Race and religious pluralism in Kingston, Jamaica

AbstractThe elaboration of syncretic belief systems outside the framework of white‐dominated denominational Christianity by enslaved African labourers is a fundamental hallmark of the religious terrain of Caribbean societies. This process of creole institution‐building started during the period of slavery, and, in the case of Jamaica, continued throughout the post‐emancipation period, during which the black lower class formed Afro‐Christian sects and cults. This paper examines religious pluralism in Kingston, the capital of Jamaica, over the decades since independence in 1962, and focuses on the spatial expression of that religious divide. It shows that Afro‐Christian religions still correlate with the black lower class, although the growth of US‐based evangelical sects in Kingston's downtown areas has gathered pace in recent decades. Uptown Kingston remains predominantly Anglican, Roman Catholic, Baptist or Methodist, although by no means so exclusively white or light‐skinned as before independence. Special attention will be given to the cult of Rastafari and the Pentecostal sect in the Jamaican context, both of which exemplify post‐slavery creole creativity, and provide a religious framework for confronting historical white racism. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.