THE ARTS JOURNAL: THE SIXTH ISSUE

Nov 09, 2008 Features / Columnists, The Arts Forum

Another double issue of THE ARTS JOURNAL, Volume 4 Numbers 1 & 2, has just been released. This unique issue is entirely devoted to new interpretations of East Indian experience 170 years after Indians arrived on the shores of British Guiana and other West Indian islands as contract workers and remained as settlers.

A number of well-researched articles offer deeper insight into areas of our literature and history that have previously been neglected.

A rich Art Section seeks to discuss, document and celebrate the traditional arts and culture of East Indians in the Caribbean including works of art from a vanishing past that were in danger of being lost.

Two instructive Interviews of prominent Guyanese Indian personalities (one a broadcaster, the other a prize-winning author), new creative writing that evokes both the tragic nature of East Indian existence as well as the positive sides, and a Book Review section that opens a window on new historical and fictional writings all combine to make this an issue that will be invaluable to teachers and students at the tertiary and secondary levels or wherever literature, history and the arts are being studied as well as persons with an interest in the artistic and cultural life of the society.

With its accessible language free of linguistic jargon, The Arts Journal also appeals to the wider public and will make valuable gifts for almost any occasion.

This issue follows Volume 3 Numbers 1 & 2 which was devoted to fresh analyses of the Trans-atlantic Trade in Captive Africans 200 years after its abolition. It is one of the few solid publications that marked the historic event.

THE EVOLUTION OF THE ARTS JOURNAL:

The Arts Journal is a peer-reviewed Journal that emerged in 2004 in a society where no formal avenues for a critical tradition existed especially in the area of the arts and culture.

Informed interpretations of published works of history and literature, appreciation of our visual culture and the traditional arts were virtually non-existent and limited to journalistic commentary.

There was need for a scholarly Journal that would critically analyze, document and celebrate the arts and culture of Guyana and the Caribbean region with which we have a shared history.

It is important that people with a history of colonialism who continue to struggle in neo-colonial conditions should seek deeper understanding of their past so as to inform their present; should seek self-discovery and healing through the structures of art.

Why the structures of art?

It is a well-known axiom that the genuine works of our writers, artists and poets contain more truths about the nature and condition of our survival and existence than anything uttered by our politicians.

It is also true to say that the solutions to many of our problems can be found, not only in getting more grants and aids and in spending more and more on projects and meeting economic indices, but in self-examination and self-reflection.

It is necessary for us to come to a sense of ourselves through the lessons embraced in the arts and then we would be better able to contribute to a society that coheres. While we welcome the aids and grants, it cannot be the panacea for our continuing stasis.

We are in search of a democratic humanism struggled for by writers, artists and poets who continue to painstaking anatomize their societies through their works, especially those who have gained international recognition for their pains.

The Arts Journal with its multidisciplinary span and its focus on all the ethnicities that comprise our multi-cultural society, aims to provide fresh critical perspectives on neglected areas of our condition as depicted in the wide discipline of the arts.

As we will come to realize, no democratic society can afford to be without an intellectual tradition and more so, in the context of our transition from colonialism.

Now in its fourth Volume The Arts Journal is being subscribed to by learning institutions at the secondary and tertiary levels, Teachers Colleges, Community Colleges, public libraries, art galleries and archives across the Caribbean, the United Kingdom, North America and Europe that find it a necessary critical tool and an important addition to their library resources.

AN OVERVIEW OF PAST ISSUES:

Volume 1 Number 1 presents articles that constitute a lively and instructive engagement with (East) Indian experience in the Caribbean through history, the creative imagination and the visual arts.

Volume 1 Number 2 offers a variety of articles on literary criticism and cultural expressions in the Caribbean (including a good critique on a novel used by CXC students and other topics on culture that form the basis of lessons in Social Studies). The issue is enhanced by photographic representations of the landscape of Guyana.

Volume 2 Number 1 illuminates the works of second-generation Caribbean writers who live and work in North America and reinterpret the migrant experience in their creative writing. The articles are rich critiques of dislocation and of how we understand and negotiate survival.

Volume 2 Number 2 is a special issue that explores Caribbean identity through literary criticism, memoir, creative writing, photography and visual art.

Every issue of The Arts Journal brings you a Guyanese or Caribbean visual artist whose work deserves greater critical attention and appreciation and will be invaluable research material especially for examination students.

The Arts Journal will ultimately serve to raise the level of reading and writing intelligently and guide students and scholars on the conventions necessary for good writing.

In addition, teachers who must have a wide background in order to influence and inspire students, will find the several issues very instructive.

Eminent academics representing all the campuses of the University of the West Indies, the University of Guyana and other universities overseas serve on the Journal’s Editorial and Advisory Boards. For more information on the Contents of each issue, the Journal’s website is www.theartsjournal.org.gy.