Volume 13 (1997)
The Caribbean(s) Redefined
Article IV
MULTIRACIAL IDENTITIES IN
TRINIDAD AND GUYANA:
EXALTATION AND AMBIGUITY
Camille Hernandez-Ramdwar
University of Toronto
For people of formerly colonized countries, race1 mixing among the populace has always been a reality. This is particularly true for Caribbean peoples. This paper addresses the ambivalent existence of multiracial identities for Caribbean people in the regions of Trinidad and Guyana, two areas with particularly diverse populations including significant numbers of people who are of (East) Indian background, as well as (in Guyana) an indigenous Amerindian population. The current relevancy of this issue is highlighted by tensions between African and Indian populations in each area, following the elections of predominantly Indian-based governments in Guyana in 1992 (PPP) and Trinidad & Tobago in 1995 (UNC/NAR coalition). As racial terrains shift in the realms of power, people often resort to constructions of "pure" identities to support an "us" versus "them" agenda. An exploration into multiracial identity challenges this re-ordering of racial monoliths and homogeneous social organization; it provides an opening for discussion of similarities rather than differences, of interlinkages and a shared history of colonization.
For the purposes of this article, the term "multiracial" is intended to signify an identity which has arisen out of a colonial history. Prior to Columbus, any notion of "race" among the Amerindians would have differed considerably from that which was developed over time by the Europeans for very specific imperialist reasons. Multiracial Caribbean people are those who are descended from more than one racial group found in the Caribbean. The very notion of multiracial identity is only significant if importance, privilege, difference, or debasement has been accorded to particular racial groups over others during the course of Caribbean history.
My analysis of Caribbean multiracial identity is based on the works cited as well as a series of interviews I conducted with multiracial Caribbean and Caribbean-Canadian people during 1994-1995. It is a preliminary investigation of a subject area which requires much deeper study, a study which I hope to flesh out from this skeletal framework of initial inquiry. Caribbean scholarship has largely ignored and overlooked multiracial/mixed race identity with the exception of a few articles and papers (Khan, Puri, Reddock, and Shibata), and a rather significant body of work dealing with the Coloured/Mulatto/gens de couleur class and its historical/political significance (Braithwaite, Brathwaite, Brereton, Cohen & Green, Heuman, and Sio). In comparison, within the body of Caribbean literature there is an attempt to examine, however superficially, multiracial identity and its problematic/complex meaning beyond African/European bipolarity. This is mostly evident in the works of Edgar Mittelholzer, V.S. Naipaul, Jan Shinebourne, Lawrence Scott, and Merle Hodge. However, large gaps remain in the areas of theory and primary research examining how racially complex Caribbean people negotiate and navigate their identities in a social and political atmosphere which both exalts them ("All o' we is one", "One people, one nation, one destiny", "Out of many, one people") and denies them full recognition as a legitimate racial "group" in an arena where one's racial allegiance purportedly informs community and political alliance, personal and business networks, state power and consequently, access to resources.
I
"Raceing" in Trinidad and Guyana: Historical Developments
From the time the first Europeans invaded the Amerindian-inhabited Caribbean region, multiracial people have been a reality. As elsewhere in the world where colonialism left its indelible mark, children were born of sexual liaisons, forced or compliant, between colonizer and colonized. Over time, as the shape of Caribbean society was transformed by increasing migrations to the region (also forced or compliant), the potential for increasingly complex multiracial identity became evident. In areas such as Trinidad and Guyana, where a diverse melange of peoples existed at the advent of the twentieth century, complicated lineages could be discerned among a minority of the population (Croley Segal 83). Societies such as these were comprised of a racial/class hierarchy with the white group at the top, (mainly foreign Europeans and locally-born Creoles); and, in descending order, a Coloured group of African/European descent, (some of whom were quickly advancing into areas of influence); Chinese, Middle Eastern, and Portuguese immigrants who were aspiring to lower middle class positions; Venezuelan peons of mixed heritage (in Trinidad); Africans and Indians, who formed the majority of the population, and were in general economically and socially marginalized; and in Guyana, a sizeable and diverse population of Amerindian people who inhabited the country's interior regions. Sprinkled amongst these racial/social classes were multiracial people of every description, who occupied no set position, and were in no way a cohesive group.
Although these racial/ethnic/class divisions were evident, they were not impermeable nor rigid (Brereton, Social organization54). Interactions between all groups were inevitable, dependent on particular demographic variables such as relative isolation of a group or male/female ratios. It was out of these interactions that multiracial people arose. For example, some Chinese males who came as indentured labourers in the nineteenth century married into the Coloured class, thereby advancing themselves socially and economically (Brereton, Social organization 38). Africans and Indians, despite having historically been kept apart as a matter of colonial divide and rule politics, nevertheless interacted with one another (Reddock104). The popular term (in both Guyana and Trinidad) to describe such an African/Indian mixed race person is "dougla". The offspring of African/Indian unions did not, however, form a cohesive community as for example elite Coloured people had done since the pre-Emancipation era.
Because of the extreme social and political relevance of race and colour in the society, it was generally the mixed people who claimed partial European ancestry, ie. more than "pure" African, Indian or Amerindian heritage, out of all mixed race people, who were able to gain a measure of privilege (Brereton, Society and culture 92). The working-class African and Indian groups, and, in Guyana, Amerindian people who still maintained their traditional ways of life, were the most marginalized in the societies. Some members of the Coloured middle class had already established their status generations previous through economic activities, education, and a consistent belief in their inherent right to rule the colonies due to their mixed - racial and cultural - inheritance. It was because of this mixed heritage that they were able to assert an "authentically Caribbean" identity. Other mixed race people, dependent on racial heritage, appearance, colour, and class, were in certain cases able to advance themselves socially as well. However, because Caribbean scholarship has largely ignored the many people who did not or were not able to move from a marginalized status into a more privileged position despite multiracial ancestry, (both from the Coloured group and those of other multiracial ancestries)2 it is uncertain how they defined themselves in the society and with whom they would align themselves. Because not all multiracial people were capable of attaining a position of relative privilege, it must be assumed that multiracial lineage in itself did not automatically result in privilege, but rather that colour, phenotype and white association (familial or fraternal) would result in the possibility of advancement, combined with other factors such as income, class background, ethnicity and education. Three examples of such multiracial groups who remain marginalized despite, or because of, their mixed ancestry are "douglas" (Trinidad and Guyana), "cocoa panyols" (Trinidad) and "bovianders" (Guyana).
II
"Douglas"
The term "dougla" is seldom adopted in self-application by people of African/Indian ancestry themselves, due to its negative connotation and the stigma of illegitimacy surrounding it (Khan, Puri, Reddock, and Shibat, 5). The word itself comes from the Hindi term for "bastard" or "miscegenate". "Dougla" identity is most often ascribed to individuals who are the offspring of one African and one Indian parent.3 It is considered a non-hereditary identification: the child of a dougla and a non-dougla individual would usually be ascribed another racial identity, largely based on appearance (Segal 97). It is almost impossible to estimate the number of "douglas" in Trinidad and Guyana as there is no official category on census forms or in other demographic data; rather "dougla" is incorporated within the much more diverse and ambiguous category "Mixed". As well, not everyone who is actually "dougla" would choose to define as such, due to various pressures enacted on the individual from both African and Indian sides. In particular, rejection by Indian family members and acceptance into Afro-Caribbean communities has been most common. Rhoda Reddock clearly outlines the historical and cultural reasons for such rejection, stemming from Hindu beliefs in contamination, varna (colour) and caste endogamy, and contemporary fears of Indian racial extinction through the so-called corruption of Indian women (115-116). The social result of this rejection is that many "dougla" individuals are raised within the Afro-Caribbean/creole culture, (although, this does not necessarily result in self-identification or self-naming as "African", as is seen with some other mixed groups).
The current position of "dougla" people in both Trinidad and Guyana has been exacerbated by the tensions between African and Indian groups, in the political arena as well as at the social, interpersonal level. In Trinidad, "dougla" identity has been appropriated by ambitious politicians and public figures and wielded as a political tool in the form of "douglarisation" politics; that is, a proposal for African/Indian unity/mixing, utilizing the "dougla" as the ultimate symbol of racial harmony. Seen as a threat by conservative and orthodox elements in the Indian population, (and by some fewer but equally orthodox Africanist factions), "douglarisation" has led, contradictorily, to the silencing and invisibility of "dougla" people themselves, due to the extreme vitriol released by these factions in reaction to the proposals. Lauded in song (a number of calypsos deal with dougla identity/politics),4 utilized symbolically as the basis for new cultural movements ("dougla music",5 "dougla poetics").6 descendants of African and Indian parents remain outside the bipolarity of African/Indian dynamics and yet are most intimately affected by them. Disunified without a cohesive community, "dougla" people can not be ushered into the buffer zone between competing racial factions as Coloured people were during the emancipation era, yet the relevance and importance of "dougla identity" to racial politics and social transformation is increasingly being recognized.
It must be noted that the small amount of research on "dougla" identity has dealt with the position of "dougla" people in the Trinidadian context; specificities which deal with how "dougla" identities are taken up in Guyana is an area which has been highly neglected, with one exception being the work of Shibata. Although there are many similarities regarding the position of "douglas" in both societies, some of Shibata's findings which relate specifically to Guyana included 1) an increased improvement in how interracial relationships are viewed since the 1960's; 2) that Guyanese are largely unaware of the "actual experiences that intermarriage may bring" due to the lack of information and scholarly work on the subject (1); and 3) that African/Indian marriages among "contemporary politicians and their immediate families" are not uncommon (7). Shibata clearly sees the role of "douglas" in the society as bringing the races together, and states that the majority of her informants felt that "'Douglas' can be the only true Guyanese" (9).
III
The "Cocoa Panyols"
Like "dougla" the term "cocoa panyol" was a pejorative one ascribed to migrant labourers who came from Venezuela to Trinidad in the late 19th and early 20th century to work on the cocoa estates (Brereton, Social organization 35 and Moodie-Kublalsingh xi). Descendants of Amerindian, Spanish and African ancestors, they maintained tight-knit communities in the isolated valleys of Trinidad's Northern and Central Ranges, thereby preserving their distinct cultural practices and Spanish mother tongue. Most of them, despite multiracial ancestry which included European heritage, remained marginalized due to migrant status, class/occupation, language, ethnicity, and relative isolation from other groups. Differentiated from the "true" Spanish, ie. white, urban, elite Trinidadians who claimed "pure" Iberian descent from the original Spanish occupiers of the island, or those who came from the more recent group of upper class Venezuelan émigrés, the "cocoa panyols" remained marginalized until the fall of the cocoa industry in the 1920's. As well, the building of the Caura Dam in the 1940's forced many out of the rural areas and into greater interaction with other ethnic groups through increased urban migration.
Over time, "panyol" or "Spanish" identity in Trinidad has been transformed from its original meaning into one which relates less to culture and ethnicity than to particular phenotypical characteristics, a "look" distinguishing one from "pure" African, Indian, European, Chinese, or identities such as "dougla", "mulatto" etc. (Khan 184). The "panyol" culture itself has largely disintegrated; however, particular, preserved remnants are utilized in the interests of constructing and supporting belief in an ethnically-plural national culture. The most notable example of this is parang, a form of music originally brought by the Venezuelan immigrants, and now established as the traditional music in Trinidad at Christmastime. Like the evolution of chutney ("dougla music"), parang is being transformed from its Spanish Catholic roots and intensely religious content into a hybrid pop music performed by all racial groups and incorporating creole Trinidadian lyrics of a typically bawdy nature in the fashion of calypso. The original meaning and intent of parang and, in relation, the contribution and importance of the "panyol" culture to Trinidad is being eroded. In its place, a nationalist construction of "Spanish" identity is employed in much the same way "dougla" is: to advocate for racelessness through racial mixture and thereby overcome racial tension and polarization (e.g. "all o' we is one") (Khan195).
Again, it is impossible to trace the numbers of "panyol" people or those descended from "panyols" as they are simply considered "Mixed" for demographic purposes. Interestingly, as a number of people lay claim to a "Spanish" identity based on phenotype rather than, or in addition to, ethnocultural heritage, the term has become increasingly ambiguous and unclear.
IV
"Bovianders"
"Boviander" is a Guyanese colonial term which originally referred to a variety of mixes including European/Amerindian, but presently is applied to people of mixed African and Amerindian descent (Williams 129), who are found mainly in the coastal regions and the interior mining towns of Guyana. As elsewhere in the Caribbean, appearance is a primary factor in how one is accepted/not accepted by community. In the case of children born in an Amerindian village to an Amerindian mother (unions are almost always that of an Amerindian woman/African male) the children are accepted as Amerindian by the village and raised as such. However, those born within, or who migrated to, coastal areas would adopt the racial identity and culture of their father's group. In fact, individuals of this group have been known to switch according to where they are presently residing (Sander, 119). In this way, racial identity is not only flexible, but adopted for reasons of social survival. People of such mixed descent may be denigrated in the urban areas by Afro- and Indo-Guyanese alike on the basis of their "buck" (Amerindian) ancestry unless such heritage is denied or disregarded. Amerindians or "bucks" as they are called by Guyanese, are the most disparaged and disenfranchised group in Guyana. With the rise of Afro-Guyanese power under Forbes Burnham and the PNC in the 1960's and 1970's, many mixed people who could "pass" for Afro-Guyanese would do so in order to advance their position. Therefore, denial of mixture ("passing") worked to buttress social and economic advancement based on phenotype. This is an old colonial pattern which had formerly been employed by "Coloured" (African/European) people passing for white under British rule. Under Burnham, the practice was inverted to one of passing for African in order to benefit from political, economic and social privileges.7 However, in cases where phenotype belied multiracial heritage, multiracial people incapable of passing faced possible discreditation and rejection by Afro-Guyanese.
V
Representations of the Multiracial Person
As previously stated, the greater the stakes between racial groups, and any increase in racial tension stemming from competition over resources and power, can lead to a great deal of interest and attention being placed on those who occupy an intermediate and ambiguous racial position. Historically, multiracial people have been afforded specific stereotypes and identities which suited a colonial system based on extreme and discrete racial division. Perhaps one of the most salient markers of this is found in Caribbean literature. Edgar Mittelholzer (himself a multiracial Guyanese) was among the first authors to foreground race in his novels as a major component of the society's structure. In Sylvia (1953) he takes the classic theme of the tragic mulatto and places it within a specifically Guyanese multiracial context. In this excerpt, Sylvia's British father explains racial and social identity to his daughter:
He went on to tell her how society in the colony was graded. If he had married a white lady, yes, they would have been one of the very best families. But as he had married her mother, whose parents had been black and Arawak Indian and who did not come from an old and respected family, well, his family wasn't rated as much if she saw what he meant.
"But don't let that scare you too much. If you can succeed in marrying a man of good family you'll be alright, because I'm white, an Englishman, and I'm no pauper. That will count heavily in your favour. Mother will be forgotten and overlooked in the general reckoning."
In a not untypical Caribbean scenario, "undesirable" ancestry is downplayed or, in this case, simply erased. It is not unfeasible to think that a character such as Sylvia would grow up and function in the society as a white Guyanese, regardless of her mother's racial heritage.
Furthermore, Sylvia, the multiracial protagonist, comes to a tragic end in the novel. Multiracial women, in particular, have historically been portrayed as flawed, doomed heroines who have to rely on what is perceived to be their formidable and excessive allure and sexuality in order to survive. For example, in Alfred H. Mendes' short story "Her Chinaman's Way" (1929)8 Maria, the "half-'paniol" wife of a Chinese shopkeeper is regarded as infinitely desirable and relies on the whims of men who "keep" her:
...her brown face handsome in an exotic way with its full lips, large nose, and small eyes that told you there was Chinese blood in her veins, she looked a strange queen. Her voluptuous figure, inherited from her half-breed Venezuelan mother, had always been sought after by the men in town. (Sander 104)
The story climaxes with the murder of Maria's multiracial child at the hands of her Chinese husband. Here, even the child must come to a tragic end. In another example, C.A. Thomasos' "The Dougla" (1933), Elaine, the "dougla" heroine, is "black and elegant" (138), possessing an "irresistible fascination" and "a grace that intoxicated" the men of the community (139). In one scene, Elaine is flirting with men at a dance as her estranged paramour Tony watches in agony. His friend consoles him by explaining: "De dougla at it again...Dat's de way wit' dem" (141), inferring that heritage establishes behaviour and expectations not accredited to other women, in this case, a "feline and vicious" woman of African and Indian descent (138).
Such exoticizations were not limited to females: in two more examples from early Trinidadian writing we see how multiracial males are sexualized and deemed to possess some irresistible allure. The "dougla" character Maxie of Mendes' "Sweetman" (1931) is the highly sought after consort of many women; in this case, a "kept" man. In "Boodhoo" (1932), by the same author, the "half-caste" Anglo-Indian protagonist is considered irresistible by his white mistress Minnie; she is "struck by his beauty" (145), his "large and almondshaped" eyes which were filled with a "distressing intensity" and "passion and longing" (149). When he finally embraces her, it is with a "primitive harshness" (161), yet Boodhoo is more than simply the exotic and savage male Other - Minnie is transfixed by the novelty of race mixture itself: "How fascinating to be in the midst of Chinese and Indians and Negroes and crosses between them all!" (147). However, Minnie must fatally pay for her miscegenistic transgression, and the child whose birth results in her death, possesses "blue eyes, pink skin and fair hair" - ostensibly the child of her husband and not Boodhoo - "pure" white and therefore worthy of life.
More recent examples are no less provocative. In a number of newspaper articles from Trinidad, popular perceptions of multiracial characteristics are abundant. During the 1996 Trinidadian controversy over the alleged douglarization of Carnival, a feature on one "dougla" woman was included in the Sunday Guardian. Marilyn Raphael was described as "brown skinned, curly haired...who has managed to get rid of her links (sic) through chemical processing". She is a "figure of elegance in her skillfully wrapped red sari", a "true reflection of harmony in diversity...Her ready smile and pleasant disposition make her instantly likable, but it is her deep commitment to completely unite the different races (that)... completely bowls you over" (Wanser 3). In this case, the oversexualized image of the "dougla"/mixed woman gives way to the almost saintly image of the harbinger of peace and unity between the races.
Conversely, in another example, we see how a male of multiracial descent is pathologized due to his ancestry. The man, described as the "'Fresh' Beast From the East" was charged with an incestuous sexual assault; reports from the community said that he had committed numerous offences over the years. The article states: "Police say the man's insatiable appetite for sex involving his own family might in some way related (sic) to his breed. They say he is of mixed descent, with East Indian, Negro and noble Spanish blood all rolled up into one electrifying bundle that represents a walking nightmare" (Ali 1). Again, the image of uncontrolled sexuality and, in this example, deviance is resurrected. In another article which examines a popular dating service, a number of the clients are either looking for mixed race dates, or choose to describe themselves (accurately or not) as mixed, purportedly due to an increased level of marketable desirability. In particular, a "Spanish" description or request appeared to be the defining factor for many (Findlay 5).
It seems apparent that the ways in which multiracial identity is represented is determined by the social and political climate of the time. Factors such as gender are also important variables. The inconsistency and malleability of multiracial identity is utilized by politicians, statisticians, cultural producers and others to suit their agendas. Similarly, national holidays such as Indian Arrival Day and African Emancipation Day in Trinidad can be viewed as the result of political manoeuvering which seeks to support a re-investment by these two groups in an assertion of racial and ethnic origin. The first official Indian Arrival Day was inaugurated in May 1995 to commemorate the 150th arrival of Indian people to Trinidad. Emancipation Day, celebrated officially since 1985, is observed to commemorate the freeing of African slaves in Trinidad in 1838. A predominantly Indian-based government was elected (for the first time) in Trinidad & Tobago in 1995, and the rise in visibility and predominance of Indian figures to positions of political power has created tensions between the Indian community and the previously-dominant African and Mixed groups. It is therefore not surprising that over the last two years, the significance of Emancipation and Arrival Days has increased.
For each event, dignitaries from "the Motherland" are often invited to the celebrations: Indian president Dr. Shaker Dyal Sharma to Arrival Day in 1995 (proclaiming "India has not forgotten you")9 and the exiled Prince of Libya, Idris Al-Senussi to Emancipation Day ceremonies in 1996. Emancipation Day 1996 was described as the "biggest" ever by a number of sources, although one report stated "...the Emancipation Support Committee skipped a long period of Afro-Trinidadian history and took everyone back to Africa" (Baboolal, Aug. 9, 1996). Contrary to this report, the entertainment for Emancipation Day included among the events art forms indigenous to Trinidad including steelband and calypso. One columnist (Pires 1996) decried the depiction of a "20-foot tall Egyptian symbol" (Hinds 1996) at the festival site: a "Negro" as opposed to "African" sphinx, one with "politically-correct features". It was the result, he felt, of the "celebration of a blackness so deliberate that the face of the Sphinx could be revised, and the truth re-written, not just without a care, but with something like justification" (Pires, 1996). Similar examples are found in Arrival Day ceremonies, but the emphasis here is less on racial identification with India than with cultural identification and the erasure of class differences. That Indians see themselves as racially "pure" is a given in Trinidad - strong sentiments of anti-miscegenation and notions of pollution have ensured that mixed Indian people are often silenced and/or choose not to recognize non-Indian heritage (particularly if that heritage includes African ancestry) (Hernandez-Ramdwar, Khan, and Reddock). What disturbed most journalists, however, was the glossing-over of the horrors and unpleasantness of indentureship in order to construct a representation of Indian history in Trinidad as one of positive experiences which have lead to economic, educational and now political success for Indians. One columnist wrote: "...in today's Trinidad, many ex-Africans routinely exaggerate the horrors of their past, while, cattacorner, many Indians, - and whites too, of course - assiduously work at prettifying theirs" (Brown 1995).
What appears to be lacking in Caribbean societies is the input of multiracial people themselves - how they perceive themselves and the society around them. With the racial climate increasingly becoming more polarized between "pure" racial groups in places such as Trinidad and Guyana, and an increased erasure and/or privileging of multiracial people, the insider perspective of multiracial people could prove significant though controversial. It certainly would not serve the interests of those who depend on division between "the races" in order to exercise power in these respective societies. Furthermore, certain multiracial people must ask themselves if they wish to continue to associate themselves with a colonial hierarchy of colour and class which can automatically invest them with racial privilege that is associated with white supremacy and economic elites. Commitment to social change and the amelioration of class differences and economic deprivation based on race and colour must not be dismissed by multiracial people who can "prove" that they are "not racist" because of multiracial ancestry; it must be demonstrated by action rather than words.
VI
"Brotherhood of the Boat"?
The Common Origin Debate in Trinidad
Another illustration of how deeply sentiments run regarding racial identity, particularly in relation to multiple origins, was evident during the 1996 Carnival season in Trinidad. Due to a number of co-existing factors (including the recent first-time election of an "Indian" government and the widespread popularity of chutney soca), tensions heightened among Trinidadians who had an investment in the notion of a pure racial identity. One major challenge to this notion was Brother Marvin's calypso "Brotherhood of the Boat", which stated
For those who playin ignorant
Talking about true African descent
If you want to know the truth
Take a trip back to your roots
And somewhere on that journey
You will see a man in a dhoti
Saying he prayers in front of a jhandi10
Two well-known Afro-Trinidadians - artist Leroi Clarke and activist Pearl Eintou Springer, reacted strongly to these lyrics, inferring that they themselves were positive they had no such Indian descent, and that to insinuate Indian ancestry among the majority of the African population was "nonsense",11 "mischievous and misleading".12 Other Trinidadians, African and Indian alike, followed suit, disparaging the calypso for alleged historical inaccuracy. However, some commentators, such as the Chief Iyalorisha of the Shango religion Molly Ahye, applauded the calypso for stating that "symbolically or not, we are in the same boat". Ahye pointed to the many references in the calypso which could relate to either Indian, African, or other traditions (such as prayer flags, manifestations of divinities, etc.).13 The calypsonian Selwyn Demming (singing under the name Brother Marvin) and his wife Shafina, co-authors of the calypso, responded that nowhere had they stated that this "man in a dhoti" was indeed Indian. By being deliberately vague, they hoped to infer that "the history of the two races are so mixed up that there is no reason for division among us" (Baboolal 1996). Despite the calypso's extreme popularity, it placed second in the Calypso Monarch competition. The winning composition was a calypso sung by the controversial CroCro, entitled "They Look For Dat", in which the artist belittles Afro-Trinidadian men (in particular) for failing to vote in the last election, thereby ensuring an "Indian" victory.
VII
Erasure of Multiracial Identity in Trinidad
Erasure of Multiracial Identity in Trinidad and
Guyana
Although it may seem, by the previous examples, that multiracial people suffer a hypervisibility due to either the public's prurient interest in their perceived inherited characteristics, or politicians' interest in their symbolic and/or intermediary usefulness, some multiracial people have a greater choice as to how to they will identify racially than others, and may exercise this choice if their mixed status is of a relative disadvantage to them rather than an advantage. Based on community affiliation, residency, phenotype and so on, these multiracial people will gravitate towards the group with which they are most familiar, but also where they feel most accepted. It is at this point that genealogical heritage becomes less important than ethnocultural affiliation. It follows, then, that in the censuses of Trinidad and Guyana, the category "Mixed" is highly ambiguous (as are all other categories), unless one is intent on studying self-identification of race as opposed to ancestral lineage. Why people choose to self-define as Mixed while others do not (or, perhaps, feel they can not) needs to be examined. Is "Mixed" identity relative to class, income, locale, phenotype? Does self-definition change over time? This would seem probable, as at certain historical moments the sociopolitical climate may affect racial identification. For example, during the Black Power movement years of the late 1960's/early 1970's, or under the Burnham regime in Guyana, it is probable that many multiracial people who could claim an African identity, but who previously may have declined to, now did so. Similarly, as interest rises in the construction of a competing, culturally distinct and homogenous Indian identity in both Trinidad and Guyana, (especially with the election of the PPP in Guyana in 1992, and the UNC coalition government in Trinidad & Tobago in 1995, both of whom are seen as "Indian" parties) sole Indian identification by mixed-Indian people is becoming more attractive.
What is evident is that the Mixed group has been steadily increasing with each census - up from 16.3% in 1980 to 18.4% in 1990 (Henry 87); and up from 10.3% in 1970 Guyana to 12.2 in 1991 (Bernard 11) (the lower percentage for Guyana could very well be attributable to the mass exodus of "Mixed" Guyanese during the 1970's and 1980's). These numbers could reflect an actual increase in multiracial people, or it could instead reflect a desire on the part of some Trinidadians and Guyanese to evade "pure" racial identity in an effort to break out of the racial polarization between African and Indian in each country, despite lack of political power and cohesive community associated with "Mixed" standing. Hypothetically, then, one might suggest that "Mixed" identity may be more attractive to middle and upper class Guyanese and Trinidadians who are more independently secure and less dependent on group affiliation for survival. However, there are still a great many people who, for a variety of reasons, describe themselves as "Mixed" because they feel it is their only option; as, for example, one women who told me, "It's the most truthful". Those multiracial people who feel they do not or can not belong to any other group (despite how they may be perceived by others), or who have experienced rejection from racially "pure" individuals, may opt to identify as "Mixed".
VIII
Conclusion
Historically, racial hierarchies in the Caribbean shaped a social structure which rewarded certain racial groups and disenfranchised others. Multiracial people have, at different times and for different reasons, been both rewarded and marginalized. The category of "mixed" itself as it now operates in Trinidad and Guyana has become increasingly unclear and ambiguous, but the official recognition of multiracial identity (despite its desired outcomes and implications by those in power) remains a particularly salient element of social organization in the Caribbean. Whether multiracial identity - in particular "dougla" identity - will be recognized and/or elevated as a desirable identity, remains to be seen.
Notes