THEY CALLED the hilltop Rastafarian settlement in St Catherine The Pinnacle, because of the lofty heights in which it was situated. And, the Rastas basked in the manifestation of existing in a space, far from the madding crowd, one in which the...
ON NOVEMBER 2, 1930, Ras Tafari Makonnen was crowned Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia, in Africa. His supporters believe that he was the earthly manifestation of God or Jah. His birth, it is said, was foretold in the Bible and his lineage goes...
THE STORIES of bank employees pocketing the money of their employers and clients have been around since the start of the formal banking system. Some people just cannot help themselves from helping themselves with the money that is put into their...
JAMAICA HAS had many serial killers, some committing heinous acts, for which they were never found to be charged. There were those who paid for their dastardly acts, sometimes by way of the hangman’s noose. Lewis Hutchinson was one of them, but he...
OBEAH, A type of witchcraft which originated in Africa, was practised widely during the days of slavery in Jamaica. It was used for benevolent and malevolent purposes. Practitioners were revered and feared at the same time because the people firmly...
JAMAICAN PEOPLE, for the most part, believe in God, whosoever they perceive him to be. But 80 years ago, an incident exploded in the western parish of St James that obliterated such a belief in one person, inspiring him to curse God himself. And...
ON OCTOBER 16, 150 people will be bestowed with Jamaica’s national awards and honours, of course, of different classes and categories. They were established by the National Honours and Awards Act by the Parliament of Jamaica in July 1969 (Act No....
CALL HIM ‘Mr Tourism’, call him ‘Mr Popularity’, call him ‘Mr Innovator’. But he was born Edmund Bartlett, who evolved into “a transformative leader who is recognised globally for his wide-ranging expertise and accomplishments in both tourism and...
JAMAICA’S HISTORY and heritage are replete with stories – folktales, Anansi stories, duppy/paranormal stories, sorcery, tragedies, legal and family dramas, political scandals, stories of persecution and bigotry, ‘bangarangs’ and brouhahas....
LAWSON JOHN CRAWFORD, born October 6, 1973 to Vivian Crawford, former executive director of the Institute of Jamaica, and his wife, Carva, made his transition on July 6, 2024 in London, England. He also predeceased his sister, Sheena. The attorney-...
RECENTLY WE published an article on how, despite our efforts to break away from the political ties that Jamaica has with Britain, there will always be a strong connection between both jurisdictions because the names of hundreds of places in Jamaica...
THE GREAT majority of the Jamaican people are descendants of Africans who were forcibly removed from their homeland and transported across the Atlantic in overcrowded vessels to work on plantations owned by Europeans in a brutal system of chattel...
ON JULY 17, The Gleaner published a story headlined, ‘Jamaica-born artist Garfield Morgan making lasting impressions in Canada’. In it we look at how Morgan has been making a name for himself through his art in that North American country,...
For centuries, Jamaicans have been using herbs (bushes, vines, tree leaves, roots and barks) for a variety of physical, mental, psychological and medical ailments. Hot beverages (bush teas), tonics, balms, oils and powders are some of the things...
In terms of medal count and the quality of the six medals that Jamaica earned at the just-concluded 2024 Olympics in Paris, France, was the most disappointing since 2008 when Jamaica, a fully fledged bird, flew around the ‘Bird Nest’ stadium in...
AFTER EMANCIPATION in 1838 the peasantry class emerged out of the former enslaved people. Some people were established in free villages, from which cheap labour was supplied for the plantations that still thrived from the legacy of slavery. It was...
SOON, THE monarchy of Britain will not be the head of the Jamaican state. It has been such since 1661, six years after the British, led by Admiral William Penn and General Robert Venables, arrived on the Spanish-ruled island on May 10, 1655. The...
The 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, France, was promoted to be like none other, especially with the opening ceremony centred about and on the River Seine, an ambitious display of French architecture, history, and culture. And the world waited to see...
IN THE mid-1990s, the tension between Jamaica’s top female sprinters and their American counterparts was the strongest ever. There was absolutely no love lost between them. The fiercest rivalry seemed to have been between Merlene Ottey and Gail...
JAMAICA, LIKE most sovereign territories, has national emblems that represent our autonomy, history, and culture. Some people hold them dear to their hearts, but to others, they are meaningless for a variety of reasons. We are not at all patriots...
YEARS AGO, Frank Lumsden, colonel of Charles Town Maroon village, wanted his niece, Nomali Lumsden-Campbell, a music educator, to contribute in a significant way to the annual International Charles Town Maroon Conference and Festival. Colonel...
ON SUNDAY, August 11 a huge breeze of poetry will be passing through the University of Technology Jamaica (UTech) in Papine, St Andrew, to manifest SenYAcum Edutainment’s 14th Annual Jamaica Poetry Festival (JPF), in partnership with UTech, the...
AT MIDNIGHT on August 1, 1838, Governor Sir Lionel Smith read the Emancipation Proclamation on the steps of the portico of the governor’s mansion in Spanish Town, St Catherine. Yet, that was not the beginning of full freedom. The people were still...
THE 1738 treaty of peace and friendship between the Leeward Maroons of western Jamaica and the British, and the 1739 treaty between the Windward Maroons of eastern Jamaica, effectively gave the Maroons their freedom from British control under...
DESPITE ‘EMANCIPATION’, ‘Independence’, and the Government’s current plans to get rid of the monarch of Britain as Jamaica’s head of state, these sovereign territories are forever linked by the names of places. But do you know how some places in...
