| Total population | |
|---|---|
| 20,872 Guyanese-born (2001 Census) 21,417 Guyanese-born (2011 Census) | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| London, Birmingham, Manchester | |
| Languages | |
| English (British English, Guyanese Creole), Akawaio, Hindi, Macushi, Wai-Wai, Arawakan, Cariban | |
| Religion | |
| Hinduism, Pentecostalism, Roman Catholic, Islam, Anglicanism | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Guyanese people, British African-Caribbean community, British Indo-Caribbean community, Black British, Black African, Multiracial, Indo-Caribbean, Indo-Guyanese, Amerindian, British Indians, British Chinese | |
* Please note that in 2001 only 40.4% of Afro-Caribbeans in the UK were actually born in the Caribbean, 59.6% were born elsewhere (of which 57.9% of the total ethnic groups population was born in the UK) [1] |
Citizens or residents of the United Kingdom whose origins lie in Guyana are a part of the country's British Caribbean community. Guyana was a former British colony, British Guiana, responsible for moving large numbers of Africans and Indians for labour in the sugar industry. British Guyanese are notable for their contributions to literature and music.
At the time of the 2001 UK Census there were 20,872 Guyanese-born people in the UK. [2] In 2001, Guyana was the sixth most common birthplace within the Americas for people in the UK and on a global scale ranked as the 51st most common birthplace of people resident in the UK. [2] Estimates published by the Office for National Statistics suggest that the Guyanese-born population of the UK was 24,000 in 2009. [3]
Guyanese immigrants have had an influence on recent literature in the UK, and significant numbers of writers and poets have made their footprint on current British culture and have become everyday household names. [4] It is, however, claimed that this trend of success in the field has not continued through to the second- and third-generation Guyanese Britons. [4] The late Beryl Gilroy was a significant figure within the Afro-Caribbean diaspora in the UK. This highly respected Guyanese-born novelist became the first black headteacher of any school in the country. [4] Another important literary figure of the Guyanese British community in the UK as a whole is John Agard, who is probably the most famous Black British poet and has been recognised with many awards. Pauline Melville's output of work has led to such awards as Guardian Fiction Prize, the Macmillan Silver Pen Award and the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for best first book. [4] Wilson Harris, who received the first ever Guyana Prize for Literature, has like many other Guyanese writers in the UK has been heavily influenced and inspired by the culture and history of his homeland. [4] Indo-Guyanese writer David Dabydeen, a UK resident, has interests that encompass the slave-trading history of Guyana as well as contemporary Caribbean culture in the UK. [5] Other writers, including Roy Heath and Michael Abbensetts, have helped create a greater knowledge of Guyanese culture in the UK. [4] Other UK-based writers of Guyanese origin include Fred D'Aguiar, Mike Phillips, Jan Shinebourne, Sharon Maas and Maggie Harris.[ citation needed ]
The pioneering black publishing company Bogle-L'Ouverture was founded in London in the late 1960s by Jessica Huntley and Eric Huntley from Guyana, their first publication being Walter Rodney's The Groundings with My Brothers (1969). [6]
The music of Guyana is a mix of African, Indian, European and native elements. It is similar to the music of various other Caribbean nations, where reggae, soca and calypso prove the most popular. [7] These forms of music have worked their way into British life by the Guyanese community of the UK and even by several famous Guyanese musicians who have migrated to the UK. The influence of Caribbean music in the United Kingdom is evident in many walks of life; the work of many contemporary artists is based in the reggae and calypso styles. Eddy Grant, a Guyanese-born immigrant to the UK, helped popularise such genres as reggae through his global hits such as "Electric Avenue" and "I Don't Wanna Dance". [8] Reggae has proven the most successful sub-category of Guyanese music (and Caribbean music in general) in the UK and Grant himself is noted as saying: "in my heart, I know that Soca and Ringbang have the same potential as reggae to achieve great popularity… but there has never been any proper commitment to marketing these artists and their music. We are not Sony, and the artists on board realise it will take time. It is an upliftment process." [8] Another Guyanese-born musician who developed a successful musical careers in Great Britain is Mad Professor (Neil Fraser). Fraser established Ariwa Records in the 1980s and became a central figure in the UK dub scene as a prolific producer of dub, reggae and an originator of the "Lovers Rock" genre.
As the Guyanese community in the UK has advanced into its second and third generations, evidence of traditional Guyanese elements in the music has begun to decrease. British-born individuals of Guyanese origin have in particular become more mainstream and modernised. The most recent success story of a British singer of Guyanese origin is Leona Lewis, the Londoner whose music is largely pop and R&B won series three of the talent contest The X Factor . [9] She has attained three number one hits in the UK and it the only solo British female in over two decades to have reached the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100. Another example of a successful British-Guyanese artists is Wretch 32, a rapper from Tottenham, London who has led on to release 4 UK top 10 singles, a number 1 single and an album which topped the UK R&B chart selling nearly 25,000 copies in its first week. Haring Traditional Guyanese acts and British acts influenced by such genres as reggae, soca and calypso can be found in festivals across the country, the most famous being the Notting Hill Carnival (the world's second largest street festival). [10]
Guyanese culture reflects the influence of African, Indian, Amerindian, British, Portuguese, Chinese, Creole, and Dutch cultures. Guyana is part of the mainland Caribbean region. Guyanese culture shares a continuum with the cultures of islands in the West Indies.
Walter Anthony Rodney was a Guyanese historian, political activist and academic. His notable works include How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, first published in 1972. Rodney was assassinated in Georgetown, Guyana, in 1980.
Black music is a sound created, produced, or inspired by black people, including African music traditions and African popular music as well as the music genres of the African diaspora, including some Caribbean music, Latin music, Brazilian music and African-American music. These genres include spiritual, gospel, rumba, blues, bomba, rock and roll, rock, jazz,Pop, salsa, R&B, samba, calypso, soca, soul, disco, kwaito,funk, ska, reggae, dub reggae, house, Detroit techno, amapiano, hip hop, pop, gqom, afrobeat, bluegrass, and others.
The music of Guyana encompasses a range of musical styles and genres that draw from various influences including: Indian, Latino-Hispanic, European, African, Chinese, and Amerindian music. Popular Guyanese performers include: Terry Gajraj, Eddy Grant, Dave Martins & the Tradewinds, Aubrey Cummings, Colle´ Kharis and Nicky Porter. Eddie Hooper The Guyana Music Festival has proven to be influential on the Guyana music scene.
Indo-Guyanese or Indian-Guyanese, are Guyanese nationals of Indian origin who trace their ancestry to India and the wider subcontinent. They are the descendants of indentured servants and settlers who migrated from India beginning in 1838, and continuing during the British Raj.
Guyanese literature covers works including novels, poetry, plays and others written by people born or strongly-affiliated with Guyana. Formerly British Guiana, British language and style has an enduring impact on the writings from Guyana, which are done in English language and utilizing Guyanese Creole. Emigration has contributed to a large body of work relating the Guyanese diaspora experience.
David Dabydeen FRSL is a Guyanese-born broadcaster, novelist, poet and academic. He was formerly Guyana's Ambassador to UNESCO from 1997 to 2010, and was the youngest Member of the UNESCO Executive Board (1993–1997), elected by the General Council of all Member States of UNESCO. He was appointed Guyana's Ambassador Plenipotentiary and Extraordinaire to China, from 2010 to 2015. He is one of the longest serving diplomats in the history of Guyana, most of his work done in a voluntary unpaid capacity.
British Afro-Caribbean people are an ethnic group in the United Kingdom. They are British citizens whose recent ancestors originate from the Caribbean, and further trace their ancestry back to Africa or they are nationals of the Caribbean who reside in the UK. There are some self-identified Afro-Caribbean people who are multi-racial. The most common and traditional use of the term African-Caribbean community is in reference to groups of residents continuing aspects of Caribbean culture, customs and traditions in the UK.
Andrew Salkey was a Jamaican novelist, poet, children's books writer and journalist of Jamaican and Panamanian origin.
The Southern Caribbean is a group of islands that neighbor mainland South America in the West Indies. Saint Lucia lies to the north of the region, Barbados in the east, Trinidad and Tobago at its southernmost point, and Aruba at the most westerly section.
Barbadian British people, Bajan Brits or British Barbadians, are citizens or residents of the United Kingdom whose ethnic origins lie fully or partially in the Caribbean island of Barbados. The UK is home to the second largest Barbadian-born migrant population out of all the OECD countries, with the 2001 Census recording 21,601 UK residents born on the Caribbean island, compared to the 53,785 Barbadian-born residents of the United States.
In Panama, dancehall reggae sung in Spanish language by artists of Latin American origin is known as Reggae en Español. It originated in the late 1980s in Panama. Reggae en Español goes by several names; in Panama, it is called "La Plena panameña".
For a history of Afro-Caribbean people in the UK, see British African Caribbean community.
Bogle-L'Ouverture Publications (BLP) is a radical London-based publishing company founded by Guyanese activists Jessica Huntley and Eric Huntley in 1969, when its first title, Walter Rodney's The Groundings With My Brothers, was published. Named in honour of two outstanding liberation fighters in Caribbean history, Toussaint L'Ouverture and Paul Bogle, the company began operating during a period in the UK when "books by Black authors or written with a sympathetic view of Black people's history and culture were rare in mainstream bookshops in the UK." Alongside New Beacon Books and Allison & Busby, BLP was one of the first black-led independent publishing companies established in the UK. BLP has been described as "a small, unorthodox, self-financing venture that brought a radical perspective to non-fiction, fiction, poetry and children's books."
John Lyons is a Trinidad-born poet, painter, illustrator, educator and curator. He has worked as a theatre designer, exhibition adviser and as a teacher both of visual art and creative writing. As an art critic, he has written essays for catalogues, notably for Denzil Forrester's major touring exhibition Dub Transition, for Jouvert Print Exhibition and Tony Phillips' Jazz and The Twentieth Century.
No Colour Bar: Black British Art in Action 1960–1990 was a major public art and archives exhibition, the first of its kind in the UK, held at the Guildhall Art Gallery, City of London, over a six-month period, with a future digital touring exhibition, and an associated programme of events. No Colour Bar took its impetus from the life work and archives of Jessica Huntley and Eric Huntley, Guyanese-born campaigners, political activists and publishers, who founded the publishing company Bogle-L'Ouverture Publications and the associated Walter Rodney Bookshop.
Keith Waithe is a Guyana-born musician, composer and teacher who has been based in the United Kingdom since 1977. He is best known as a flautist and founder of the Macusi Players – a world music jazz band whose name derives from the indigenous Guyanese Macushi people – and has been "acknowledged as the best flute player that Guyana has ever produced". His musical style explores a fusion of jazz, classical, African, Caribbean, Asian and Western influences, and he has also developed a technique he calls "vocal gymnastics", in which he uses the voice to reproduce percussive sounds. Music critic Kevin Le Gendre notes that Waithe "has single-mindedly pursued his own artistic agenda, developing a songbook that draws heavily on African-Caribbean and Asian folk traditions as well as jazz ingenuity in a manner not dissimilar to a large number of his forebears, of which Yusef Lateef is perhaps the most direct reference."
Jessica Elleisse Huntley was an Guyanese-British political reformer and prominent race equality campaigner. She was a publisher of black and Asian literature, and a women's and community rights activist. She is notable as the founder in 1969 of Bogle-L'Ouverture Publications in London.
Eddie Hooper was a singer, composer and musician from Fyrish, Guyana. In Guyana, he is best known for his early patriotic calypso songs, which remain classics to this day. Internationally, Hooper's later music has captured the most attention. This later music defies easy categorization; it has been defined variously as disco, soca, reggae and samba-jazz. He referred to this music as 'loopie'.
