Dear Editor,
Noted is Freddie Kissoon’s resolution to lay aside the dialogue we have been having about the CIOG, Bisram etc.
On the point of Muslims and race in Guyana we note that there was tension between a few brothers from the two different communities following the PPP win in 1992. We heard complaints from both sides of one of the smaller organisations. The accusations were of defensiveness by Blacks, triumphalism by Indians. It got to the point of creating a rift within this small group and a minority of Blacks, claiming this as the reason for setting up a separate praying area.
Also, I need to stress that the point of my recent reflections is not to portray the Muslim community here or elsewhere as faultless. We have all types of minds among us.
Perhaps the expected racism within the Indo-Guyanese Muslim community is muted because of its conflict with the fundamentals of the faith. But we need to note that, here, as in all other Caribbean territories, the segments of the Indian community that have been most open to cultural exchange have been the Hindu and Madras groups. Also, the large and growing amount of Douglas wherever Indian are found, are most often the product of alliances involving at least one Hindu, former Hindu or Madras descent partner. The cultural trajectory of the Hindu/Madras group in Guyana, Trinidad, Suriname the British colonies as well as in the French West Indian departments, is indeed one of the most interesting areas of study available to us.
I have found that resistance to exogamy is most marked within the groups. As young Muslims we all knew of cases of boys rejected for all kinds of non-Islamic reasons. The tensions and suicides in our communities are all mostly due to in-group problems.
The point was made that Arabs are racists also. One reader ought to beware of Prof Bernard Lewis’ tendentious work on the subject. Arabs, like everyone else, have been all things at some point or other of their history – the greatest race mixers and the greatest elitists among them. The first major migration of refugees from persecution in the prophet Muahammad’s lifetime, was done by a band or believers seeking the protection of the Negus of Ethiopia.
The last king of Morocco had a black mother. So did the last Prime Minister of Kuwait. In Saudi Arabia the head of the Security Minister, Prince Bandar Bin Sultan, is a figure who warrants reading about. Friend of George Bush and Colin Powell, he is one of the most influential figures in the Middle East. By American definitions, he is a black man born of a black mother.
Like many of the Arab elite, only the father is Arab. But in their culture that is what counts. The definition of Arab, in this patrilineal society, is an ethno-linguistic one. It is not a racial group in the genetic sense race is now considered. Arabs come in all races and colours. It is a language group that embraces people of all possible ‘racial’ compositions; we cannot use our distorted and eurocentric concepts of ‘race’ to judge another culture. There have been, or course, racial stereotyping and prejudice, in all directions, within the Arab group.
At this time, and for the past centuries, Arabs are a minority component of the Muslim world. Their fortunes vary according to economic and geo-political circumstances. They are not considered by most Muslims to be any longer a group of reference or ‘validating elite.’
Yours faithfully,
Abu Bakr
