Roots home coming festival

Celebration and bridging of cultural divide

A people without the knowledge of their cultural background are like a tree without root. Such a tree in fact would hardly grow to maturity as it will soon be pulled down by even the mildest of winds. In the same light, a people ill-informed or scarcely informed about their cultural heritage will be under eternal susceptibility to identity crisis, and the implication of such a situation is that such a people remain constantly at loggerhead with one another and the very essence of their existence.

And in this charged generation of incessant cultural discontent, failure to know your culture leaves one highly vulnerable to moral corruption and external exploitation, which is sure of leading them to oblivion.  

In history, the people that might be greatest at risk of this are the people of the black race, especially the descendants of the slave trade which saw hundreds of thousands of Africans shipped to the Americas and the Caribbean to work on plantations. Yet very few black Americans among those that are knowledgeable in it seem to appreciate this part of their history. But this very same history has so far proven that we will never be short of people that will steer the course for the revival and preservation of these cultures that has repeatedly fallen victims of the slavery-era Whitman’s ruthless.

Sometime in the early 1950s, Alex Hailey, a descendant of the legendary Kunta Kinteh, after a unique self-identity search, found his way in the Smiling Coast of The Gambia. His mission was to explore what he vehemently believed was his ancestral origin. The book, Roots, which ensued from that discovery of a monumental significance, has since aroused interest in hundreds of thousands of people in the Diaspora; be they Americans, Britons, Caribbeans or what have you.

But until 1996, when the Gambia government under President Jammeh, himself a personality with an obsessive taste for culture, took a renewed momentum in the crusade of preserving the country’s heritage, The Gambia would not be guaranteed of a convincing cultural base to point at. His establishment of the annual and then biennial roots festival, which would portray the real identity of our culture, was one of the finest decisions taken in safeguard of our past, a past that is genuinely rich in substance and basis.

This festival offers the opportunity not only for Gambians who are ignorant of their past to get a glimpse of it, but, most importantly, it serves the unique purpose of reconnecting lost generations kept apart by distance. For those in the Diaspora, it has become a spiritual journey. Like the Gambian leader said:

“The Gambia shares affinity with those who by a tragedy of history now find themselves in the West, the ‘ Diaspora’ par excellence, who yearn for a physical and spiritual return to the ‘ Motherland’!

“For such people”, the President went on, “it is more than a festival as it provides the prospect for cultural emancipation and spritual fulfilment.”  

What has become a biennial celebration offers a unique potential in bridging the cultural divide that set a people away from their destiny. One could sense this in the feelings of the participating visitors of this year’s event which kicked off last Saturday, May 31, 2008. As one of the visitors put it, the home-coming offered her the opportunity to "renew myself with my culture."

In The Gambia, we have seen the power of celebrating culture, in terms of its potential to unify and harmonize a people. So, this biennial event is one that should be maintained with utmost jealousy as it has a great bearing on generations of Gambians to come.

A people without the knowledge of their cultural background are like a tree without root. Such a tree in fact would hardly grow to maturity as it will soon be pulled down by even the mildest of winds. In the same light, a people ill-informed or scarcely informed about their cultural heritage will be under eternal susceptibility to identity crisis, and the implication of such a situation is that such a people remain constantly at loggerhead with one another and the very essence of their existence.

And in this charged generation of incessant cultural discontent, failure to know your culture leaves one highly vulnerable to moral corruption and external exploitation, which is sure of leading them to oblivion.  

In history, the people that might be greatest at risk of this are the people of the black race, especially the descendants of the slave trade which saw hundreds of thousands of Africans shipped to the Americas and the Caribbean to work on plantations. Yet very few black Americans among those that are knowledgeable in it seem to appreciate this part of their history. But this very same history has so far proven that we will never be short of people that will steer the course for the revival and preservation of these cultures that has repeatedly fallen victims of the slavery-era Whitman’s ruthless.

Sometime in the early 1950s, Alex Hailey, a descendant of the legendary Kunta Kinteh, after a unique self-identity search, found his way in the Smiling Coast of The Gambia. His mission was to explore what he vehemently believed was his ancestral origin. The book, Roots, which ensued from that discovery of a monumental significance, has since aroused interest in hundreds of thousands of people in the Diaspora; be they Americans, Britons, Caribbeans or what have you.

But until 1996, when the Gambia government under President Jammeh, himself a personality with an obsessive taste for culture, took a renewed momentum in the crusade of preserving the country’s heritage, The Gambia would not be guaranteed of a convincing cultural base to point at. His establishment of the annual and then biennial roots festival, which would portray the real identity of our culture, was one of the finest decisions taken in safeguard of our past, a past that is genuinely rich in substance and basis.

This festival offers the opportunity not only for Gambians who are ignorant of their past to get a glimpse of it, but, most importantly, it serves the unique purpose of reconnecting lost generations kept apart by distance. For those in the Diaspora, it has become a spiritual journey. Like the Gambian leader said:

“The Gambia shares affinity with those who by a tragedy of history now find themselves in the West, the ‘ Diaspora’ par excellence, who yearn for a physical and spiritual return to the ‘ Motherland’!

“For such people”, the President went on, “it is more than a festival as it provides the prospect for cultural emancipation and spritual fulfilment.”  

What has become a biennial celebration offers a unique potential in bridging the cultural divide that set a people away from their destiny. One could sense this in the feelings of the participating visitors of this year’s event which kicked off last Saturday, May 31, 2008. As one of the visitors put it, the home-coming offered her the opportunity to "renew myself with my culture."

In The Gambia, we have seen the power of celebrating culture, in terms of its potential to unify and harmonize a people. So, this biennial event is one that should be maintained with utmost jealousy as it has a great bearing on generations of Gambians to come.

A people without the knowledge of their cultural background are like a tree without root. Such a tree in fact would hardly grow to maturity as it will soon be pulled down by even the mildest of winds. In the same light, a people ill-informed or scarcely informed about their cultural heritage will be under eternal susceptibility to identity crisis, and the implication of such a situation is that such a people remain constantly at loggerhead with one another and the very essence of their existence.

And in this charged generation of incessant cultural discontent, failure to know your culture leaves one highly vulnerable to moral corruption and external exploitation, which is sure of leading them to oblivion.  

In history, the people that might be greatest at risk of this are the people of the black race, especially the descendants of the slave trade which saw hundreds of thousands of Africans shipped to the Americas and the Caribbean to work on plantations. Yet very few black Americans among those that are knowledgeable in it seem to appreciate this part of their history. But this very same history has so far proven that we will never be short of people that will steer the course for the revival and preservation of these cultures that has repeatedly fallen victims of the slavery-era Whitman’s ruthless.

Sometime in the early 1950s, Alex Hailey, a descendant of the legendary Kunta Kinteh, after a unique self-identity search, found his way in the Smiling Coast of The Gambia. His mission was to explore what he vehemently believed was his ancestral origin. The book, Roots, which ensued from that discovery of a monumental significance, has since aroused interest in hundreds of thousands of people in the Diaspora; be they Americans, Britons, Caribbeans or what have you.

But until 1996, when the Gambia government under President Jammeh, himself a personality with an obsessive taste for culture, took a renewed momentum in the crusade of preserving the country’s heritage, The Gambia would not be guaranteed of a convincing cultural base to point at. His establishment of the annual and then biennial roots festival, which would portray the real identity of our culture, was one of the finest decisions taken in safeguard of our past, a past that is genuinely rich in substance and basis.

This festival offers the opportunity not only for Gambians who are ignorant of their past to get a glimpse of it, but, most importantly, it serves the unique purpose of reconnecting lost generations kept apart by distance. For those in the Diaspora, it has become a spiritual journey. Like the Gambian leader said:

“The Gambia shares affinity with those who by a tragedy of history now find themselves in the West, the ‘ Diaspora’ par excellence, who yearn for a physical and spiritual return to the ‘ Motherland’!

“For such people”, the President went on, “it is more than a festival as it provides the prospect for cultural emancipation and spritual fulfilment.”  

What has become a biennial celebration offers a unique potential in bridging the cultural divide that set a people away from their destiny. One could sense this in the feelings of the participating visitors of this year’s event which kicked off last Saturday, May 31, 2008. As one of the visitors put it, the home-coming offered her the opportunity to "renew myself with my culture."

In The Gambia, we have seen the power of celebrating culture, in terms of its potential to unify and harmonize a people. So, this biennial event is one that should be maintained with utmost jealousy as it has a great bearing on generations of Gambians to come.