E.A.D.U.M.C.ETHIO-AFRICA DIASPORA UNION MILLENNIUM COUNCIL.
RASTAFARI ROOTS OF REGGAE
The Ethio-Africa Diaspora Union Millennium Council (‘Millennium Council’) was established in 2007 by the major Rastafari Mansions and Organizations in Jamaica, as an umbrella Rastafari organization to organize and centralize the aims, objectives and representation of the Rastafari Community. The objectives of the Millennium Council include:
(1) To provide support and empowerment to all Rastafari and member Rastafari Mansions and Organizations in the practice and furtherance of their living faith.(2) To secure, protect and manage the intellectual property of the Rastafari community worldwide, for the benefit of the Rastafari community worldwide.
(3) To take all such actions as are necessary and appropriate to prevent the further theft and abuse of the symbols, emblems, music, cultural marks, tangible and intangible heritage of the Rastafari community worldwide. (4) To advocate and negotiate with appropriate bodies in order to further the interests of the Rastafari communities, including in matters of human rights and welfare, intellectual property, repatriation, reparations, and cultural heritage tourism.
Rastafari has been called ‘the dominant ideology of Jamaican music since the mid-1970s.’ Reggae is and has been primarily Rastafari message music, which accounts for its incredible global appeal. Reggae is therefore an offshoot of Rastafari thought and resistance. Rastafari as an indigenous socio-economic, Afro-centric, faith-based, resistance movement has not been given sufficient credit and respect for its role in the development and phenomenal economic growth of Reggae. Despite the invaluable contribution of Rastafari to the sucessful evolution of reggae, the Rastafari community remains socially and economically marginalized in Jamaica.
Unauthorized copying, reproduction and association of Rastafari style of dress, talk, appearance, raises serious issues with regard to the right of Rastafari as a culture to safeguard the use and misuse of its culture against use by all and sundry, without regard or respect for the culture and those who suffered and died to establish, develop and nurture it.
Under the auspices chiefly of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), laws and policies have been developed to protect the cultural traditions, symbols and representations of indigenous/traditional people from piracy of images and counterfeiting of goods and services as genuine and authentic, when they are not. WIPO, UNESCO and the UN have all issued international protocols and declarations recognizing the moral right of indigenous/traditional people to control and manage their cultural heritage. The Rastafari community therefore has the moral right to ownership of its identity and to protect and determine how the Rastafari faith and community is identified, represented and associated.
Since the 1980s to this day, there has been distinct and purposive use of Rastafari-associated products in hotels especially on Jamaica’s north coast tourist capitals. The entertainment packages, in order to portray authentic Jamaican culture, almost invariably have a Rastafari-look-a-like or Rastafari-themed reggae band and show to entertain tourists weekly. This Rastafari theme is exemplified by extensive use of locks (real and fake) and red, gold and green, both by persons on stage as well as in the use of stage and entertainment motifs and decorations. This has been supplemented by stocking of in-hotel craft and souvenir shops with t-shirts, tote bags, cups, caps, key rings, slippers, towels, posters (and the list goes on) all depicting Rastafari imagery and symbolism. There are hundreds of business enterprises, both in and out of Jamaica, which have utilized Rastafari imagery and symbols as part of the get-up or trade dress of various rergae products, including CDs, DVDs, flags, reggae advertising and paraphernalia, from t-shirts and caps, tams, to smoking utensils, banners, etc. While this is a positive move, there needs to be a mechanism in place whereby part profits or some material benefit accrues to the Jamaican Rastafari community in some way. It is only fair and just that the Rastafari community should benefit from this multimillion dollar Rastafari Reggae merchandising industry.
This is where the model of benefit-sharing agreements could be very appropriate. These agreeemtents would see the various businhess entities, including the many reggae show promoters and merchandisers, national and international, simply entering into voluntary arangemnents to see to it that a percentage of profits from the goods and services is paid into the Rastafari Trust Fund for the benefit of the greater Rastafari community, esopeciaslly here in Jamnaica, to which Rastafari and Reggae are indigenous and where there are still living among us many of the matriarchs and patriarchs of the Rastafari faith who were beaten and battered, imprisoned, tortured, humiliated and denigrated in Jamaica, on account of their spiritual convictions, for this spirit of Rastafari to survive and flourish and continue to be the head cornerstone of Reggae. Few commentators, such as Charles Campbell, publicly recognize the problem. In the Sunday Observer of November 18, 2007, in a piece entitled “Do We Own Reggae?”, he states that “the still largely underexploited potential which Jamaica has to increase our annual earnings from tourism and entertainment/music” is due to the “Jamaican status quo” and the “conscious attempt” by “high government officials” of “all Jamaican governments across the party lines since the 1970s when Reggae began its international outreach… “to disavow the umbilical link between Reggae and Rastafari.” He concludes that “In the land of Reggae, until the prejudice-the psychological barrier - is broken and the Rastafari community gain greater acceptance of the movers and shakers of society, their rightful contribution to the genesis and evolution of Reggae will continue to be denied, thus the potential growth and promotion of the music stultified in the process.”
Possible Examples of Solutions- The Wailers incorporating Robert Marley O.M., Winston McIntosh & Neville Livingston CD decreed that the Rastafari community was to benefit from their recording of “Rastaman Chant”.
- Rastafari Trademarks Development of authentic trademarks authenticating products and services that are beneficial to the Rastafari community as well as securing sacred symbols and livity that dilute the culture and effective cultural transmission.
- Rastafari Artist Organization For the sensitization of Rastafari Artists as to their moral obligation to the traditional Rastafari communities and to be ambassadors, activists and champions in the international markets on behalf of Rastafari Intellectual Property and Moral rights.
- EADUMC establishment of the Rastafari Trust Fund which would be central fund into which all proceeds and contributions for Rastafari benefit will be pooled, invested and spent for common Rastafari progress and projects.
For more information, contact:jamaicamusic50.blogspot.com
E.A.D.U.M.C.
ETHIO-AFRICA DIASPORA UNION
MILLENNIUM COUNCIL
.
RASTAFARI ROOTS OF REGGAE
The Ethio-Africa Diaspora Union Millennium Council (‘Millennium Council’) was established in 2007 by the major Rastafari Mansions and Organizations in Jamaica, as an umbrella Rastafari organization to organize and centralize the aims, objectives and representation of the Rastafari Community. The objectives of the Millennium Council include:
(1) To provide support and empowerment to all Rastafari and member Rastafari Mansions and Organizations in the practice and furtherance of their living faith.
(2) To secure, protect and manage the intellectual property of the Rastafari community worldwide, for the benefit of the Rastafari community worldwide.
(3) To take all such actions as are necessary and appropriate to prevent the further theft and abuse of the symbols, emblems, music, cultural marks, tangible and intangible heritage of the Rastafari community worldwide.
(3) To take all such actions as are necessary and appropriate to prevent the further theft and abuse of the symbols, emblems, music, cultural marks, tangible and intangible heritage of the Rastafari community worldwide.
(4) To advocate and negotiate with appropriate bodies in order to further the interests of the Rastafari communities, including in matters of human rights and welfare, intellectual property, repatriation, reparations, and cultural heritage tourism.
Rastafari has been called ‘the dominant ideology of Jamaican music since the mid-1970s.’ Reggae is and has been primarily Rastafari message music, which accounts for its incredible global appeal. Reggae is therefore an offshoot of Rastafari thought and resistance. Rastafari as an indigenous socio-economic, Afro-centric, faith-based, resistance movement has not been given sufficient credit and respect for its role in the development and phenomenal economic growth of Reggae. Despite the invaluable contribution of Rastafari to the sucessful evolution of reggae, the Rastafari community remains socially and economically marginalized in Jamaica.
Unauthorized copying, reproduction and association of Rastafari style of dress, talk, appearance, raises serious issues with regard to the right of Rastafari as a culture to safeguard the use and misuse of its culture against use by all and sundry, without regard or respect for the culture and those who suffered and died to establish, develop and nurture it.
Under the auspices chiefly of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), laws and policies have been developed to protect the cultural traditions, symbols and representations of indigenous/traditional people from piracy of images and counterfeiting of goods and services as genuine and authentic, when they are not. WIPO, UNESCO and the UN have all issued international protocols and declarations recognizing the moral right of indigenous/traditional people to control and manage their cultural heritage. The Rastafari community therefore has the moral right to ownership of its identity and to protect and determine how the Rastafari faith and community is identified, represented and associated.
Since the 1980s to this day, there has been distinct and purposive use of Rastafari-associated products in hotels especially on Jamaica’s north coast tourist capitals. The entertainment packages, in order to portray authentic Jamaican culture, almost invariably have a Rastafari-look-a-like or Rastafari-themed reggae band and show to entertain tourists weekly. This Rastafari theme is exemplified by extensive use of locks (real and fake) and red, gold and green, both by persons on stage as well as in the use of stage and entertainment motifs and decorations. This has been supplemented by stocking of in-hotel craft and souvenir shops with t-shirts, tote bags, cups, caps, key rings, slippers, towels, posters (and the list goes on) all depicting Rastafari imagery and symbolism. There are hundreds of business enterprises, both in and out of Jamaica, which have utilized Rastafari imagery and symbols as part of the get-up or trade dress of various rergae products, including CDs, DVDs, flags, reggae advertising and paraphernalia, from t-shirts and caps, tams, to smoking utensils, banners, etc. While this is a positive move, there needs to be a mechanism in place whereby part profits or some material benefit accrues to the Jamaican Rastafari community in some way. It is only fair and just that the Rastafari community should benefit from this multimillion dollar Rastafari Reggae merchandising industry.
This is where the model of benefit-sharing agreements could be very appropriate. These agreeemtents would see the various businhess entities, including the many reggae show promoters and merchandisers, national and international, simply entering into voluntary arangemnents to see to it that a percentage of profits from the goods and services is paid into the Rastafari Trust Fund for the benefit of the greater Rastafari community, esopeciaslly here in Jamnaica, to which Rastafari and Reggae are indigenous and where there are still living among us many of the matriarchs and patriarchs of the Rastafari faith who were beaten and battered, imprisoned, tortured, humiliated and denigrated in Jamaica, on account of their spiritual convictions, for this spirit of Rastafari to survive and flourish and continue to be the head cornerstone of Reggae.
Few commentators, such as Charles Campbell, publicly recognize the problem. In the Sunday Observer of November 18, 2007, in a piece entitled “Do We Own Reggae?”, he states that “the still largely underexploited potential which Jamaica has to increase our annual earnings from tourism and entertainment/music” is due to the “Jamaican status quo” and the “conscious attempt” by “high government officials” of “all Jamaican governments across the party lines since the 1970s when Reggae began its international outreach… “to disavow the umbilical link between Reggae and Rastafari.” He concludes that “In the land of Reggae, until the prejudice-the psychological barrier - is broken and the Rastafari community gain greater acceptance of the movers and shakers of society, their rightful contribution to the genesis and evolution of Reggae will continue to be denied, thus the potential growth and promotion of the music stultified in the process.”
Possible Examples of Solutions
- The Wailers incorporating Robert Marley O.M., Winston McIntosh & Neville Livingston CD decreed that the Rastafari community was to benefit from their recording of “Rastaman Chant”.
- Rastafari Trademarks Development of authentic trademarks authenticating products and services that are beneficial to the Rastafari community as well as securing sacred symbols and livity that dilute the culture and effective cultural transmission.
- Rastafari Artist Organization For the sensitization of Rastafari Artists as to their moral obligation to the traditional Rastafari communities and to be ambassadors, activists and champions in the international markets on behalf of Rastafari Intellectual Property and Moral rights.
- EADUMC establishment of the Rastafari Trust Fund which would be central fund into which all proceeds and contributions for Rastafari benefit will be pooled, invested and spent for common Rastafari progress and projects.
For more information, contact:
jamaicamusic50.blogspot.com
