Being Maroon: Music, Memory and Trauma in Jamaican Maroon Identities

This dissertation explores how music and musical performances are used to mediate trauma and memory, and the influence that these mediations have on identities at individual and community levels. The CGII grant will support ethnographic field research in Jamaica, where I will study musical performances as historical and contemporary texts. My community of focus are Jamaican Maroons, descendants of Jamaica's inhabitants who fought against the British and won their freedom. By conducting interviews, participating in performances, and documenting personal observation of daily interactions, I will explore the ways that Maroons use musical performances to define themselves in the 21st century.