Is Jam-AMERICAN our new NATIONALITY?

By: Kmar Henry
       CEO │ BIZcare Consultation & Accounting Firm

I remember back then as kids we would get excited about Easter Holidays not to eat bun and cheese, but to throw out our 'T Kites' just to see who could fly them the furthest. I remember boldly when we would come in from the marble grounds with our knee cups multicoloured, with the dirt of which we ignored happily due to the competitive and fun ambience we created while playing. I remember hearing the intrigued onlookers clapping and cheering as our female peers played Chinese skip singing sweetly with melodies that would provide absolute pleasure and laughter. I remember back then we would tear the petals from our parents’ flowers with intentions of using them as markers to throw in each box of our Hop Scotch game that created a fun nature for us to garner our competitiveness and athleticism. But now, when we walk our streets, what we see are kids grouping to play video games or just to show each other videos from YouTube with their favourite cartoon characters. No longer are our kids excited to enjoy the fresh mystics that sore from our trees or from that fishing pond that's always near to our communities.

But where did all this go? Where did our love for watching our kids dancing Jonkonnu or Dinki-Mini

in their colourful suits with faces of laughter and pride? Now we are forced to embrace a whole new culture of our youths getting overly eager to watch the latest episode of reality series or TV shows that only portrays and forms a gimmick of ourselves as human beings. Now, our kids find it hard to distinguish facts from fiction as popularity and social trends are so easily absorbed and adopted as the norm. Hence, celebrities now expose whatever they are instructed to further corrupt and curb the young minds in exchange for monetary rewards or fame. How do we now teach our kids to respect our cultural platforms created back then when they are so connected to all these cable networks shown on TV or their mobile devices which are plastered with social media apps that further exposes them to all other walks of life except their own. Parenting is now even harder due to the fact that our technological world forms such a detour for our kids to accept everything they see without the harder task of constantly reassuring their values by parents which lead to such strong and paralysing impact on their culture, being that everything is now just the NORM. So now our kids aren't interested in researching our heroes, much less hearing about them, knowing the significance of our holidays or even ask questions about the fundamentals of our background growing up. They are far more interested in celebrating Halloween, Memorial day or shopping on Black Friday and talking about celebrities that aren't even aware of their existence.

Sad to say, we can see the extent to which this is passed down directly yet uniquely from our government, as our economy is now overly dependent on that of the US. Our government's decisions are neatly gripped and tied to the direction of thinking 'first world' even though we are evidently a 'third world' nation. The foundations left in the early days of governance which provided so much gloom and growth are now ignored in order to facilitate foreign-built infrastructures from loans from our beloved IMF. Classism and colourism stand dominantly within our land and continues to encourage segregation amongst our people. Our morals and values are directly linked to what is taught on and by the Television teamed with social media, and not from the cultural dynamism of our roots. Now we are so quick to deny our culture, absorb & accept that foreign (twangy) accent and then knowingly change our I.G. locations to Jamaica/America.

Whilst we can all agree that we are now in the technological and information age that provides our millennials with ultimate access to data beyond the timely regime to us as human beings, hence this exposes them to other cultures of this world. Let us ensure that we guide them tightly with the roots and foundations laid by our fore parents and the importance behind our existence as Jamaican people and more so tribes from Africa. Let us ensure that we educate them of the significance of our celebrated holidays, landmarks and foods as we are seeing more and more how disconnected they are becoming with acknowledging the importance of these cultural practices. Dock inside their brains why our culture is so heavily embraced across this world, and why people from all walks of life fall in love with our contagious and infectious persona.

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Edited by: Reinard 'Prablem' Bryan
              Reggae/Dancehall Artiste │ BBA Marketing Major 

BIZcare Consultation & Accounting Firm is a consultation agency that operates within the small parish of Clarendon in the beautiful land of Jamaica. We are geared towards educating the minds of upcoming entrepreneurs of the important aspects that must be considered before starting their businesses. Hence why we operate under the slogan 'Your Business is OUR Priority' and tagline 'Helping Small Businesses & Individuals to better Organise their Business Functions.'

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