Identity in an Ethnically Bifurcated State: Trinidad and Tobago

Abstract

Examines how identities are formed & expressed in multiethnic Trinidad & Tobago in terms of an analytic typology comprising four identities: ethnonational/ethnolocal, national, regional, & trans-Caribbean Trinidadian. Demonstrated is how these identities form & are engaged, revealing competing & supportive forces. It is found that the ethnolocal family & community bond provides the basis for the self. Three samples of national sites of interethnic conflict are presented: elections/political campaigns, employment in the public bureaucracy, & cultural politics. However, countervailing forces of unity exist in the shared school & public transportation system, language, sports, workplace, & laws. Yet balance is seen to lean toward the contentious forces. Regionally, some unifying themes are apparent, but they cannot redefine the range of shared Afro- & Indo-Trinidad meanings that underpin the respective ethnic communities. At the transnational level, antagonisms reproduced by the older generations are less apparent among the new metropolitan-born generations of the Trinidadian diaspora who are influenced by environmental factors & forces in the recasting of transnational identities. 2 Tables, 41 References. J. Zendejas