The Boboshanties are basically a sect of Rasatafari who live in communities in the Jamaican mountains. In this video, they are called "the most spiritually committed Rastafarians".
I saw many things in this glimpse into their community which corroborated what we've read so far in our book for class. The opening image to the video is a lion surrounded by the traditional Rastafari colors, and the houses on the hillside also have those colors. Their goals as stated by one of their followers are "Resurrection, Redemption, Repatriation" and "Organize, Centralize, Purify". One thing that was stated as a difference between the Boboshanties and other Rastafari is that the Boboshanties observe the Sabbath.
I thought it was interesting that when the shots were shown of writing or pictures depicting good vs. evil, the good was black and the evil was white. I saw this as a conscious effort to shake off the "black = evil" image that has been ingrained in people's minds. The contradiction to this image is probably seen as part of overcoming the ideology of Babylon.
I also thought it was suspicious that there was no mention of the holy purposes of ganja (marajuana). Much of our reading has stressed the importance of that herb to this movement and its people, and this film did not address it at all (though I think there was one shot of a man with a joint, but that's still not much for an issue this central to Rastafari).
Otherwise, I thought the symbols were consistent with what we've read and also with the music coming out of that faith.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I really liked the idea of putting black as good and white as evil. This may be going a bit off topic, but in American popular culture, it is ALWAYS the shadowy type that is the evil and the brighter light or fire-like type that is the good. I am often frustrated by this (being a lover of dark colors, snakes etc.) and it was really cool to see this unfortunate stereotype challenged.
ReplyDelete