T09:07:00.000-07:002008-08-17T09:07:00.000-07:00Hi fsjl: I think I must make the admission that in...Hi fsjl: I think I must make the admission that in this case the omission is mine! (I just went back and checked.) Truth to tell, when story come to bump, I don't think I'm cut out for this blogging thing. You need to write fast, consume information fast, not be addicted to checking and double-checking – which I am. But the example is timely and makes the point, doesn't it? Thank you for being my 'expert' reader. The text should indeed read 'omission' and not 'admission'. The fault is wholly mine. And, as ever, inexpert as I am, I am happy to be corrected...clarabellahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18046264094193801260noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-57743258523416823112008-08-13T14:25:00.000-07:002008-08-13T14:25:00.000-07:00Pam, is it you or Eddie who can't tell the differe...Pam, is it you or Eddie who can't tell the difference between 'admission' and 'omission'?<BR/><BR/>Oonu big piipl edumacate a dem farin uvinersity; mi iz a small-small man an jis go a U-bline, but mi tink dar iz a difrance. :-)FSJLhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15803079547494458258noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-35453622592687155102008-08-13T09:08:00.000-07:002008-08-13T09:08:00.000-07:00Couldn't agree with you more, jdid. "The key word ...Couldn't agree with you more, jdid. "The key word IS diligence." When one thinks of the kind of trouble that might ensue from getting one supposedly "small" thing wrong... For example, the story in the press recently about the baby who died because the person (was it a person?) taking the emergency call got two CITIES mixed up! Just makes the case for back-up – searches, protocols, procedures, etc. Have a great weekend!clarabellahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18046264094193801260noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7147029108490505546.post-73887817290967922862008-08-13T08:54:00.000-07:002008-08-13T08:54:00.000-07:00double and triple checking isnt in vogue these day...double and triple checking isnt in vogue these days. you do one google search and thats it, whatever pops up first is the answer.<BR/><BR/>i've used google and the internet in general for work purposes on a project a few years back and while its amazing how easy it is to get info that you may not otherwise be privy to its also amazing at how wrong that info can be at times. the key word is diligence.Jdidhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08493622796742761799noreply@blogger.com