DESTINATIONS

The island of Barbados has a diverse cultural history that is influenced by the Caribbean, Britain and West Africa. Celebrated for its highly anticipated Barbados Food and Rum Festival and notable citizens such as Rihanna, who was appointed an official ambassador for culture and youth in 2018, Barbados is a well-known island in the southeastern Caribbean Sea. Although its people are free today and live n an independent parliamentary republic, this beautiful nation has a long history of slavery and colonial brutality.

Barbados is considered one of the most beautiful islands in the world.

Barbados was first visited by the British in 1625 and became one of the earliest English colonies. Before then, the island had been inhabited by Amerindian tribes and then for a few years by the Spanish and the Portuguese. Although it is known today for its people’s social amiability and enchanting landscape, the island was also the birthplace of Britain’s ruthless black slave society.

Soon after their arrival in the 17th century, the British established their first slave site in Barbados, branding it the most systemically violent and racially inhumane society of its time. It served as a popular slave-trade center where numerous enslaved people were transported from regions in Africa. By accelerating the rate of mass enslavement of Africans, it transformed the island’s economy and redefined its social dynamics.

This new economic system also required the establishment of strict and harsh rules to control the majority black enslaved population and maintain minority white economic and ethnic dominance. The Barbados Parliament thus passed the Barbados Slave Code, or “An Act for the better ordering and governing of Negroes,” in 1661. It was an especially brutal system that left enslaved people almost under the total will of their owners for nearly two centuries. Although slaves did revolt against this brutality from time to time, the revolts were brutally put down by the British. Fortunately, even though these slaves failed to gain their freedom at the time, the brutality of the colonial government was so repulsive that it may have helped fuel the abolitionist movement and end the evil institution once and for all. TOP: Traditional colorful houses abound in Barbados. BOTTOM: Promenade at the waterfront of Bridgetown, the capitol city.

With the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833, the United Kingdom finally eliminated the institution of slavery, but white planters still prevailed in their independent sugar plantation operations, abusing laborers and compensating them with unlivable wages. These sugar plantations made fortunes from the exploitation of a disposable workforce and secured Britain’s status as an imperial superpower.

Beginning in the 1930s, the majority black population slowly began to secure economic and political freedoms. In 1937, the Barbados Riots broke out after the deportation of Clement Payne, a black Barbadian leader who championed the formation of trade unions. These riots were pivotal in the fight for equality and contributed to the reforms that led to the island’s independence in 1966 when the British parliament passed the Barbados Independence Act.

Statue of Bussa, who led the largest slave revolt in Barbadian history

Photo credit: maskconsortium.com

Independence and Its Aftermath

While Barbados’ economy was historically dependent on sugarcane cultivation, especially during slavery, its economy has recently evolved and diversified into a light industry and tourism economy. Today, its flourishing tourism industry has become the driving force of its economy. Recognized as an international destination for tourism, it prides itself as one of the top tourist destinations in the world. With English as the nation’s official language, it is easy for visitors to immerse themselves in the island’s culture.

In addition to tourism, the country provides offshore finance and information services, which are an important source of income. As a result, Barbados is one of the wealthiest and most developed countries in the eastern Caribbean. Unfortunately, Barbados’ economy also has an institutional impact on racial inequality. As an offshore financial center, the island contributes to the continuous disparity in Western

The planned slavery museum

Rendering by Adjaye Associates

Europe and the United States by enabling wealthy foreigners to shift income and wealth into a low-tax jurisdiction.

Barbados also experiences underlying issues of wide and widening inequalities of income, wealth and power within. Although the population is predominantly black with 92.4 percent of its citizens being of African descent, 3.1 percent of its people are mixed race, 2.7 percent are white, and 1.3 percent are South Asian. Since slavery was abolished and independence was gained from Britain, the black majority has made economic and political progress, yet Barbados continues to struggle with a long history of deep-rooted racial disparities.

Trading the Queen for a Parliamentary Republic

In 2021, Barbados officially removed a final vestige of its colonial past by removing Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom as its head of state and replacing her with a Barbadian. This decision made

TOP: Sugarcane harvesting, the key industry Photo credit: loopnews.com BOTTOM: Kensington Oval, “Mecca of Cricket,” the national sport TOP: Rihanna, Barbados’ most famous homegirl

Photo credit: SIGMA, Wikimedia Commons BOTTOM: Cou-cou, a popular dish

Photo credit: blog.thecrane.com

Barbados the first country to remove the Queen since 1992. By putting a formal end to the country’s 400-year relationship with the British monarchy and establishing itself as a parliamentary republic, Barbados displayed a sign of confidence and nationalism as it severed ties to the evils of its colonial history.

Over the years, powerful women such as Sandra Mason, the new republic’s first president, and Mia Amor Mottley, its first prime minister, have led the country as it reclaimed civil rights for its citizens.

Prime Minister Mottley has lived a career of many firsts for the country. She is notable for being the first female leader of the Barbados Labour Party and the Opposition, the first female attorney general, and the youngest ever admitted to the Queen’s Counsel in Barbados. In 1994, at age 29, she became one of the youngest Barbadians assigned a ministerial portfolio. In 2018, she became the eighth prime minister of Barbados and the first woman to hold this title.

It was Prime Minister Mottley who nominated Sandra Mason to be Barbados’ first president after she delivered a powerful speech at the UN General Assembly regarding climate change. Mason said that she doesn’t see gender as an angle or handicap. She chooses instead to focus on the issues concerning the island. Once the British monarchy relinquished its hold on the country, its citizens fought to replace the queen with a Bajan leader. Mason was elected the nation’s first president by the country’s two houses of Parliament after securing twothirds of the votes, and she took office on November 30, 2021, the 55th anniversary of Barbados’ Independence. With a Barbadian as the Barbados head of state, the Barbadian people are conveying to the rest of the world confidence in their identity as a country and what they are capable of.

President Mason is more than capable of guiding the country through this political shift. In 1975, she became the first Bajan woman admitted to the Barbados bar, and in 2008, she became the first woman to serve on the

Barbados Court of Appeals. In 2014, she became the first Barbadian to be appointed as a member of the Commonwealth Secretariat Arbitral Tribunal.

As the nation celebrated its transition to become an independent republic, the island also declared another woman—the singer and makeup mogul Rihanna— a national hero.

Robyn Rihanna Fenty was born and raised in the nation’s capital of Bridgetown and unapologetically represents her Barbados roots and culture. The island’s star speaks confidently with her Bajan accent, a variation of English spoken by Bajan locals, and remains connected to her Caribbean heritage in her music and lifestyle.

The Past Must Not Be Forgotten

To commemorate the nation’s revolutionary transition and to mark its first anniversary of becoming an independent republic, Barbados also began plans to build a transatlantic slavery museum. The Barbados Heritage District will establish the largest collection of British slave records outside of the United Kingdom to recount the historic cultural impact of slavery on Barbados. The museum will be located next to the Newton Enslaved Burial Ground Memorial on the site of a former sugar plantation where the remains of 570 West African slaves were uncovered. This memorial will transform this location into a place of remembrance by spotlighting the tragedies of bondage.

This remarkable nation has demonstrated great resilience in the face of terrible adversity. Now, with two prominent Barbadian women at the helm of this new republic, it enters a new era of global economic development and race relations.

TOP LEFT: Queen Elizabeth II ceded British control in 2021.

Photo credit: Steve Parsons – WPA Pool/Getty Images

TOP RIGHT: Barbados’ president, Sandra Mason, one of two black women running a single government on the planet. Photo credit: loopnews.com BOTTOM: Mia Amor Mottley, Barbados’ Prime Minister