The late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was a period of economic distress and social unrest in the Caribbean, which peaked in a series of 'labour rebellions' across the British West Indies in the 1930s. In this lecture, we will examine the causes of this period of crisis and its consequences for reform and path towards decolonisation.

Suggested reading

Bolland, O. Nigel, ‘Labor protests, rebellions, and the rise of nationalism during Depression and war’ in Stephan Palmié and Francisco A. Scarano (eds), The Caribbean: A History of the Region and its Peoples (Chicago, 2011), pp. 459-474.

Bolland, O. Nigel, On the March: Labour Rebellions in the British Caribbean, 1934-39 (London, 1995).

Bolland, O. Nigel, The Politics of Labour in the British Caribbean: The Social Origins of Authoritarianism and Democracy in the Labour Movement (Princeton, NJ, 2001).

Brereton, Bridget (ed.), General History of the Caribbean V: The Caribbean in the Twentieth Century (London, 2004), especially chapters 2 and 3.

Cross, Malcolm and Gad Heuman (ed.), Labour in the Caribbean: From Emancipation to Independence (Basingstoke, 1988). [See epsecially chapter by Richard Hart.]

Ewing, A., 'Caribbean labour politics in the age of Garvey, 1918–1938', Race and Class, 55: 1 (2013), pp. 23-45.

Hart, Richard, ‘Labour Rebellions of the 1930s’ in Hilary Beckles and Verene Shepherd (eds), Caribbean Freedom: Economy and Society from Emancipation to the Present (London, 1993), pp. 370-375.

Hart, Richard, Labour Rebellions of the 1930s in the British Caribbean Region Colonies (London, 2002).

Heuman, G., The Caribbean (London, 2014, 2nd edition), chapter 14.

James, Winston, Holding Aloft the Banner of Ethiopia: Caribbean Radicalism in Early Twentieth-Century America (London, 1999).

Lewis, Gordon K., The Growth of the Modern West Indies (London, 1968).

Lewis, W. Arthur, ‘The 1930s Social Revolution’ in Hilary Beckles and Verene Shepherd (eds), Caribbean Freedom: Economy and Society from Emancipation to the Present (London, 1993), pp. 376-392.

Macpherson, Anne S., ‘Toward decolonization : impulses, processes, and consequences since the 1930s' in Stephan Palmié and Francisco A. Scarano (eds), The Caribbean: A History of the Region and its Peoples (Chicago, 2011), pp. 475-490.

Moore, Brian L. and Michele A. Johnson, Neither Led nor Driven: Contesting British Cultural Imperialism in Jamaica, 1865-1920 (Kingston, Jamaica, 2004).

Smith, Leonard, Insanity, Race and Colonialism: Managing Mental Disorder in the Post-Emancipation British Caribbean, 1838-1914 (Basingstoke, 2014).

On First World War service:

Howe, Glenford D., Race, War and Nationalism: A Social History of West Indians in the First World War (Kingston, Jamaica, 2002).

Smith, Richard, Jamaican Volunteers in the First World War: Race, Masculinity and the Development of National Consciousness (Manchester, 2004).

On Garveyism:

Campbell, Horace, Rasta and Resistance: From Marcus Garvey to Walter Rodney (Africa World Press, 1987).

Grant, Colin, Negro with a Hat: The Rise and Fall of Marcus Garvey (Oxford, 2008).

Lewis, Rupert, Marcus Garvey: Anti-Colonial Champion (London, 1987).

Stein, Judith, The World of Marcus Garvey: Race and Class in Modern Society (Baton Rouge, 1986).

On Rastafarianism:

Barrett, Leonard E., The Rastafarians: The Dreadlocks of Jamaica (London, 1977).

Chevannes, Barry (ed.), Rastafari and other African-Caribbean Worldviews (London, 1995).

Chevannes, Barry, Rastafari: Roots and ideology (Syracuse, NY, 1995).

Murrell, Nathaniel Samuel, William David Spencer and Adrian Anthony McFarlane (eds), Chanting Down Babylon: The Rastafari Reader (Temple University Press, 1998).

Owens, Joseph Dread, The Rastafarians of Jamaica (London, 1979).