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A Word from the Editor
Africa and the Caribbean
Jennifer Brown
(Jamaican poet)
I came to you
fresh
dew wet
child of these islands
jewel of the Caribbean Sea
and you loved
my skin
like black beaches;
my hair
like coconut fibres
my lips
large and generous
tasting sun and fruit.
You took me home
and together we dug
until we found
my long lost navel string;
we recalled the ceremonies
that had subsided in my skin;
I sang for you
my new songs
and we slept together at dawn.
From, Sisters of Caliban: Contemporary Women Poets of the Caribbean,
ed. MJ Fenwick, Azul Editions, 1996.
When I was asked by Stephanie Horton, the editor of Sea Breeze Electronic Journal of Contemporary Liberian Writings, to serve as guest editor of its May 2008 edition, I was quite taken aback. However, it did not take me long to make a decision because I realized what a great honour it would be. We settled quickly on a theme. As a Virgin Islander who lived in Liberia and taught at the University of Liberia for fourteen years, and a founding member of the Liberia Association of Writers (LAW), I thought about the history that connected the Caribbean to Liberia.
Members of the Liberian Association of Writers (LAW), 1984.
Rear: Osbourne Collins.
Standing row left to right: James Feo Okai, Gbawu
Flomo Woiwor, Joseph Jallah Kpartor,
Patricia Jabbeh, C. William Allen, K. Moses Nagbe, Althea Romeo-Mark.
Squatting left to right: D. Yadeh Chea, Putu Sonpon and unknown.
LAW was established on July 17, 1982 at the University of Liberia.
Stephanie and I quickly settled on “The Caribbean Presence in Liberia” as the working title with “the African influence on Caribbean people and culture” as a sub-theme.
I began to appeal to Liberians of Caribbean decent to contribute to this issue. I was particularly interested in why their forefathers left the Caribbean and immigrated to Liberia, and what contributions they had made to that country.
It was my hope to feature a few articles on Dr. Edward Wilmot Blyden, a Virgin Islander, who made Liberia his home and contributed enormously to West African history. We had come into a wealth of articles published by The Voice, a Liberian newspaper, whose maiden publication in 2007 was a special souvenir issue dedicated to the 175th birthday anniversary of Dr. Blyden (1832-2007). Unfortunately, we were unsuccessful in our attempts to contact the editor to reprint some of the exciting articles the contributors had written.
Marcus Garvey, a Jamaican, who initiated the “Back to Africa Movement,” was another subject of interest. We hope that what you read is enough to whet your appetite and that you would go on to discover more about the importance of these men.
In addition to Dr. Edward Wilmot Blyden and Marcus Garvey, you are going to read about the Barclay family from Barbados, Albert Porte from Barbados, the Horton family from Jamaica, and Mr. Christopher H Rennie from Grenada. These are people who contributed to the development of Liberia.
Barbados, a Caribbean nation, gave Liberia two presidents and a famous pamphleteer, Albert Porte.
This edition also features contributions by Liberian and Caribbean writers, intellectuals, scholars, and poets. They share their views on Liberian and Caribbean history, the influence of African languages on Caribbean Patois, identitarian modes of artistic representations of blackness, and stories from the oral tradition.
One sees the West African influence on Caribbean art, short stories and poetry. A Scottish writer, in his book review of a Caribbean novel, gives the reader some insight on Caribbean culture. There is much to read and savour, much to learn.
Being the guest editor was also a wonderful opportunity to bring Liberian and Caribbean scholars and writers together. It is my hope that this edition will generate an appreciation of the history and the ancestry that connects them and that it will lead to further interaction. We could have done much more but we could only work with those who were willing and found the time to share their family histories.
One love,
Althea Romeo-Mark
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