This along with the asymmetry of power relationships within slavery, indentureship and colonialism imposed its patriarchal rule on Caribbean society and economies. Male domination was inscribed in the culture and political economy of the region. This male domination of the social relations within the Caribbean society laid the foundation for the institutionalsiation of gender inequality in the region. The reality of the situation in the Caribbean is that the public sphere remains largely but not exclusively the domain of men. So we see that expressions of masculinity and feminity in the Caribbean have men as superior and women as inferior. It is these expressions that are displayed in the culture of dancehall.
According to Linden Lewis, the work on masculinity in the Caribbean is underdeveloped but what emerges from the literature is a characterization of men and masculinity which views the Caribbean male as powerful, exceedingly promiscuous, derelict in his parental responsibilities, absent from the household and when present fails to take any responsibility for domestic chores. The Caribbean male also comes across in this literature as possessing a propensity for female battering and a demonstrated valorization of alcohol and drug consumption. While this might be true for some Caribbean men, it is obviously not true for all. The Caribbean male is also defined in terms of the distinction between hegemonic masculinity and other subordinated forms of masculinity. Hegemonic masculinity refers to the practices of a particular representation of men and manliness. It refers to an orientation which is heterosexual and decidedly homophobic. It prides itself on its capacity for sexual conquest and ridicules those men who define their sexuality in different terms. Hegemonic masculinity often embraces certain misogynist tendencies in which women are considered inferior and violence against them is encouraged and condoned. Due to this perception, women who are stallions and can “wuk”. Departure from this form of masculinity could result in a questioning of one’s manhood. As a result, hegemonic masculinity contains a high level of hostility directed toward homosexuality and to a lesser extent to men who perform oral sex. Homosexuality is seen as a phenomenon that undermines and fundamentally contradicts hegemonic masculinity and which brings much derision and wrath upon persons who engage in its practice. Men who perform oral sex are portrayed as unable to handle the “wuk” so he ejaculates prematurely. This characterization of the Caribbean male is located in several dancehall songs. Beenie Man’s Ole Dawg Like We likens men to dogs and as such, it is expected of them to have more than one woman:
Ole dawg like we
We haffi have dem inna two's an three
An everybody know wi wild already
Believe you me,
Wi navle string cut under pum pum tree
(Appendix # 1)
In another of his songs “Nuff Gal”, Beenie Man contends that it is necessary for men to have loads of women and be able to keep them satisfied:
So Man fi have nuff gal, an gal inna bundle
Gal From Rema, gal from Jungle
Nuff Gal an none a dem musn't grumble
All ghetto youth unno fi tek mi example
The power relations between men and women and the basic notions as to what constitutes “normal” (i.e. hetereosexual) sexuality are promoted in the dancehall coupled with many dancehall songs written by male DJs and singers aim violence toward women and homosexuals. Men are “shottas” or men who have adopted the gangster lifestyle, based on a conspicuous display of traditional masculine symbols of power (women, cars and money) and a willingness to use violence to achieve desired ends. Spragga Benz’s “Murdarah” gives a misogynist rendition of sexual intercourse with a female:
Hold har inna bed an she a call mi ...Murdarah
Run di body red and she a callmi...Murdara
Foot behind har head and she a call mi...Murdarah
Sink di half a h leg an she a bawl me ah...Murdarah
Well a she go climb pon di ladder an drop
Mi never gi a damn caa mi never waa stop
Mi tell har who i am mr mek woman gap …..
….Di guiness and di egg and di ocro and stout
Mek mi busy till she dizzie and she nearly pass out
Mr. Vegas joins his fellow performer and declares death to an unsuspecting female who he will be having sex with:
Undah mi Guiness and mi High Grade ting
Some body ago get mash up dis evening
Can’t wait fi hear all di door bell ring
Cause Jaclyn a go dead dis evening
Homosexuality is censured in the dancehall especially homosexuality among men. According to Spragga Benz’s “Wi Nuh Like” (1) and his “Wi Nuh Inna Dat” (2), there is a pure and justified hatred for homosexuals to the extent that they would choose to see prostitutes than homosexual men and women:
(1)
And wi nuh like
Funny man and sodomites
(2)
Badman from east and west and north and south get ready and guns out
J.F.L.A.G. dem ah brag and ah talk bout out ah di closet wey dem ah go walk out
But man nuh inna dhat shotta nuh inna dhat
Dem betta stay inside and hide cause if dem come out ah shot
Badman from South and Dunkirk tell dem it cyan work inna wi Island
Why man waa whine man infront ah I man that cyaa gwaan inna My land…
….We rather see ah whore than a sodomite or ah battycatcher
(We prefer to see a whore than a sodomite or a homosexual man)
(We are Negroes from Africa, we don’t kiss bottom)
According to Stolzoff, women are all but excluded from becoming entertainers, because it is not seen as suitable work for them. One can only remember how Lady saw was condemned for making a name for herself as female in the dancehall arena because of the use of her “raw” lyrics. Therefore, this gender ideology states that women should not challenge men in the public space. Rather, they should perform backup roles that accentuate their roles as objects of sexual desire instead of their power as musical creators, political and religious leaders, or sexual agents. It is argued that women have started to openly celebrate their sexuality in dancehall performances (primarily through fashion and dance) (See Appendix ), but this celebration is just a recreation of male dominance in that these fashions and dance moves only serve to give men pleasure and basically does nothing to empower the woman. Even if she claims to be receiving pleasure or power from her style of dress and the way she moves, that pleasure and power is more beneficial to the man who seeks her as a sexual object waiting for him to plunder and conquer.
Women have been discouraged from assuming the position of active sexual initiator in their role as singers and DJs but in the higher levels of the business, such as record production, artist management, and advertising, women, usually from a middleclass background, are somewhat better represented. However, this again is another form of patriarchy because women are not supposed to get involved in anything that may question their ladylike status or shatter society’s conceptions of woman as decent and nice while men are free to whatever they want without facing any censured statements from society. This is also ironic in the sense that the woman is at the higher level of management but the artiste under her administration is perpetuating her subordinate state in society through his lyrics. Therefore, in the end the man wins.
Several dancehall songs present women as sexual objects with their sexuality or sexual organ waiting for the challenge of a man. For instance in Spragga Benz’s “Pum Pum Conqueror”, a woman is defined by the fact that she has a vagina and regardless of its size, shape, elasticity or colour , his only purpose is to conquer it :
Pum Pum Conqueror, Pum Pum Conqueror, Pum Pum Conqueror
Pum Pum Conqueror
Pum pum fat pum pum slim pum pum bushy and pum pum trim
Pum pum black pum pum brown pum pum heavy than a hundred pound
Pum pum skinny and pum pum fat pum pum tight and pum pum slack
Pum pum rich and pum pum poor pum pum nuff and wi still want more
Sometimes women are completely dehumanized and objectified in some of these songs:
Peanut and steamfish mi must breed somethin
(Yuh tink mi ah drink my callaroots why fi nuttin?
Any girl want ah triplet press mi button
Weh mi seh yuh must do must breed somethin
Typically groups of men and women do not occupy the same space or dance with each other unless they came as a couple. Rather women tend to dance with their friends in groups, and men dance by themselves or with a few of their buddies. Songs tend to reinforce the division of space by gender. Men generally are seen as creative, sexual and violent agents and women as sexual objects whose sexuality is both desired and feared, pitting women against each other as rivals for male attention. Spragga Benz in his song “She Nuh Ready Yet” encourages a female to be proud because she does not display undesirable qualities as another female and additionally the girl is not fit to be compared to her:
A gal a hype up pon yu and she nuh ready yet
Tell a gyal fi hop off a yu because yu delicate
Yu a nuh di type mek nobody do weh shelly get
Reach fi di sky cause yu single but you celibate
Dancehalls are usually male dominated spaces. Most men enjoy the divas provocative dressing and their open embodiment of sexuality, as evidenced by the thousands of songs produced each year dedicated to these women. However, a lot of men have more than a measure of ambivalence about women taking center stage from them. At rural dances, men tend to exert more control over what women wear and how they perform at a session. In the crowd, especially in Kingston, a few dons, leaders of gangs, and dozens of rude boys are decked out in their “latest threads and gold chains” (See Appendix). Unlike the divas they tend to cover their bodies from neck to ankle in dancehall-styled suits. They embody a dancehall understanding of coolness, commanding respect from those whom they encounter.
Contrary to the representation of women as inferior or sexual objects within dancehall, Cooper contends that dancehall culture is the “social space” where “female power can be extravagantly displayed in the flashy jewellery, expensive clothes, elaborate hairstyles and rigidly attendant men that altogether represent substantial (female) wealth”. … women in dancehall, are free and active agents, who lay proper claim to the control of their own bodies. The gender politics of the dancehall that is often dismissed by outsiders as misogynist, can be read in a radically different way as a glorious celebration of full-bodied female sexuality; particularly the substantial body of the black working class woman whose body image is rarely validated in the middle-class Jamaican media where eurocentric norms of delicate female face and figure are privileged. The recurring references in the DJ’s lyrics to fleshy female body parts and oscillatory functions is not, I argue, a devaluation of female sexuality; it is a reclamation of active, adult female sexuality from the entrapping passivity of sexless Victorian virtue. Cooper may be right as evidenced by the lyrics of stalwart female DJ Lady Saw and newcomer Tanya Stephens. Lady Saw’s “Backshot Mi Love” could be viewed as a woman’s love of sex and her ability to dictate to a man her sexual desires and not the other way around and a move away from the image of woman needing to be caressed and treated tenderly:
Nuh want nuh belly rub a dub because a backshot mi love
Nuh want nuh kiss nuh want nuh hug because ah backshot mi love
Das why mi prefer inna tub because a backshot mi love
Mi nuh business if mi knee dem wan fi rub off pon di rug
Also in her song “Son of a Bitch”, Lady Saw challenges the view of the woman remaining faithful to her man regardless of his sexual indiscretions as she gives advice to her friend who caught her boyfriend with another woman:
Lady Saw:
It's simple, run di bwoy outta your life
Divorce him as your wife
Dis him cause yuh know him disrespect yuh to
Nuh mek him come back on the ends
Mash up all di benz, call da cops and tell dem seh him beating yuh
Son of a bitch don't deserve, who yuh try preserve?
Him always just mad cause him a look fi yuh
It nuh mek sense to pretend, him nah change again
A dog will be a dog till da very end
Another female artiste, Tanya Stephens challenges the view that men always leave their women sexually satisfied in her song “Draw Fi M Finger” where she expresses her need to have to masturbate to acquire an orgasm because her partner is not able to satisfy her:
When some bwoy dun wuk mi haffi draw fi mi finger
Caan tell yu how much the heat still a linger
bwoy gone a sleep lef mi hot like a ginger
(Some bwoy jus don worth a damn)
Well it aggo cause a mix-up mix-up if mi don get mi fix-up fix-up…
Lady Saw again opposes the view that only men can initiate sexual contact or the perception that only men know what to do during sexual intercourse in her song “Heist It Up”, in fact she’s the one that represents a threat to the man:
When mi fling it up from the left yaah
Fling it up from the right
We know how fi fling it up
Wi kow how fi fling it up, yeah-eaah
Wi know fi heist it up from the left
Heist it up from the right
Wi know how fi hiest it up
However, regardless of these two ladies performances, many critics like Norman Stolzoff, Cooper’s claim and brand dancehall as a medium that represents women as sexual objects and whatever power they gain in terms of their “full-bodied sexuality” is still to please men. Dancehall continues to perpetuate the image of man as dominant and controlling and women as their subjects. Also, these female performers could just be an example of women who even though they are challenging the “male gaze” in society is merely constructing their reality through the lens of the said “male gaze” where women are appreciated for their “ass-ets” and are not treated fairly. If these women want to effectively challenge their inherent subordinate role in society, it is necessary for them to develop a genuinely female gaze that represents them as human beings that can do any task just as well as a man can and not just reinterpret the male gaze. It is their responsibility to offer society a new definition of themselves that doesn’t limit their opportunities as a mere consequence of their sex.
It is important to note however that not all dancehall artistes take pleasure in degrading women. An emerging generation of young Jamaican artistes are subverting the dancehall scene and improving its prospects for international acceptance by taking the music back to its roots in reggae. This new breed is led by singers and songwriters such as Luciano, Sizzla, Capleton, Richie Stephens Warrior King and Tony Rebel. These artistes are on a mission to uplift women. In responding to the lewd nature of dancehall music, Tony Rebel said “I think it has to do with how they were socialized, from the days of the Bible, the concept is that sin came into being because of the woman and apart from that most artisites do it because they get a good response from it”. In his song, Virtuous Woman, Warrior King says “a good woman is essential to a man’s purpose and his missions, a good woman is a glory to her man, she will never take his power, she will just make him a better man”. He was further quoted in an article as saying “I love and honour the woman dem, nuh matter what race, class, creed or religion. I am sick and tired of men blaming the women for the wrongs of creation”. Capleton refers to the ‘Black Woman’ as the ‘Mother of the Earth’ and often warns “Never yuh dis Mother Earth, bwoy wise”. Whereas Caribbean men are often times perceived as derelict in their responsibility to their families, Sizzla in his song “Black Woman and Child” contradicts this perception:
“For you I really have so much love…
Dollar bills and coins will fade away,
They could never make I so proud”
Queen Ifrica, a female artiste managed by Tony Rebel says she is frustrated with those that continue to disrespect but she is more disappointed with those females that condone this behaviour. She says “Jamaica is a society where men consider themselves to be the head, so they feel they can do as they please with no consequences. And I think that women who condone it have low self-esteem, also if someone is to address the issue, these women would be the first one to bash you”. Brenda Hamilton, a female manager in the male dominated “business” responsible for Baby Cham, said she is not at all impressed with artistes that disrespect women in their lyrics. “The ones who do it are not respectful to their mothers, sisters or any other female family member as a matter (sic), if they had any respect at all, they would not think about doing it”. Doctor Dread of RAS Records in his response to dancehall songs emphatically declared “…we are now tired of being passive observers. It is time to declare that slackness is done!”. Again, Richie Stephens, in an interview with the Gleaner, said “Women to me are like flowers, they help to beautify the world. It’s very simple. A woman plays a very important role in a man’s life, when a woman is around there is so much beauty. It’s not hard to compliment the ladies.
Although these views contain some element of the traditional subordinate way in how women are represented, they tend to be kinder to women and recognize them as human beings with a voice, who are also valuable and not worth the degradation. This recognition can serve as a starting point for women to continue to break the conceptions of how they are normally viewed in society.
CONCLUSION
The derogatory lyrics about women in the dancehall seem to stem from those dancehall artistes trying to be hardcore. This leads dancehall to be seen as just another form wherein men try to protect their “manliness” and power in society. Through the denigration and degradation of women, DJs exert their power and emphasize the importance of males as dominant. Through the DJs hostility towards homosexuality, he is protecting what he values most, his sexuality. As much as society is tending towards greater equality between men and women, this is slow to becoming a reality in the dancehall. Women are still portrayed as sex objects worthy of slander and violence. This violence is even taken top the act of lovemaking where these DJs promote rough and “wicked” sex that will privilege the women with a near death experience. On the other hand, the fact that these women are scantily clad and openly display their sexuality could be a form of freedom or release for them. The degradation of women, however, does not go unchallenged as artistes who have become frustrated with the unequal treatment given to women, have risen up with counter lyrics that praise and honour women instead. Although these lyrics are sometimes a reflection women’s subordinate state, it is an open door through which Caribbean women can continue to remind society of their existence independent of an attachment to a men.
Dancehall is often seen as a culture whose expression doesn’t emit positive messages in society but one should not take it at face value. Rooted in dancehall is the expression of a subordinate or “forgotten” people that use dancehall lyrics as a medium for expressing their frustration at a system that they believe is built to preclude them. This is demonstrated in Bounti Killa’s rendition of “Poor People Fed Up”:
Poor people fed up
Cause the system sheg up
In this way, gender and class share a similar relationship. The persons at the lower class are discriminated against because of their social status and as such are not given fair and equal treatment in society. In terms of gender, because women are the “lesser” sex, they are not given fair and equal treatment either. Therefore, dancehall tends to reflect the mood of the disadvantaged. As far as expressions of masculinity and feminity in the dancehall are concerned, men are still dominant and women are inferior but this is changing. Women have entered the dancehall arena as performers but they need to emancipate themselves from the shackle of the male gazer and create an original female gaze. Other male artistes are now defending the rights of women as human being and worthy of respect. However, it will take a more concerted effort by our women to bring about change. This involves women who perform, women who are in administrative positions and women who listen to these songs. This is something that affects us and if we want to bring about change then we have to consistently use every medium available to us to enhance our status in society.