Making the Chief Servant Mad: Disability, the Regulation of Afro-Caribbean Religions, and the Political Prophesy of Tubal Uriah Butler

Facing unrest after a global economic downturn, the British government in Trinidad arrested the labor organizer Tubal Uriah "Buzz" Butler in 1937. The colonial government charged him with sedition, claiming that his actions had led to revolts. While evidence in the king's court focuse...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of Africana religions
Main Author: Rocklin, Alexander (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: The Pennsylvania State University Press 2021
In: Journal of Africana religions
Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains:B Butler, Uriah 1897-1977 / Trinidad / Colonial power / Discourse / Racism / Religion / Handicap
RelBib Classification:AD Sociology of religion; religious policy
AE Psychology of religion
AG Religious life; material religion
AX Inter-religious relations
BS Traditional African religions
FD Contextual theology
KBR Latin America
NCC Social ethics
TK Recent history
XA Law
Further subjects:B Disability
B Spiritual Baptist Faith
B Colonialism
B Caribbean
B Secularism
Online Access: Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
Description
Summary:Facing unrest after a global economic downturn, the British government in Trinidad arrested the labor organizer Tubal Uriah "Buzz" Butler in 1937. The colonial government charged him with sedition, claiming that his actions had led to revolts. While evidence in the king's court focused on Butler's supposedly seditious rhetoric, in the court of elite public opinion and in popular and official speech and writing Butler was repeatedly portrayed as a disabled madman, an unreasonable religious fanatic. Colonial regimes and their dependents in the Caribbean have used a racializing discourse of mental and physical disability purportedly caused by African superstition or fanaticism to contain the social formation of the colonized, including uprisings but also general community-building outside of colonial control. In this article, I use the history of such regulation to better understand the government crackdown on Butler's activism as well as his critique of colonialism and British sovereignty.
ISSN:2165-5413
Contains:Enthalten in: Journal of Africana religions