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“Le’ Wi Play Mas!” MINI-EXHIBITION AT UWI MUSEUM, MONA

Published:Thursday | March 24, 2016 | 5:40 PM
File
FileUWI Carnival Road Parade, with the theme 'Birds of a Feather', held on the Ring Road, Mona campus, in 2011.

Did the UWI Carnival, which emerged at Mona in the mid-1950s, help fertilise the ground into which Jamaica Carnival was eventually planted?

The indirect connection is one of the elements explored in a cameo exhibition now on at the University of the West Indies (UWI) Museum, located in the UWI Regional headquarters building at Mona. The museum's semi-permanent exhibition on the Origins of the UWI continues alongside the new offering.

The exhibition went up on March 10 at the start of UWI Carnival 2016 and will come down in mid-April, after Jamaica Carnival. It sets out to dust off the roots of the annual celebration, which emerged out of a longing of southern Caribbean students at the early regional university to 'Play Mas' before the Lenten season, as they had done at home.

Dr Archie Hudson Phillips and UWI Professor Emeritus Woodville Marshall agree that it would have started in the early 1950s, with a steelpan element added by the middle to late 1950s.

Ole Mas with its individual impersonations and costumes that play on words came to the campus, as did the Pretty Mas, where halls of residence turned out costumed bands and carnival queens.

Curator Dr Suzanne Francis-Brown notes that the museum is seeking, in an ongoing way, to collect recollections and memorabilia relating to the early days of the university, including elements of the social history. "We want to create a database of information on many aspects of life within the university, including hall life, carnival, etc, as well as connections that have extended outward," she said.

In November 2015, the museum and the Social History Project of the Department of History and Archaeology kicked off an occasional series on UWI and the 1960s, focusing on UWI connections with international movements, people and events of the time.

n For more information please visit the UWI Museum Blog post: https://uwimuseum.wordpress.com/2016/03/11/uwi-carnival-le-wi-play-mas/. You may also contact: The UWI Museum via email: uwi.museum@uwimona.edu.jm or Tel: 977-6065.