Afro-Surinamese people

Last updated
Afro-Surinamese people
Regions with significant populations
Suriname (Paramaribo  · Coronie  · Brokopondo  · Marowijne  · Para)
Netherlands
Languages
Dutch, Sranan Tongo, Maroon languages
Religion
Christianity, Winti

Afro-Surinamese people are the inhabitants of Suriname of Sub-Saharan African ancestry. They are descended from enslaved Africans brought to work on sugar plantations. Many of them escaped the plantations and formed independent settlements together, becoming known as Maroons and Bushinengue. They maintained vestiges of African culture and language. They are split into two ethnic subgroups (Creoles and Maroons).

Contents

Origins

Most of the enslaved people imported to Suriname came from West Central Africa (circa 61,500 slaves, 27% of the total number), Gold Coast (Ghana) (circa 46,000, 21% of the total), Windward Coast (circa 45,000, 20%), and Bight of Benin (more than 32,000, 14% of the total). Thousands of enslaved people also arrived from Bight of Biafra (circa 11,000, 5.0% of the total) and Sierra Leone (circa 3,600, 1.6% of the total). [1] The total number of enslaved people was estimated at 220,000. [2]

The Akans from the central Ghana were, officially, the predominant ethnic group of slaves in Suriname. However, in practice, enslaved people from Loango, [3] purchased in Cabinda, Angola, [4] were the largest group of slaves in Suriname since 1670; they surpassed the number on the Gold Coast in almost all periods. Enslaved people including the Ewe (who live in southern Ghana, Togo and Benin), Igbo (from Nigeria), Yoruba (from Benin [5] ) and Kongo (who live in the Republic of Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Angola), all left their cultural footprints in Suriname.

History

The Dutch were involved in the slave trade during the early colonial years. They sought office space for their plantations. The space they received was when the British in the Treaty of Breda (1667) gave land on the northern coast of South America, ceded to them in exchange for New York. Suriname became a slave colony. Slaves were rapidly shipped from Africa to Suriname to work on coffee, cocoa, and sugar plantations for the Dutch and other Europeans. [6]

Afro-Surinamese scholar Gloria Wekker argues, for example, that working-class Afro-Surinamese women retained pre-colonial African cultural understandings of gender, sexuality, and spirituality. She, and other theorists, argue that African cultural retentions are found most often in Afro-diasporic communities that either had irregular contact with dominant groups of the host community or that shielded their cultural retentions from their colonizers. As Wekker observes, Surinamese slaves socialized, communicated, and communed with little white cultural, social, or linguistic interference. [7]

Maroons

Maroon group in 1930 Tropenmuseum Royal Tropical Institute Objectnumber 60006217 Portret van een groep Marrons op het.jpg
Maroon group in 1930

Escaped enslaved people in Suriname and French Guiana, known as Maroons or Bushinengues, fled to the interior and joined with indigenous peoples to create several independent tribes, among them the Saramaka, the Paramaka, the Ndyuka (Aukan), the Kwinti, the Aluku (Boni), the Matawai, [8] and the Brooskampers. [9] By 1740, the maroons had formed clans and felt strong enough to challenge the Dutch colonists, forcing them to sign peace treaties. Because of their long isolation in interior rainforests, they maintained more African culture than did ethnic Africans in the cities.

From 1972 to 1978, two American professors, S. Allen Counter and David L. Evans, made seven voyages upriver into the maroon areas. Both African Americans, they wanted to contact these communities and learn about the peoples, to see what African cultures they followed. [10]

By the 1980s, the maroons in Suriname had begun to fight for their land rights to protect territory which they had long occupied. [11] They won an important case in 2007 at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, which ruled they had rights to their traditional lands. [11]

Notable Afro-Surinamese people

Related Research Articles

Suriname Country in South America

Suriname or Surinam, officially known as the Republic of Suriname, is a country on the northeastern Atlantic coast of South America. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north, French Guiana to the east, Guyana to the west, and Brazil to the south. At just under 165,000 square kilometers, it is the smallest sovereign state in South America.

Demographics of Suriname Demographics of country

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The early history of Suriname dates from 3000 BCE when Native Americans first inhabited the area. The Dutch acquired Suriname from the English, and European settlement in any numbers dates from the 17th century, when it was a plantation colony utilizing slavery for sugar cultivation. With abolition in the late 19th century, planters sought labor from China, Madeira, India, and Indonesia, which was also colonized by the Dutch. Dutch is Suriname's official language. Owing to its diverse population, it has also developed a creole language, Sranan Tongo.

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Maroons African refugees who escaped from slavery in the Americas, and their descendants

Maroons are descendants of Africans in the Americas who formed settlements away from slavery. They often mixed with indigenous peoples, eventually evolving into separate creole cultures such as the Garifuna and the Mascogos.

Saramaka

The Saramaka, Saamaka or Saramacca are one of six Maroon peoples in the Republic of Suriname and one of the Maroon peoples in French Guiana. In 2007, the Saramaka won a ruling by the Inter-American Court for Human Rights supporting their land rights in Suriname for lands they have historically occupied, over national government claims. It was a landmark decision for indigenous peoples in the world. They have received compensation for damages and control this fund for their own development goals.

Saramaccan is a creole language spoken by about 58,000 ethnic African people near the Saramacca and the upper Suriname River, as well as in Paramaribo, capital of Suriname. The language also has 25,000 speakers in French Guiana and 8,000 in the Netherlands. It has three main dialects. The speakers are mostly descendants of fugitive slaves who were native to West and Central Africa; they form a group called Saamacca, also spelled Saramaka.

Aluku

The Aluku are a Bushinengue ethnic group living mainly on the riverbank in Maripasoula in southwest French Guiana. The group are sometimes called Boni, referring to the 18th-century leader, Bokilifu Boni.

Paramaccan people

The Paramaccan or Paramaka are a Maroon tribe living in the forested interior of Suriname, mainly in the Pamacca resort, and the western border area of French Guiana. The Paramaccan signed a peace treaty in 1872 granting the tribe autonomy.

The Kwinti are a Maroon people, descendants of runaway African slaves, living in the forested interior of Suriname on the bank of the Coppename River, and the eponymous term for their language, which has fewer than 300 speakers. Their language is an English-based creole with Dutch, Portuguese and other influences. It is similar to the languages spoken by the Aluku and Paramaccan Maroons, and split from Sranan Tongo in the middle 18th century. The Kwinti had a population of about 300 in 2014 and adhere to the Moravian Church.

Richard Price is an American anthropologist and historian, best known for his studies of the Caribbean and his experiments with writing ethnography.

Ndyuka people Ethnic group

The Ndyuka people or Aukan people (Okanisi), are one of six Maroon peoples in the Republic of Suriname and one of the Maroon peoples in French Guiana. The Aukan or Ndyuka speak the Ndyuka language. They are subdivided into the Opu, who live upstream of the Tapanahony River in the Tapanahony resort of southeastern Suriname, and the Bilo, who live downstream of that river in Marowijne District

Graman Quassi

Kwasimukamba, Quassi or Graman Quacy was a Surinamese slave, later freedman. He was known as healer, botanist and slave hunter in service of the Dutch colonists in Suriname. He is also known for having given his name to the plant genus Quassia.

Kwinti is an English-based creole of Suriname closely related to Ndyuka. The language has less than 300 speakers, and split from Plantation Creole which is nowadays known as Sranan Tongo in the middle 18th century. Code-switching with Sranan Tongo and Dutch was common among the younger generation in 1973, and about 70% of the tribe have moved to the urban areas. UNESCO considers the language endangered.

History of the Jews in Suriname

The history of the Jews in Suriname starts in 1639, as the English government allowed Spanish and Portuguese Jews from the Netherlands, Portugal and Italy to settle the region, coming to the old capital Torarica.

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Surinamese Maroons

Surinamese Maroons are the descendants of enslaved Africans that escaped from the plantations and settled in the inland of Suriname and French Guiana. The Surinamese Maroon culture is one of the best-preserved pieces of cultural heritage outside of Africa. Colonial warfare, land grabs, natural disasters and migration have marked Maroon history. In Suriname six Maroon groups -or tribes- can be distinguished from each other.

Matawai people

The Matawai are a tribe of Surinamese Maroons. The Matawai were originally part of the Saramaka, and signed a peace agreement with the Dutch colonists in 1762. The tribe split from the Saramaka, and in 1769, they were recognized as a separate tribe.

Bokilifu Boni was a freedom fighter and guerrilla leader in Suriname, when it was under Dutch colonial rule. Born in Cottica to an enslaved African mother who escaped from her Dutch master, he grew up with her among the Maroons in the forest. He was such a powerful leader that his followers were known as Boni's people after him. They built a fort in the lowlands and conducted raids against Dutch plantations along the coast. Under pressure from Dutch regular army and hundreds of freedmen, they went east across the river into French Guiana. Boni continued to conduct raids from there, but was ultimately killed in warfare.

The Brooskampers were a Maroon people, descendants of runaway African slaves, living in the forested interior of Suriname. The tribe is related to the Saramaka, and originated from Loango-Angola. The Brooskampers gained autonomy in 1863, but sold their land in 1917.

References

  1. ↑ Borges 2014, p. 41, : Based on embarkation with 10% undetermined, therefore all figures are at least ±10%
  2. ↑ Borges 2014, p. 41.
  3. ↑ Identidades en juego, identidades en guerra (in Spanish: Identities at stake, identities at war) - Page 49
  4. ↑ "Batey. Revista Cubana de Antropología Sociocultural (ISSN 2225-529X)". www.revista-batey.com. Retrieved 2019-04-29.
  5. ↑ Publico.es: Los genes narran la rebelión de los esclavos Archived December 14, 2010, at the Wayback Machine (in Spanish: Genes tell the Revolt of the slaves). Posted by Núñez Domínguez.
  6. ↑ "Bittersweet: Sugar, Slavery, and Science in Dutch Suriname".
  7. ↑ Wekker, Gloria. The Politics of Passion: Women’s Sexual Culture in the Afro-Surinamese Diaspora. Columbia University Press, 2006.
  8. ↑ Scholtens 1994, pp. 155–156.
  9. ↑ Scholtens 1994, p. 33.
  10. ↑ Vincent Harding, "A remarkable search for roots;" I Sought My Brother: An Afro-American Reunion, by S. Allen Counter and David L. Evans, Christian Science Monitor, 12 March 1982, accessed 2 October 2013
  11. 1 2 Case of the Saramaka People v. Suriname, Judgment of November 28, 2007, Inter-American Court of Human Rights (La Corte Interamericana de Derechos Humanos), accessed 21 May 2009

Bibliography

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