Boyd 1

Freewrite 8/29: My Summer Vaca

This summer, I was unable to do very much vacationing, as it were. Because I spent the larger
part of my summer conducting research in New Orleans, when I was able to leisure, it was brief
and I carried with me the looming thoughts of my project. That said, the site of my research still
urged me to experience it in a way that I had not before. I was able to play the tourist: dining at
the citys celebrated eateries, visiting St. Louis Cemetery #1, and taking official walking tours of
the French Quarter. Of course, I was able to visit my family in Metarie and Lafayette, which was
a treat in itself. In all honesty, I am quite content in not having gone on a summer vacation.

9/5/17 -Freewrite

I once had to write a speech that would be read to a group of nearly one-hundred individuals at
a Vacation Bible School when I was a senior in high school. The group consisted of a mix of
adults, elderly people, and children. As such, I had to use language that would be
understandable to my entire audience and I had to raise ideas that were relevant to them.

9/7/17

I think that I would like to write about homophobia in Jamaican culture in relation to African-diasporic
interpellation. Specifically, I want to address how this homophobia surfaces in Jamaicas reggae/dancehall
lyrics and, thereby, fuels the islands anti-gay legislation. I am interested in exploring this issue through
Afrocentric presumptions about precolonial Africa and the dissemination of colonial epistemologies
through what sexuality scholars have called the heterosexist matrix. I hope to argue, through a
postcolonial lens, that the island should repeal its buggery law, should reform its understanding of
precolonial African family structures, and should articulate homophobia as a legacy of colonialism/
slavery (and not as an interpellated cultural signifier). I believe that this syncretic analysis, merging
lyrical and political critique, is missing from the discourse on Jamaicas anti-gay posturing. While it is
therefore relevant to gender/sexuality scholars and Caribbeanists, I hope this work will be liberating and
not esoteric. Put otherwise, I hope that it will unstop the voices of queer Jamaicans, en route to
condemning the buggery law, and will be cathartic to mea queer man who locates himself (historically,
genealogically, and discursively) on Southern and Caribbean landscapes.
Tentative Listing/Outlining:
Intro to the Issue
Caribbean cultures gender binaries
Murder music/Anti-gay brutality and crimes (e.g. recent murder of Dexter Pottinger)
The buggery law
Jamaican history of sexuality
Slavery and sexual puritanism (incl. the buggery law)
The birth of Jamaicas heterosexist matrix
Post-emancipation Jamaica and cultural mimicry (Homi Bhabha)
Contemporary Jamaican gender/sexuality
Jamaican independence and national codification (colonial epistemologies in the 20th-century
independence)
Rastafarianism and Afrocentric ideology (Christianity through Africa, and the African traditional/
precolonial family)
The heterosexist matrix in Rastafarian/Jamaican popular culture and tourism advertisements
Homophobic Reggae/Dancehall Lyrics
Buju Bantons empire atop brutalized queer bodies
Analysis of Boom Bye Bye, No Man, and Chi-Chi Man
Jamaican yardies and the queerantagonistic dance ritual
The Buggery Law in Dialogue
 Boyd 2

Prime Ministers anti-law contention (and rebuttal)

Backlash from Jamaican citizens
J-FLAG and social progressivism
Conclusion

9/12

One time I saw a water rat on my way to the Student Center, near Whipple Barn, one evening. At first I
thought I was a possum of some sort, but when it ran across the street, it was clearly an very portly rat.
Instead of continuing along my path to the STU, I walked back home. There have been a number of scary
stories over the course of my time at HU, including black widows.

9/19

The chapter NYPD Green story stood out to me for its use of Irish vernacular, particularly in the scene
where the young officer is faced with the criminals early in the reading. Because the text situates itself in
Dublin, I was expecting some use of language.

9/21

The comments I received on an essay were not helpful because they were unclear as to how and I why I
received the grade that I did. Instead of providing case-specific notes, the professor wrote that I needed to
strengthen my argument, even though the individual had not clarified where my argument was weak
during a meeting. I was left rather unconfident with my product.

9/26

I really admire E Patrick Johnson as a speaker and writer. He is never afraid to push the boundaries of
respectability in academic discourse, by cursing, using colloquial language, or even by throwing shade
as he calls it at other theorists. He has performed in different plays and is a performing folklorist. I hope
to be like him some day.
 Boyd 4

11/7

CLAIM: The anti-buggery laws in Jamaica should be lifted.

1. Anti-buggery laws in Jamaica are encoded by a colonialist epistemology of race, gender, and
sexuality, which undermine the countrys proclaimed independence from colonial rule.
2. Contrary to the heteronormative tenets of the Caribbeans own style of Afrocentrism, non-
binary people, non-heterosex relationships, and buggery all existed in some form in
precolonial Africa; therefore, non-heterosexual identities are not products of the West.
3. Statisticians have found that, if the buggery law were to be lifted, there would be no
deleterious effect on the national birth rate