Jamaican-raised scholar Catherine John-Camara to publish book on Afroindigenization
The University of Rhode Island Africana Studies chair, whose parents were Jamaican and Vincentian, explores the cultural power of the Black diaspora in a new Duke University Press title.
RHODE ISLAND, United States. Catherine A. John-Camara, professor and chair of Africana Studies at the University of Rhode Island (URI), will publish her new book, "Afroindigenization: A Theory of Grassroots Cultural Practice", on August 25 through Duke University Press.
She said the book centres on culture, spirituality and the African diaspora, exploring Black diaspora contributions and cultural resilience. It seeks to answer one question: "Where does the Indigenous power of enslaved Africans come from?"
A Caribbean childhood
John-Camara grew up in Jamaica in the 1970s and early 1980s. Her mother was from Clarendon, Jamaica, and her father from St Vincent and the Grenadines.
She recalled that society at the time held up people with lighter skin and curly or straight hair as more beautiful, through magazines, advertising and imported American television and film. At home, the picture was different.
"My parents were Black people who were highly educated for their generation. They both had master's degrees and came of age during the era of Caribbean independence," she said. "My father's hero was Muhammad Ali. My mother wore her hair in an afro throughout the 1970's."
Because her father, Fitz John, was a Caribbean Methodist minister who moved often, she has lived in four countries and 15 cities and attended 11 schools.
Career and influences
She taught at the University of Oklahoma for 23 years before joining URI in 2021, when the unit had just become a department. Initially its only full-time faculty member, she helped it grow to four full-time staff and three shared with other units within four years.
She credits her maternal grandfather, Cyril George Bailey, her father, whom she called the hero of the family, and her mother, a scientist and teacher, as her greatest influences. She hopes to write about her grandfather next.
Writing while building a department was difficult, she said, requiring weekly online writing groups and weekend retreats. "What motivates me most is teaching," she said.
Describing the book as "the highpoint of my life's work", she said she hoped readers, including younger generations in Rhode Island, Jamaica and the wider Caribbean, would look at their ancestors' past with new eyes.
"You are not nothing!!! You have more power than you know." Catherine John-Camara
The book is available to pre-order from Duke University Press.
