Dear Editor,
To many, Independence means merely the formal conceding of political and constitutional power by the imperialists to representatives of the local populace. Some may go further and contend that for it to be real it must also mean local control of the new nation’s economy and destinies. Few, however, address their minds to the need for more cultural and artistic independence, to the need for formulating cultural and artistic goals for the Caribbean nations. In our own country we have produced our poets, our authors, our dramatists, our painters and our sculptors, but what attempts have been made to relate our works to their history and the evolution of a distinctive culture? What has been done to interpret and commit to writing our social history? Who, hitherto, has thought of discovering the roots of our people and the community of origins which we share with our brothers and sisters of the Caribbean, North America and the nations of Africa and Asia.
Like so many other people achieving independence in our generation we have had our lives and our habits influenced and shaped by centuries of colonial rule, as a result of which our society has remained a complex of complexes, causing us to ignore and sometimes condemn our own achievements and distinctive cultural patterns. We have been satisfied to accept the European description of our forefathers’ revolutions and struggles as mere riots and rebellions against lawful authority, instead of a pattern of a subject people’s struggle to recapture their freedom.
Whence have we sprung? Where are we going? Who are our brothers? What contributions have we got to make as members of the family of man? These are the questions that must excite us as we move into Carifesta XI.
This is a moment when our feelings must transcend electoral rivalries and ideological differences, and when we must acknowledge the urgent and essential role of the intellectual worker in the process of transforming our society and nations. It is not without significance that included in this work are pieces and poems not only by Guyanese or the English-speaking Caribbean, but those by the regional peoples of Martinique and Cuba.
The net has been cast wide and the catch has been of the highest quality and of greatest portent for the future. We can now see ourselves as part of a regional and world movement. We can be the haven for new and revolutionary thought and the place where there can be a free exchange of ideas and concepts. We, the working-class of Guyana, welcome again this participation by our friends, brothers and sisters in the celebration of this historic event, Carifesta X.. Theirs to use are the fruits of our efforts. Our achievements are theirs to claim. We know that our history and culture will be richer for their contributions.
Yours faithfully
Sherwood Clarke
I attended primary school in the interior of Guyana forty five years ago and I can distinctly remember when David Correia and Ivor Smith won scholarships in consecutive years to attend St. Stanislaus College in Georgetown. The whole village was in awe and very proud of their stellar achievements. At that time, it showed us that we could achieve a goal which we were told, was of absolute necessity if we wanted to have a better life than that to which we were all subjected in our village, far removed from the glitter of the capital city. For the old, it was an indication that their sacrifice to educate their children was worth their while and inspired them to push harder. More importantly though, it inspired and paved the way for the young among us who followed in their pioneering footsteps to seek education in the very different and sometimes hostile environment we all encountered when we went to Georgetown to attend High School.
Sixteen years later, during Christmas, I was working on my UG final year dissertation at home while the other men in my family were busy participating in the festivities associated with the season. At one stage, my brother (who is a gold miner) came to my room and confidently observed that I would be better of joining the party since the investment in time and energy would not really make a difference to the quality of my life in the future. To strengthen his position he proudly declared that when I obtained my degree it would take me a whole month to earn the amount of money which he earned in one day as a gold miner. Suffice it to say, one doesn’t argue with men when they are worshipping at the altar of Bacchus!
In 2002/2003 I spent some time teaching the first year Caribbean Studies program to junior sixth formers at Queen’s College. With few exceptions, members of the class needed to be constantly persuaded, prodded,cajoled and sometimes even threatened to do their work. On questioning the members of this group in search of an explanation for their obvious lack of interest in academic work I elicited almost the same response from each of them. It was simple. What sense did it make investing time and energy into an enterprise which did not even guarantee one a job, much less, a decent living? And some of them invariably added that there were other “economic” activities which provided a higher return of income and other intangible rewards for less effort. So the million dollar question had become by then, “Why Study?”
I use these stories to illustrate in chronological order, the inglorious and very tragic devaluation of academic and intellectual work, and by extension, academics and intellectuals, in our society. In less than thirty five years I have seen this devaluation take us from being one of the more literate societies in the world to one where academic/intellectual work is now viewed, at best, in a rather dismissive manner. Don’t be fooled by the outstanding CSEC and other results which a handful of our students have been producing recently! Obligatory academic certification has now typically become the domain of the nouveau riche/ elitist demographic in Guyana. The problem is that their focus has shifted from academic excellence to certifying oneself at any cost so that you could be deemed “qualified” to access the few available jobs and other opportunities for self development, available in the system. Why do you think there has been a slew of disappearing CXC and other exam scripts in Guyana over the years? It is not the children of the poor who have been “benefitting” from this national embarassment. They could not afford it! It is the children of those who have amassed fortunes in the last few years which affords them the opportunity to buy “certification”, “social status” and the “respect” bestowed on those who have successfully and honestly completed a programme of academic study, as is the convention in more civilised societies.
Of course, the institutionalising of this despicable social and cultural phenomenon could have only happened with the sanctioning of our leaders. And this is a relatively new issue in Guyana so we know the group which is most culpable for its entrenchment as a part of our education system. I understand Mr. Clarke’s concern but to people who have witnessed first-hand the decline of the importance of academic and intellectual work in Guyana over the last three decades or so, it has been predictable.
The major reconfiguration of our value system that has spawned this uglines has been the shift from attributing premium value to abstract/ academic/ intellectual enterprises to bestowing the highest value on the acquisition of financial resources and material possessions. Put another way, our leaders are only concerned with propogating a now dominant and dominering sub-culture whose primary focus is to make money using whatever means available. Who cares about Culture and Self Identity? Mr.Clarke obviouslly spends time pondering on these matters in response to his natural desire to lend to our national enterprise of development. Unfortunately, Mr. Jagdeo and his cabal could not care less about these issues even though they articulate them hypocritically when it suits their purpose!!!
I may be late in expressing my congratulations to you for a body of work well done. But better late than never. Excellent observation.
………………..Speedy you have done a good job to rebut what Sherwood had chronicle. I cannot say more to it but to say that this is the result of poor planers. What happen after World Cup Cricket…………………..Use the out come to score the performance of the Government with respect to the Garden City Georgetown’s beauty…………….. Look at New Amsterdam hospital if the Government was thinking New Amsterdam Hospital could of been a symbol for Guyana wood and demonstration to show case New Amsterdam as an old Dutch City………………… This Government is for a few, it not for the people…………………….They come to the people when they in a bine…………………..
Excellent articles by Sherwood Clarke and speedy that i will give them a round of applause. I agree with Sherwood Clarke to a point since i will add that intellectuals should first acknowledge themselves in the process of transforming our society. It would be valuable to our society if people(the intellectuals) ferment critical thinking and induce society to look inward beyond the failed ways of the past.
Where is our Adam Smith,John Adams,Abraham Lincoln et al?
Guyanese Society is trap in a time zone/mental slavery. For people to come together and get beyond the PPP/PNC nonsense and get real change they need to be induced to think for themselves. Everyone in Society must walk hand in hand and know that they have a stake in each others future. One little step,one little mind that is molded one at a time is better than none. Intellectuals need to be more vocal,pragmatic and articulate that the time is now because tomorrow maybe too late.
I echo Ulric in congratulating speedy for his excellent observations. Once again, well done! One only have look around Guyana for corroboration – a good place to start is UG.
Good observations, but we must remember,that this problem is worldwide, or to be more specific in the so called ‘West’.Western socities have placed more value in ‘having a good time, even on the dole’. There are now countries,which are paying students to take up certain areas of studies, because they are considered by the young to be too demanding; e.g engineering. We just have to look at what’s going on at American Universities, where about 75 % of the Phd students are from afar and usually from Asia. The same is reflected in UNESCO’s comparative studies, where the Asian countries are whipping us in every department. The socities and culture there, still place academic achievements very high on their scale of values. Therefore, the arguements of ‘lowly paid’ intellectual jobs isn’t applicable in this case, when we consider highly developed countries,where the tendency is exactly the same. I’m suprised, that in our ‘poor’ socities, education is no longer seen, as a means of moving up the social ladder. We don’t have access to the same level of welfare benefits, as those in the highly developed economies. This is one of the unfortunate aspects of globalization, some people forget about their realities and would like to emulate, what they see on TV and in the movies. On a lighter note, it reminds of what I saw in GT, a few years ago, when I was on a visit; a young gentleman, in a winter coat, fully decked out in timberland boots and it was the middle of July :)
You have made some sweeping generalizations. I wonder what you mean by “western societies”, bearing in mind that in every society, mainly those in the west, there is a well entrenched class system (financial, intellectual and sometimes both). It is no secret that people who grow up in stable (ie. with a mother and a father) families, in the higher income brackets, tend to get a better education than those who do not. It is true that many persons in the lower brackets do not see educations as a means of climbing the social ladder, but whether or not this proportion has dwindled in recent times is debatable.
To get into the best universities in the west, one usually need a very good education beforehand, so it is no coincidence that most students in Harvard, Oxford, etc come from higher income households. I really don’t see how this is a problem in West. It has been that way all along, and it is the very intellectual class which shape the world in which we live. Just to illustrate:
– the richest man in the world is an intellectual
– the internet was invented by a British scientist (an intellectual)
– intellectuals at Princeton came up with the algorithm from which we have google, and those intellectuals are VERY rich
– intellectuals (at Harvard) created facebook, who also are also VERY rich.
What has happened recently is that there has been a proliferation of education. Many institutions today that claim to be “universities” and grant degrees of many sorts, cannot be compared to the top/best schools, and same for degrees gained from them. Indeed it is the “powers that be” in the west which has facilitated this phenomenon, but the distinction between the classes of intellectual is ever present.
I would love to know where in the west persons are being paid to take up undergraduate studies in subjects like engineering, apart from the usual competitive scholarship route. As far as PhD level, this is usually how it is done (few people take up PhD studies on their own money) . The usual process is for researchers (Professors, lecturers, etc) to submit grant proposals to funding bodies and, once these grants are successful, employ PhD students and research assistants to do the research for them, while the take a supervisory role. Universities also compete against each other via the amount and quality of research they produce. Usually the better the Phd student, the better quality research they produce. So there are always avenues for excellent overseas students to get PhD opportunities at many top universities. There have been Guyanese who have gotten PhDs like this, and there will be more.
Intellectuals?.. Gimmie a break banna… Guyana’s time for intellectuals has long come and gone with the wind since 1992. The only place where genuine intellectuals resides, in Guyana, is at UG and those few in numbers over there are diminishing rapidly to a point of no return.
The brain drain train has left Guyana for greener pastures ages ago and judging from the way things are shaping up these days with those vindictive totalitarian shenanigans coming from the leadership, I don’t know banna….Now I’m beginning to think it may be too late for goodbye until there is real change in the polity.
Speedy you sound like you’re a good man so keep the faith for me I’m already too far gone.
……………………and respect for the Court…………………….and laws table and inforce to protect the people in a true Guyanese democracy in which they live………………….a better place to start is the Courts because it is the protector of the people