These are some thoughts I had on this topic

I wrote a piece about a year ago on the nature of Caribbean language as it is used and expressed especially through oral poetry, or scribal that makes use of the sound and rhythm of words in a way that is unique to Caribbean oral poetry.

Of course a large part of that history is that of the Rastafarian oral poet of the 60's and 70's. Coming out of the history and ongoing reality of racism, colonialism etc by those within and outside African community in both Jamaica and Trinidad, their own language and expression is vital to understanding the ideology and sensibility behind Caribbean Creole.

In this language there is a key, that may seem small, but a key to what a lot do not readily get. I hear so much about Rasta being about peace and love and unity etc. but for a long time it really had little to do with that in a certain context.

In trying to whitewash the African struggles that Rasta has always seen as its cornerstone, we forget the rage that forged it and miss a vital part of its history and genesis in the Caribbean. It is no mistake that it is called DREAD locks. Rasta was associated with a kind of fear, with a group that existed on the fringes of society, who were seen as invested with some mystical, fearsome, melancholy. There is bitterness, and a rage at the injustice, at the blindness of Babylon.

For so many of the urban youth in Jamaica and in Trinidad daily life was that unnamable rage, that silent scream of anguish; it was Rasta that gave them the words and the framework to understand the silent and invisible chains, and it was Rasta that gave them the means to articulate what they felt; and it was Rasta that was a recognizable symbol of Africanness- the blackness, the rage, the anger, the critic of society- the Rasta was the symbol of apartness, of separation.