Our Goals: Preservation, Awareness, Accountability
"By definition, digital preservation does not necessarily guarantee ‘preservation’ of the actual digital artifact or object, but its informational value and how it is rendered and accessed” (Noonan, Dan “Digital Preservation Policy Framework: A Case Study”).
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While on the whole, “Caribbean Clovers: Tracing the Irish Influence in Montserrat, Jamaica, and Barbados” will ultimately celebrate cross-cultural intersections between the Irish and those of West African descent throughout the titular nations, the ultimate significance of “St. Patrick’s Day Masquerade…” will be to highlight the bravery of the 9 slaves who were hanged as a result of their attempted uprising on 17 March 1768. In addition, memorializing these unsung heroes will simultaneously draw attention to the reality that “there is a myth that the Irish, being oppressed by the British, were more humane, and [the hangings] expose that lie” (Fergus qtd. in “Celebrates”). As with the Humanities field in general, the notion of oppressed and marginalized cultures remaining disenfranchised due to the whitewashing of their history is an issue that can only be eradicated through uncovering truth.
As the Irish certainly have experienced our share of hardships, servitude, and subjugation at the hands of the English, Spanish, Portuguese, and other invaders, there is no comparison to be made to the black peoples torn from their native countries, placed on ships, and sent to distant lands to build economies via forced labor and various forms of abuse and torture. Thus, while in comparison to other groups of landowning whites, the Irish have seemingly been seen as less barbaric in our practices, more research into the history of Montserrat’s settlements reveals and clarifies what could have led to this misconception: in the area with the highest density population Irish, St. Patrick’s Constituency, there were no large plantation type estates, therefore leading to a low slave population. As such, “the slaves were evenly distributed among Irish households, each having from one to six, [and] whites and slaves lived in close proximity” (Fergus 337). Whereas life in St. Patrick’s Constituency was the exception not the rule, the widespread adoption of friendlier relations between slaves and their Irish owners as everyone’s reality was, as Fergus also notes “a situation which may have given rise to the traditional view that the Irish in Montserrat treated their slaves well” (Fergus 337), despite evidence indicating otherwise. In turn, this section of the “Caribbean Clovers…” project will hopefully be a step in the direction of reclamation for those nine slaves that were hanged, in addition to descendants of the West African slaves whose historical narrative was underscored and usurped by myths of non-hostile race relations between them and their white counterparts. It is my ultimate hope that “St. Patrick’s Day Masquerade: Unmasking the Irish Planters of Montserrat” will not only serve as a form of counterstory for those slaves whose history has been rewritten in a friendlier tone, but also as an acceptance and admission of accountability for those of us who’ve benefitted from our Irish whiteness through false narratives of being, as Fergus puts it, “more humane” (“Celebrates” 1).
Citations:
Fergus, Howard A. “Montserrat ‘Colony of Ireland’: The Myth and the Reality.” Studies: An
Irish Quarterly Review, vol. 70, no. 280, 1981, pp. 325-340.
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“Montserrat Celebrates Slave Revolt.” The New York Times, 17 Mar. 2000,
http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/slavery/montserrat.htm. Accessed 25 Nov. 2020.
Noonan, Dan. “Digital Preservation Policy Framework: A Case Study.” Educause Review, 28
Jul. 2014, https://er.educause.edu/articles/2014/7/digital-preservation-policy-framework-a-case-study. Accessed 25 Nov. 2020.