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Transcript of an interview with Desrey Fox
LOCATION: Georgetown, Guyana
DATE: 1989
Well,
I came from the upper Mazarin district; from a little village called Waramadong
that's populated with four hundred and twenty Akawayos. Basically, it's a
traditional Amerindian society and the political structure, the organisation is
like having a Chief and a series of council members which would man parts of
the little village and would give advice as to what should happen within the
village.
Actually
for educational purposes in the first place because I was selected to do a
period of two years training at the Georgetown nursing school. I nursed at
Georgetown for three and a half years and decided to quit because I passed
through a bit of hardships there trying to adapt myself in terms of the rules
and regulations of the whole idea of coming to work on time and trying to abide
by the rules and so on and I thought there was also a bit of discrimination, so
I became disinterested in nursing and left and I got married after that.
And
after that, I realised to myself personally, I had failed my people. I should
have returned to work for them and that I didn't do and because of that as soon
as an advertisement came out saying that they wanted researchers particularly
archive researchers at the University of Guyana, I applied and immediately I
was accepted after just a short interview and this was on the 1st of March,
1977 and since then, I am still at the University of Guyana, but in 1984, I
started to do some studies and I did a first degree in Sociology and I
graduated two years ago.
As
I said, I realised that I had failed them and while I was studying at the
university too and maybe prior to that, I realised that my culture was
different to the culture on the course and that sort of urged me to look inside
of me because growing up in an Amerindian community, I took my culture for
granted and I didn't see eating and waking up and walking and saying things in
a different way was different from anybody else and I realised that I was
different and from then on, I started to whip up consciousness within myself
and said that "there is an Amerindian culture. I ought to be proud about
it and so on and because of this, I was sort of urged to work again hard and compensate
my people for the loss they had experienced through me just leaving the nursing
profession and deciding to go on my own and that being so, I was very much
interested.
I
got into research into the languages and I started off doing research into the
Akawi and the Aracuna languages(??) Just about three months after, we produced
a small dictionary with a linguistic introduction as well as the historical
introduction the Akawayo peoples.
That
to myself was an achievement and I had felt that I had done something at that
point; some kind of leeway to sort of tell my people that I had not forgotten
them; that I was going to work of them.
Basically
I feel richer with the experience because at first I thought that everybody was
just discriminating against me, but I realised that people are different in
terms of culture and that culture also changes so by adapting myself on the
course, I was able to merge what I learned on the course with my own Amerindian
experience. Having whipped up my consciousness, I now start to utilise from
both cultures, what was important for me and if only because of that, I feel
that there is a way where both cultures could compromise and that I could still
look back into my Amerindian culture and still feel proud about it and be
interested in my Amerindian people.
I
think sometimes, we tend to see it a little wrong, I mean my own people too.
After they have been introduced to this modern, contemporary education on the
course and the whole kind of life on the course, they tend to go aside with the
dominant culture and leave their own culture alone and try to develop that way,
but then you realise that you are neither here nor there.
The
dominant culture has not integrated you, does not really want you either.
You're a misfit also in your traditional culture so what I feel Amerindians
should do is the whole idea of making use of both sides of the culture and
making yourself richer and whipping up consciousness. Consciousness is very
important I feel for future Amerindian development.
The
whole idea of militancy; the whole idea of having an idea of what you want for
the future in terms of development and progress. I think that it's very
important as far as I see, especially in the light of the new kind of spirit
that is now brewing within the Caribbean and in the South and North American
people. We as indigenous peoples, should get together and do something about
our plight because the whole Indian question is a problematic question in the
South.
O.K.
I think we should get ourselves organised and get in touch with organisations
like the Caribbean Organisation Of Indigenous Peoples, World Council Of
Indigenous Peoples and some other brother organisations like the Mezquito
organisation in Nicaragua and really get ourselves together and talk about what
the Amerindian people want in the future, what they want for their progress.
For
example, we finds links in Belize - the Garifuna of Belize. I was just there a
couple of weeks ago. I thought that I was there before; the familiarity was
there and every time I met the Garifunas, they were just accepting me as though
I was there before. One particular experience strikes me here when I went to
visit the spiritual church and the priestess, when she shook my hand said "O.K.,
we've been waiting for you a long time and now you're here and I felt as though
there was a sort of vibration
through
my entire body. I felt like I was there too. I was so familiar and that the
people who were there were recognising me as a symbol of their ancestry and
roots.
I
think there is a lack of education and learning about each other and the
learning should be reciprocal. Coastal people should make an effort to know
about the Amerindians, as well as the Amerindians should know about the Coastal
people. In that way, both sides can sort of respect each other and come up with
some kind of agreeable terms.
Yes,
I think we should. I think both sides should know that because we know your
folk songs, your choruses, your religious songs whatever and you have not done
that in terms of the Amerindians. Maybe it's also the Amerindians' fault. We
tend to be very mystical about ourselves too and we are very conservative and
secretive about what we do.
So
because of that we have not talked about who we are, basically to the Guyanese
society. What overwhelmed me at the conferences that I have attended is the
whole idea of meeting other Amerindians and more importantly not just ordinary
Amerindians. I never knew they had Black Caribs for example in St. Vincent. When
I heard the term "Black Caribs", I wanted to know what they were
talking about and the Garifunas in Belize are also Black Caribs. The St.
Vincent Black Caribs also were very interesting.
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