Send us a text message and tell us your thoughts.
Join us for a riveting discussion with Dr. Shani Roper, Curator at the University of West Indies Museum, as we celebrate a monumental event—the homecoming of the Jamaican Giant Galliwasp from Scotland, an emblem of natural heritage that's been away since the 1850s. The stirring tale of this lizard's return is not only a first in the repatriation of natural history specimens to the Caribbean region but also a testament to the collaborative spirit between international institutions.
Embracing the complexities of international diplomacy and reparations, we recount the behind-the-scenes efforts that paved the way for the Giant Galliwasp's return. Dr. Roper and I dissect everything from the meticulous negotiations and logistics involving the CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species) conventions to the detailed protocols that ensured the specimen's safe journey back to the Natural History Museum of Jamaica. The impact of this successful transfer extends beyond the mere physical possession—it's a powerful acknowledgement of Caribbean heritage, shaping policies and legal frameworks essential for the preservation of historical narratives.
Weaving the social history of the galliwasp into our discussion, Dr. Roper showcases a creature steeped in the folklore & collective memory of Jamaica. The episode also casts a wider net on the topic of artifact repatriation, considering the roles of diasporic communities and the necessary steps Caribbean nations must take to protect and honor their repatriated cultural property. As we celebrate this significant chapter in Jamaica's story, we invite listeners to reflect on the broader implications of this homecoming for our shared global history.
Shani Roper is Curator of the UWI Museum and has worked for twenty years in the museum sector in Jamaica. She is also Co-President of Museums Association of the Caribbean and holds a PhD (Rice University) in Caribbean history with a focus on Car
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Strictly Facts, a guide to Caribbean
history and culture, hosted byme, alexandria Miller.
Strictly Facts teaches thehistory, politics and activism
of the Caribbean and connectsthese themes to contemporary
music and popular culture.
Wamp people.
Welcome back to another episodeof Strictly Facts, a guide to
(00:23):
Caribbean history and culture.
If this is your first timetuning in, I'm Alexandria Miller
and here to discuss all thingsCaribbean stories, not only as
connections to our past but, asevidenced from today's episode,
as connections to who we aretoday and our evolving futures.
History is always happening allaround us, and, in fact, in our
(00:45):
most recent discussion with MrKevin Farmer from the Barbados
Museum and Historical Society,he shared a brief tidbit with us
about an artifact'srepatriation back to the lands
of the Caribbean, specificallyJamaica, and so in our
discussion today, we'redefinitely continuing on that
track, because I naturally hadto learn more about this and
(01:06):
share it with you all, and sojoining me for this sort of
continuation of our CaribbeanMuseum discussion is Dr Shani
Roper, curator of the Universityof West Indies Mona Museum and
a Caribbean historian with aspecial focus on Caribbean
childhoods.
Dr Roper, thank you so much forbeing here.
Let's begin with you telling usa bit about yourself, your
(01:29):
connection to the Caribbean andwhat inspired your passion for
Caribbean history and museumeducation.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Okay, so I'm Jamaican , born and grown and lived in
the States for grad school andcame back, so I've been in
Jamaica basically majority of mylife.
So I have always had, as myparents would put it, an
(01:55):
affinity to dates and storylines, which really that's what
history is a lot of is storiesthat are guided by dates as
peripheries and our ability tocompile multiple storylines that
are developed from engaging thearchive to come up with
multiple perspectives andnarratives.
(02:16):
So I have always defaulted tohistory.
All my degrees are in historyand just everything in my
schooling, surprisingly, hasbeen history.
And, of course, because I'm inJamaica, your first history is
the history of the island thatyou live in.
(02:37):
And then, as you advancethrough your schooling, through
your schooling, if you stay inthe field, then it becomes more
and more regional and more andmore detailed and intense.
And because I also did mydoctorate in history, I did
world history, african-americanhistory and Caribbean history in
(02:59):
terms of non-Jamaican history.
So I've always functioned likethat.
You know I'm not transitioningfrom a different field, but what
was important is that, out ofundergrad, my first job, my
first and only job at the time,only interview I got actually
was at the Museum of History andEthnography at the Institute of
(03:21):
Jamaica, and that environmentreally bridged the gap between
my practice as a historian andfunctioning in a museum space,
and so, even though I did leaveto go do my doctorate in history
, I've actually functioned inmuseum and heritage spaces for
(03:41):
about 20 years, and so it hasbeen a very important part of my
understanding our ownengagement, um and and some kind
of like real skills, becausemuseums require administration,
museums require logisticsplanning, museums require policy
development and grant writingand public education, and so it
(04:06):
brings a more practical,non-academic component.
In my life.
I've been trying to struggleboth, sometimes successfully,
sometimes not as successfullyduring the course of my career.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Well, I think we can jump in from there right into
our discussion.
Thank you so much for sharing abit about yourself.
We can jump in from there rightinto our discussion.
Thank you so much for sharing abit about yourself.
I want to, of course, talkabout the repatriation of
artifacts from you know some ofthese former in some cases,
depending on where we're talkingabout, of course, colonizing
bodies and their impact on ourhistories, right, and so, most
(04:42):
recently, it was reportedofficially by sources like the
Jamaica Observer, the JamaicaGleaner, in late April and early
May respectively, that a groupof scientists and researchers,
yourself included, from UWE,from the Institute of Jamaica
and from the National HistoryMuseum of Jamaica, had recently
returned home after repatriatingthe Jamaican giant galley wasp
(05:03):
from Scotland, which is said tohave been taken back in the
1850s, and so its return is saidto be the first repatriated
natural history specimen to theregion.
Could you tell us a bit moreabout the history of the galley
wasp and how it even ended up inScotland in the first place?
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Okay, so the Giant Jamaican Galiwas.
So let me put it first that Iworked at the Institute of
Jamaica and while we were at theInstitute of Jamaica, the
Natural History Museum ofJamaica is actually a division.
It's one of the five divisionsof the Institute of Jamaica
which, for those who don't knowthe Institute of Jamaica is the
(05:45):
equivalent of the Smithsonianbut a significantly smaller
scale, and the Institute wasestablished in 1879 under Sir
Anthony Musgrave.
It has legislation in Jamaicangovernment for the preservation
of art, science and literatureand it has five divisions and
(06:08):
two departments.
So the divisions would beNatural History, national
Gallery of Jamaica, africanCaribbean Institute of Jamaica,
national Museum Jamaica, whichused to be Museum of History and
Ethnography, and what they callthe Programs Division, and then
the two departments was morelike three Simone Bolivar,
liberty Hall, legacy of MarcusGarvey and Jamaica Music Museum.
(06:30):
When we think of a museumnational collection, the
national collection is actuallyhoused in the Institute of
Jamaica across all of thosedivisions and while I was there
and I think they still have itwe had what we call the
researchers and curatorscommittee and it was a committee
where all of us from thedifferent departments and
(06:52):
divisions would talk aboutthings that we were working on
and some key things in thecollection.
So I knew about the giant gallowwasp, I knew that there wasn't
a specimen in the collection andI knew that there was an
undated sketch of the Gally Wasp.
So the Gally Wasp, the giantJamaican Gally Wasp, is the
(07:13):
largest of a scientific familythat's referred to as Celestios
Ossidios, right, jamaica has avery high level of endemism in
the ecological environment andespecially among reptiles, with
lizards specifically.
So, as my colleagues explainedto me, they're like 40 something
(07:33):
different families of lizards.
36 of those are endemic toJamaica and four of them are
extinct, one of which is a giantgalley wasp, right.
So the galley wasp.
It doesn't look like atraditional lizard, it looks
more like a snake with shortlegs.
That's how I would interpret itfrom a non-scientific
(07:53):
perspective.
It's not a cute specimen,although the specimen has since
grown on me.
It's not cute, right?
So it's not the most photogenicspecimen, although I think the
Hunterian has produced someamazingly beautiful photos of
what we were trying to do.
So this specific Galiwasp,jamaica has 10 of the 11 in the
(08:19):
family.
The Celestius Ossidus family isendemic to Jamaica, right, the
Celestius Ossidus family isendemic to Jamaica, right, I
think the 11th one is the one inHispaniola that's called the
Haitian giant galliwasp right,and that one, I think, is
endangered.
So the galliwasp, this specificone, is believed to have lived
(08:41):
in swamp areas, specificallywhat we refer to today as the
environs of the Black RiverMorass, which is like the
largest protected I don't knowwhat you want to call it, but it
has a crocodile sanctuary there.
So if you want, you bring yourchildren and you do boat rides
throughout the morass, and thereare a whole set of other things
(09:01):
that you would learn in likeprimary school about it.
I don't remember now.
So anyway, it believed to havebeen from that area and with the
expansion of the plantationeconomy in the parishes of, like
Clarendon and St Elizabeth, theclearing of swampland, the
extraction of water to maintainthe plantation economy really
(09:24):
resulted in significant habitatloss.
The secondary factor is theintroduction of the mongoose,
and the mongoose was introducedto deal with issues with rats
and snakes in the sugar fields.
But the mongoose Indianmongoose has no natural
predators in Jamaica, so theyhave since evolved to function
in the Jamaican ecological spaceand they're believed to kill,
(09:49):
along with wild feral cats, alot of the endemic species that
are integral to the Jamaicanecological landscape.
But the giant galley waspactually has not been reported
as being collected since the1840s and it's believed to have
become extinct during themid-19th century.
This specific specimen, whichwe got from the Hunterian Museum
(10:14):
, which is the for theUniversity of Glasgow, was
originally a part of theAndersonian collection and
according to the metadata, itwas collected in the 1850s.
The Andersonian collection wasabsorbed into the Hunterian
collection in the 1880s and thespecimen remained in the
(10:34):
collection from that time untilit came out for exhibition
purposes in the last two years.
So this specimen we believe is170 years old.
But because the giant galliwasphas been extinct since the
1840s, we actually don't knowwhat is the average lifespan of
an adult giant galliwasp.
(10:54):
So it's older than 170.
It's just been dead for 170years and living in ethanol.
So the University of the WestIndies and the University of
Glasgow have a MOU and that MOUis very often referred to as a
reparations MOU.
So one of the things is that wedon't know who collected that
(11:18):
specimen and we're not sureexactly where it came from.
But one of the things that wehave recognized as museum
practitioners and as scholars ofcollections that a lot of
Caribbean collections becausethey do not constitute looted
collections moved as part ofempire.
(11:39):
So people came.
They came, you know, when theCaribbean was considered the
frontier.
They came, they collected theflora and fauna because it
didn't look like anything thatthey wanted and also where
they're from, and also in themid 19th century, being a
naturalist was also part of thesocial activities that people
(11:59):
had, and so what you ended uphaving is that a lot of the
collections for the Caribbean,in the United Kingdom especially
, are of natural origin, sothey're either flora, fauna or
cultural items made from naturalcomponents in the environment.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
Wow, thank you, I think so much for, of course,
for situating, you know, thehistory of the giant gallow wasp
for us, but also providing, Ithink, a very needed background
to why this is, you know, suchan important and, as a result of
a lot of increasedconversations about repatriation
, whether, that is, you know, ona global scale, museums in
general.
You know there are even morerecent conversations I've seen
(12:55):
about Portugal specifically inrepatriation, but I think, for
the case of our discussion today, particularly between UWE and
the University of Glasgow, ofour discussion today,
particularly between UWE and theUniversity of Glasgow, and so
what was this process like interms of coordinating for the
artifacts return and thecollaboration between scholars
and the governments and, youknow, the universities, of
(13:16):
course, between the twocountries?
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Okay.
So the University of the WestIndies and the University of
Glasgow have an MOU and it'susually they were signed in 2019
, and it's usually referred toas the reparations MOU, and it's
grown within this exchange,knowledge sharing process of
MOUs kind of costed at 20million pounds.
(13:42):
So under the MOU, the Hunterianengaged in a project, an
exhibition that they calledCurating Discomfort, and the
museums and the ways in whichmuseums could engage each other
was always a part of thediscussion.
However, when my colleague atthe Hunterian, mike Mike also
(14:09):
was a zoology curator at the StAugustine campus in Trinidad for
several years before hereturned to Scotland and he's
Scottish he went to work at theZoology Museum at the Hunterian.
They had engaged communitycurators to go through the
collection and one of them hadidentified the Gallywasp.
(14:30):
As you know, they were justlike why is this lizard in
Scotland when you guys don'thave any Gallywasp's hairs?
So when it was put on display,mike wrote myself and another
colleague who actually wasretired so he never got the
email to say, hey, we have aGaliwasp here.
(14:52):
We know you guys don't have aGaliwasp.
We think this is an idealcandidate for repatriation.
Would you be interested infacilitating it?
And, of course, because I havemy IOJ background, I knew
immediately the significance ofthe request and said to him that
I will reach out to mycolleagues at the Institute of
(15:13):
Jamaica.
So what ended up happening wasthat we formed a committee.
I remember one of the radiointerviewers was like you formed
an entire committee for Alizade.
I was like, yes, we did so.
I brought in my colleagues fromthe Institute of Jamaica, which
I would have been known for allof this time, and colleagues
from the Hunterian, and we satdown and we actually worked out
(15:36):
what this repatriation couldlook like.
And that's very important,right.
And we committed to a set ofvalues our own knowledge sharing
and knowledge co-production.
And then we worked out whatdoes this look like?
Do we go to Scotland?
Do they come to Jamaica?
(15:57):
Either way, where do we get themoney to facilitate this
process?
And so we hosted, through UWEMuseum platforms, a virtual
program last year, june, calledRepatriation, natural History
Collections and KnowledgeCo-Production.
(16:18):
The case of the giant galiwaspit's on the museum's Facebook
page case of the giant gallowhas been it's on our, it's on
the museum's facebook page andum, coming out of it.
We agreed okay, what we will dois that we will have people
from jamaica go to scotlandrather than people from scotland
come to jamaica.
Um, the other thing is wedecided that we would apply for
(16:43):
funding for four persons to go,two from IOJ, two from the
University of the West Indiesand, in keeping with the MOU,
we'd have to have a graduatestudent.
We were successful in ourrequest for funding and the
Glasgow Caribbean Centre forDevelopment Research funded
(17:03):
majority of the trip and thenthe Office of Global Affairs at
the University of the WestIndies funded the student.
And we had to you know, ofcourse, through institutional
engagement show an equal whichis how universities work anyway
show an equal contribution andinvestment in the project.
In order for us to go and get it, we had to put the specimen on
(17:29):
CITES Jamaica appendices, andCITES is the international
convention that deals with theillicit trafficking of
endangered flora and fauna.
Right, it's presumed extinct,but it had to go on the CITES
appendices, so it goes on theappendix schedule.
We had to apply for an importlicense, then we had to apply
(17:50):
for a vet import license inorder to walk the specimen back
into the country, right, and sowe left April 17.
Well, we actually really lefton the 18th.
Our flight was delayed byseveral hours so we left like
after midnight on the 18th.
(18:11):
We got to Glasgow that eveningon the 18th, of course we
dropped six hours and thespecimen, by the Monday, was
taken out of ethanol, because wecan't travel with things in
ethanol.
So it was taken out of ethanol,wrapped in cheesecloth, soaked,
(18:36):
and that was then soaked inalcohol or in ethanol, and then
it was vacuum sealed, right, sothat they triple vacuum sealed,
in fact, so that the fluid wouldstay in the bag, and then we
put it in a clip box with aimage over it and I brought it.
(18:57):
It was a put in my care as thenon-scientist and I the only
non-scientist actually in thegroup and I uh took it as my
carry-on through all thesecurity checkpoints on the
Wednesday, because once weadhered to all the not security
protocols like who has controlof it?
(19:18):
Well, I guess that's calledsecurity protocols um, and then
I walked it.
It traveled with me at my footon the plane back to jamaica and
there are all the securitycheckpoints and um, and once I
got to jamaica I had to declareit right, um, using all the
paperwork that we had used,including the official
(19:41):
documentation, to say that thespecimen was handed over, the
transfer of ownership to theUniversity of the West Indies,
all the newspaper articles,everything you know.
And once it was approved, Ihanded it over to the zoology
curator who came with us,elizabeth Morrison, and it went
(20:03):
into holdings at the NaturalHistory Museum of Jamaica.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
What a long journey.
I'm sure that was.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
Yeah, the entire process took 19 months To the
date that we collected it.
It was 19 months, Wow, wow, wow.
Yeah, and that was fairly quickbecause it's happening private
institution to privateinstitution, so it doesn't get
wrapped up in the kind ofdiplomatic channels that
normally happens for repatriateditems.
And this is what a lot ofpeople, I think, don't
(20:33):
understand that repatriation isactually a very complex legal
policy thing.
Right, you know, there is anotion that you know in Jamaica,
we're like oh, if somebody teefyour things, they must give it
back to you.
Yes, I totally agree, but thethings that you're talking about
are locked behind policy andlaw.
(20:54):
Right, and when you have alegislative and policy framework
that justifies former imperialnations keeping collections
under the guise that they arepart of their heritage, you're
going to run into some issues.
Right Now, there's some standardthings that no longer come off
(21:15):
a debate.
One of them is human remains,and so what you have happening
in, generally speaking, globally, is that, without too much
contestation, I think, humanremains get repatriated and
reinterred, and there are quitea few international conventions
and there's also the kind ofpractice in the field of
(21:35):
anthropology and other fieldsaround how you engage human
remains, and so it's a bad ideato fight to hold on to human
remains unless you are doingmedical research right.
And even so the medicalprofession has developed a kind
of complex ethics framework forhandling human remains.
(21:58):
The other one is works of artright, and I think one of the
most popular debates we're awareof is the Benin bronzes out of
West Africa and the looting ofthe city of Benin.
While during military expansionof imperialists, you know,
after the 1884 Berlin Convention, where Africa is really divided
(22:20):
up in a room by someimperialists.
Right, and when you deal withlooted collections, especially
after World War II, there arevery clear ideas about how to
handle looted collections.
Now the problem is a lot ofBenin branches if you scour the
news, they're sent back onpermanent loan.
(22:43):
There isn't a transfer ofownership.
That is different from theillicit trafficking, for example
, of pre-Columbian objects thathappens out of Latin America,
for example, when a lot of thoseget transferred through
diplomatic channels.
A museum might say, oh, I havethese pre-Columbian artifacts in
(23:05):
my collection and theprovenance and provenance being
the history of ownership is alittle sketchy.
We want to distance ourselvesfrom it.
Let me contact your embassy tosee if we can get it back, and
because the Mexican governmentand quite a few other Latin
American governments CentralAmerican governments as well are
(23:25):
very clear about their materialheritage, things get
transferred on the diplomaticchannels right, and so one of
the things that is clear is that, in order to have repatriation
happen, there needs to be aprocess of giving over and a
process of accepting, and youneed the structure on both ends
(23:47):
for it to work effectively.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
And so, in that case, a natural artifact like the
giant gallow functioned a littlebit differently.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Thank you.
It functioned differentlybecause it was a private
institution to a privateinstitution, because we didn't
know that the Ontarian had agalley wasp Right and in fact it
was through this project thatthey realized that they had more
than one Right.
But it's still a universitywith a research and teaching
(24:18):
collection.
So the universities focus veryheavily on research, teaching
and engagement through knowledgeproduction right.
So at the end of the day, youstill need your research
collection.
But because it was private toprivate, uwe retains the right
to put it in permanent known inthe national collection, because
(24:40):
that is where it's mostaccessible and not at the
University of the West Indies.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Right, interesting.
Thank you so much again forthat.
I think on one hand aside, orin addition to it being a very
long process, your point aboutknowledge production is also
important.
In what ways, or you know what,have researchers already begun
to learn about its existence inJamaica beyond what we already
(25:06):
knew, sort of?
What does the timeline evenlook like for it being available
to the public?
Speaker 2 (25:12):
OK, so in this case, we've classified it as a very
rare specimen because it's theonly one in the region and it's
170 years old, so the handlingof it has to be reduced
significantly.
However, it's only just returned, and so, basically, what we've
done is that we've done the kindof public are persons who study
(25:35):
lizards, so they've alreadybeen able to see it right, and
for them it's things likecounting the scales, the fact
that, unless you went to theUnited Kingdom or went abroad to
(26:00):
a collection that had agalliowasp in it, if you study
lizards, you're never going tosee one.
And in fact, what we found outby actually seeing this specimen
was that the image, the sketchthat the institution had which
comes from Hans Sloan's accountof galley wasps, because he was
(26:22):
collecting things in the 1670sum was actually not drawn to
scale and a poor representationof what a galley wasp looked
like, right, and so, by the merefact that people can see it
right and that scientists canthink about okay, these are the
things that we need to thinkabout when you look, for galley
(26:42):
was to think about the evolutionof the species itself.
And then also, we also took DNAprofiling from it, because the
galliwasp is actually, as thezoologist explained to me,
retiring creatures, so itdoesn't mean that it's
completely extinct, and thesespecifically apparently used to
(27:02):
only come out at nightcompletely extinct, and these
specifically apparently used toonly come out at night.
So it is possible, in the moredense areas, for example, of the
morass, that it could be thereand we just don't know, and so
the DNA profiling is important.
The next step that we'reworking on and my hope is that
we can get funding for it is forartists to do sketches and to
(27:23):
develop handling items thatwould give people an access to
the Galiwas that doesn't requireus disrupting its current state
and then when it will beavailable.
So for right now.
Initially we're hoping that itwill be available May 22.
(27:46):
But it looks like it's going togo into June, unfortunately.
But we're working on it becausea lot of Jamaicans, even though
they have a really significantfear of lizards, are actually
now interested and want to seeit.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
So yes, I think that is a very interesting point that
you make.
We're always talking aboutlizards and fear, right, but um,
even within I mean, probablylots of you know, more recent
generations don't know muchabout the gallow wasp, but it
was definitely a part of ourfolklore, um, with even you know
(28:19):
saying, saying that you know ifa galley wasp stings you and
reaches the water, yeah, theydon't bite, yeah, but they don't
bite and they're more likely torun away from you and in fact,
because this specific one is inswampy areas, more than likely
you'd run into another one whiletrying to get away from the one
that you think bit you.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
But it does present a quest and I've been thinking
about it as a social historian.
They the lore is based.
In fact there must have beensomething that was happening
that has resulted in this longrecollection and long social
memory.
Because I grew up in kingston.
(28:57):
I've never seen a gallivant,I've never grown lizard.
You know the big, long greengrown lizard.
I've never grown lizard, I'venever known gallivant, right,
but I know about it.
I know that if they bite youyou run and go water.
What is the basis for it?
Because they don't sting.
We don't have any poisonousanimals in our endemic group in
(29:18):
in jamaica.
So what is the basis of this?
And it?
It poses a very importantsocial history question about
how we understand the role of um.
I want to have the better work.
I'm not sure how I feel aboutthe term folklore, but you know
how do we engage this kind ofcollective memory?
(29:40):
That is, it makes the lizardevil but right, because
technically, if it bites you,you must trouble it Like I don't
know, like you must trouble it.
That's why it bites you.
You know what I mean.
So it requires some kind ofthinking through, and you know
you can't just exclude itbecause the thing has been gone
since the 1840s.
(30:01):
So what is the basis of it?
And I think that's a legitimatequestion yeah, one may be its
size.
Speaker 1 (30:07):
I mean, I think to think of a 16 inch lizard well,
that's, and that one was a youngadult.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
While we were in scotland we saw others that were
bigger and the estimate is thatthey ran from 16 to 20 inches,
because a grown lizard is stillslim.
Even your biggest grown lizardis, like, not big.
The galley wasp is afull-figured lizard.
Like it's not just that it is16 inches, is that it ticked too
(30:34):
right?
So I can can see why it wouldbe a problem, right, but still
not so sure.
Like I think we need somebetter accounts to tell us what
the underlying cause was youknow.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
So yeah, that, I think, brings me to a general
point in terms of our discussion.
Just what are your thoughts interms of the repatriation of
artifacts, be they naturalhistory oriented or otherwise,
back to the region generally,and how do you see the return of
the giant gallow wasps being acatalyst for other artifacts
(31:10):
throughout the region?
Speaker 2 (31:12):
Well, I think if it can return, that is that it can
return anything.
So I think it is a toe in thedoor Right.
So I think it is a toe in thedoor right.
But we have a responsibility asCaribbean nations to and I'm
speaking very broadly in termsof Caribbean I'm not only
talking about the Englishspeaking Caribbean, because the
(31:32):
Dutch, especially, have beenvery focused on provenance
research.
The French have been involved inthe return of items, and there
is a lot of conversation betweenthe Dutch kingdom and the
Caribbean countries in the Dutchkingdom about repatriation and
there are these variations ofrepatriation like digital
(31:54):
repatriation, and digitalrepatriation to me makes no
sense.
But sure, if that's thelanguage that we're using, then
it is a component of the debateswithin repatriation.
But Caribbean countriesactually have a responsibility
to not only ensure that theybecome signatories of
(32:14):
conventions that deal withrepatriation even if it cannot
be applied retroactively Becausethose conventions actually
require us to develop a veryeffective infrastructure to
receive, and it requires us toput in legislation to ensure
that we are in positions toprotect the things that come
(32:34):
back if we decide to go back forit.
So I think it's a toe in thedoor.
It broadens our idea of whatcultural property is right,
because very often we don'tthink of a lizard as part of our
cultural property, ecologicaland cultural environment, then
(32:58):
things flora and fauna are alsoconsidered material culture and
should be strategicallyrequested because it may not be
everything that you needed, inthis case the giant galliwasp.
It actually helps to completethe national collection because
it's a massive gap in thecollection and also, based on
(33:19):
some research that was done, theInstitute of Jamaica did
actually have giant galliwaspsin its collection but with the
1907 earthquake it's either thatit's during the 1907 earthquake
or around the time of the 1907earthquake where they moved some
of the collections.
The specimens were lost, butdefinitely during the earthquake
(33:40):
because the building that theInstitute occupied because it's
been on East Street the entire145 years that's been
functioning, the building thatthey occupied was destroyed.
So the current building thatexists as the main plant well,
the first of several main plantsof the Institute of Jamaica was
(34:01):
built in 1911 in the aftermathof the earthquake.
Then brings into this questionabout theft.
Right, because if we are a partof the colonial empire and we
didn't steal it and you knowwe're just, you know they're not
having a war, you know, becausepeople just came and went as
they pleased and there was nolegislation preventing the
(34:23):
mobility of cultural items.
I think the first thing it doesis also demand us to have some
transparency about what is outthere, because the Caribbean
museums don't know what's outthere.
And then, secondly, it requiresus to set up the infrastructure
and to develop relationshipsthat allow us to think through
(34:46):
the process of return.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
I think, to that point, definitely necessary, as
we're, for Jamaica, particularlythinking about, you know, and
shifting towards republicanismand, you know, dealing with
these aftermaths of imperialismeven today and continually
moving forward.
So thank you for sharing thatas well.
Um, my penultimate question ofevery strictly facts episode, um
(35:11):
is always looking for ways thatwe connect these stories and
these histories to our popularculture, and so what is one or a
few even of your favoriteexamples of it doesn't have to
be the Galiwas specifically, butthe ways that, you know, our
education and even repatriationshow up in history and popular
(35:31):
culture.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
Ah, the popular culture is going to kill me,
parrot.
You know, I don't know if Ihave a favorite.
I really don't know if I have afavorite.
I really don't know if I have afavorite, and that may be
because I function in amultidisciplinary environment,
right?
Um, the things that matter mostto me is the ways in which the
(36:01):
engagement of history andculture creates opportunity for
public engagement.
So I think, you know, I alwayscome back to the Kingston Art
Walk and the murals on WaterLane and the relationship
between Kingston Creative andthe National Gallery of Jamaica.
So those are the things that Iactually cannot.
Speaker 1 (36:24):
I think it counts.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
I would yeah right or or or increasing um tours of
downtown Kingston, those thosehistory tours.
For me, because Kingston hassuch a phenomenal history right,
and I think because ofKingston's life as a space in
(36:47):
Jamaican society and in thecontemporary context, a lot of
that history gets lost.
And so we have beautifulhistoric buildings but they're
not maintained because we don'tdo urban tourism in the same way
that urban tourism occurs in,like Cuba, for example.
So you know, it's just one ofthose things that we have to
(37:10):
work through, but I'm excitedabout the new trends that have
been happening.
Speaker 1 (37:14):
Me as well, and so, finally, I think, in addition to
the sort of artifactrepatriation that we've been
specifically talking about today, what do you hope to see for
other universities and those whoyou know may even have some of
these artifacts in their ownprivate collections?
What do you hope to?
Speaker 2 (37:38):
see in terms of continuing to right these wrongs
of colonialism, increasedtransparency.
I think what worked for us wasthat the Hunterian is committed
and actually Scotland, asopposed to England, is more
committed to repatriation.
And one of the lessons I've hadto learn is that even within
the United Kingdom I've had tolearn that even within the
(38:00):
United Kingdom it's a verynuanced space and what we found
because Scotland is morereceptive and because they're
engaging there's a series ofprograms coming out of national
museums Scotland aroundcollection, exploring what
objects are in collection, andthe current focus is African
(38:21):
Caribbean collections, which wewrap up in the next year or two.
That transparency allows us toknow exactly what's out there
right, and once we know exactlywhat's out there, then we can
reevaluate what's in ourcollections and start to ask for
things right.
So in Jamaica Jamaica the mostpopular collection is a
(38:43):
Carpenter's Mountain collection,but there's so many other and
Carpenter's Mountain is part ofthe Hans Sloan collection.
So these are things Hans Sloantook during the 1670s that
became the basis of the BritishMuseum and the Natural History
Museum and one other space inthe UK.
But it is that transparencythat will allow us to get a
(39:08):
sense of what is out thereBecause, more importantly, quite
a few museums have collectionsthat they would have inherited
from the days of empire thatthey don't actually even have
proper metadata for.
So the notion of rep that theydon't actually even have proper
metadata for, so the the notionof repatriation, is also about
how do we get the informationthat you need, because you can't
(39:28):
ask for something for which youdon't have an accompanying
archive.
That's the first thing, and thesecond thing is there are these
large diasporic communities inEurope.
Do we take everything or do webuild bridges?
And I do believe that we haveto think about our current
capacity, we have to think aboutour diasporic communities and
(39:54):
we also have to think about howdo we get access to knowledge,
because it's not just onlyobjects, it's things like film
footage that you have to paycopyright and intellectual
property fees on.
That belong to the caribbean,they were filmed in the
caribbean, but they are locatedelsewhere.
The owner is probably some dudethat happened to be in the
(40:16):
right place at the right time,for which they're now charging
you like 110 pounds a second.
Yeah, so repatriation is notjust that, it's any cultural
material, and it's also thinkingabout intellectual property and
copyright, and that's one ofthe things I also learned by
being in Scotland Like what arethe implications for digital
(40:38):
repatriation in light of theevolving legislations around
intellectual property andcopyright?
So it requires very much abird's eye view of what's
happening in the heritage sector.
Speaker 1 (40:52):
Well, I think with that I will close this out,
because I'm really excited todefinitely see the Jamaican
giant gallow wasps when it'savailable.
So thank you for the work thatyou've done, as well as the
entire team on both sides, and Ihope we all take into account
this really tremendouslyhistoric moment.
I to your earlier point.
(41:13):
Right, we might think, oh, youknow, it would have, could have
been cooler if it was an oldpainting or an old yeah, not a
16 inch lizard um, but I thinkit's a start and one that
hopefully continues to transcendum and shape future generations
.
So thank you again.
Thank you, thank you for havingme.
Yes, thank you, dr roper um,and to our strictly facts family
(41:35):
.
I hope you enjoyed this episode.
I'll be sure to include linksabout what's going on across
universities, the measures forrepatriation that are occurring,
a picture I can you know.
Try to find that sketch of oneso you all can see what it looks
like.
In the meantime, until nexttime, little more.
Thanks for tuning in toStrictly Facts.
(41:59):
Visit strictlyfactspodcastcomfor more information from each
episode.
Follow us at Strictly Facts Podon Instagram and Facebook and
at Strictly Facts PD on Twitter.
Welcome to Strictly Facts, a guide to Caribbean
history and culture, hosted byme, alexandria Miller.
Strictly Facts teaches thehistory, politics and activism
of the Caribbean and connectsthese themes to contemporary
music and popular culture.
Wamp people.
Welcome back to another episodeof Strictly Facts, a guide to
(00:23):
Caribbean history and culture.
If this is your first timetuning in, I'm Alexandria Miller
and here to discuss all thingsCaribbean stories, not only as
connections to our past but, asevidenced from today's episode,
as connections to who we aretoday and our evolving futures.
History is always happening allaround us, and, in fact, in our
(00:45):
most recent discussion with MrKevin Farmer from the Barbados
Museum and Historical Society,he shared a brief tidbit with us
about an artifact'srepatriation back to the lands
of the Caribbean, specificallyJamaica, and so in our
discussion today, we'redefinitely continuing on that
track, because I naturally hadto learn more about this and
(01:06):
share it with you all, and sojoining me for this sort of
continuation of our CaribbeanMuseum discussion is Dr Shani
Roper, curator of the Universityof West Indies Mona Museum and
a Caribbean historian with aspecial focus on Caribbean
childhoods.
Dr Roper, thank you so much forbeing here.
Let's begin with you telling usa bit about yourself, your
(01:29):
connection to the Caribbean andwhat inspired your passion for
Caribbean history and museumeducation.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Okay, so I'm Jamaican , born and grown and lived in
the States for grad school andcame back, so I've been in
Jamaica basically majority of mylife.
So I have always had, as myparents would put it, an
(01:55):
affinity to dates and storylines, which really that's what
history is a lot of is storiesthat are guided by dates as
peripheries and our ability tocompile multiple storylines that
are developed from engaging thearchive to come up with
multiple perspectives andnarratives.
(02:16):
So I have always defaulted tohistory.
All my degrees are in historyand just everything in my
schooling, surprisingly, hasbeen history.
And, of course, because I'm inJamaica, your first history is
the history of the island thatyou live in.
(02:37):
And then, as you advancethrough your schooling, through
your schooling, if you stay inthe field, then it becomes more
and more regional and more andmore detailed and intense.
And because I also did mydoctorate in history, I did
world history, african-americanhistory and Caribbean history in
(02:59):
terms of non-Jamaican history.
So I've always functioned likethat.
You know I'm not transitioningfrom a different field, but what
was important is that, out ofundergrad, my first job, my
first and only job at the time,only interview I got actually
was at the Museum of History andEthnography at the Institute of
(03:21):
Jamaica, and that environmentreally bridged the gap between
my practice as a historian andfunctioning in a museum space,
and so, even though I did leaveto go do my doctorate in history
, I've actually functioned inmuseum and heritage spaces for
(03:41):
about 20 years, and so it hasbeen a very important part of my
understanding our ownengagement, um and and some kind
of like real skills, becausemuseums require administration,
museums require logisticsplanning, museums require policy
development and grant writingand public education, and so it
(04:06):
brings a more practical,non-academic component.
In my life.
I've been trying to struggleboth, sometimes successfully,
sometimes not as successfullyduring the course of my career.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Well, I think we can jump in from there right into
our discussion.
Thank you so much for sharing abit about yourself.
We can jump in from there rightinto our discussion.
Thank you so much for sharing abit about yourself.
I want to, of course, talkabout the repatriation of
artifacts from you know some ofthese former in some cases,
depending on where we're talkingabout, of course, colonizing
bodies and their impact on ourhistories, right, and so, most
(04:42):
recently, it was reportedofficially by sources like the
Jamaica Observer, the JamaicaGleaner, in late April and early
May respectively, that a groupof scientists and researchers,
yourself included, from UWE,from the Institute of Jamaica
and from the National HistoryMuseum of Jamaica, had recently
returned home after repatriatingthe Jamaican giant galley wasp
(05:03):
from Scotland, which is said tohave been taken back in the
1850s, and so its return is saidto be the first repatriated
natural history specimen to theregion.
Could you tell us a bit moreabout the history of the galley
wasp and how it even ended up inScotland in the first place?
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Okay, so the Giant Jamaican Galiwas.
So let me put it first that Iworked at the Institute of
Jamaica and while we were at theInstitute of Jamaica, the
Natural History Museum ofJamaica is actually a division.
It's one of the five divisionsof the Institute of Jamaica
which, for those who don't knowthe Institute of Jamaica is the
(05:45):
equivalent of the Smithsonianbut a significantly smaller
scale, and the Institute wasestablished in 1879 under Sir
Anthony Musgrave.
It has legislation in Jamaicangovernment for the preservation
of art, science and literatureand it has five divisions and
(06:08):
two departments.
So the divisions would beNatural History, national
Gallery of Jamaica, africanCaribbean Institute of Jamaica,
national Museum Jamaica, whichused to be Museum of History and
Ethnography, and what they callthe Programs Division, and then
the two departments was morelike three Simone Bolivar,
liberty Hall, legacy of MarcusGarvey and Jamaica Music Museum.
(06:30):
When we think of a museumnational collection, the
national collection is actuallyhoused in the Institute of
Jamaica across all of thosedivisions and while I was there
and I think they still have itwe had what we call the
researchers and curatorscommittee and it was a committee
where all of us from thedifferent departments and
(06:52):
divisions would talk aboutthings that we were working on
and some key things in thecollection.
So I knew about the giant gallowwasp, I knew that there wasn't
a specimen in the collection andI knew that there was an
undated sketch of the Gally Wasp.
So the Gally Wasp, the giantJamaican Gally Wasp, is the
(07:13):
largest of a scientific familythat's referred to as Celestios
Ossidios, right, jamaica has avery high level of endemism in
the ecological environment andespecially among reptiles, with
lizards specifically.
So, as my colleagues explainedto me, they're like 40 something
(07:33):
different families of lizards.
36 of those are endemic toJamaica and four of them are
extinct, one of which is a giantgalley wasp, right.
So the galley wasp.
It doesn't look like atraditional lizard, it looks
more like a snake with shortlegs.
That's how I would interpret itfrom a non-scientific
(07:53):
perspective.
It's not a cute specimen,although the specimen has since
grown on me.
It's not cute, right?
So it's not the most photogenicspecimen, although I think the
Hunterian has produced someamazingly beautiful photos of
what we were trying to do.
So this specific Galiwasp,jamaica has 10 of the 11 in the
(08:19):
family.
The Celestius Ossidus family isendemic to Jamaica, right, the
Celestius Ossidus family isendemic to Jamaica, right, I
think the 11th one is the one inHispaniola that's called the
Haitian giant galliwasp right,and that one, I think, is
endangered.
So the galliwasp, this specificone, is believed to have lived
(08:41):
in swamp areas, specificallywhat we refer to today as the
environs of the Black RiverMorass, which is like the
largest protected I don't knowwhat you want to call it, but it
has a crocodile sanctuary there.
So if you want, you bring yourchildren and you do boat rides
throughout the morass, and thereare a whole set of other things
(09:01):
that you would learn in likeprimary school about it.
I don't remember now.
So anyway, it believed to havebeen from that area and with the
expansion of the plantationeconomy in the parishes of, like
Clarendon and St Elizabeth, theclearing of swampland, the
extraction of water to maintainthe plantation economy really
(09:24):
resulted in significant habitatloss.
The secondary factor is theintroduction of the mongoose,
and the mongoose was introducedto deal with issues with rats
and snakes in the sugar fields.
But the mongoose Indianmongoose has no natural
predators in Jamaica, so theyhave since evolved to function
in the Jamaican ecological spaceand they're believed to kill,
(09:49):
along with wild feral cats, alot of the endemic species that
are integral to the Jamaicanecological landscape.
But the giant galley waspactually has not been reported
as being collected since the1840s and it's believed to have
become extinct during themid-19th century.
This specific specimen, whichwe got from the Hunterian Museum
(10:14):
, which is the for theUniversity of Glasgow, was
originally a part of theAndersonian collection and
according to the metadata, itwas collected in the 1850s.
The Andersonian collection wasabsorbed into the Hunterian
collection in the 1880s and thespecimen remained in the
(10:34):
collection from that time untilit came out for exhibition
purposes in the last two years.
So this specimen we believe is170 years old.
But because the giant galliwasphas been extinct since the
1840s, we actually don't knowwhat is the average lifespan of
an adult giant galliwasp.
(10:54):
So it's older than 170.
It's just been dead for 170years and living in ethanol.
So the University of the WestIndies and the University of
Glasgow have a MOU and that MOUis very often referred to as a
reparations MOU.
So one of the things is that wedon't know who collected that
(11:18):
specimen and we're not sureexactly where it came from.
But one of the things that wehave recognized as museum
practitioners and as scholars ofcollections that a lot of
Caribbean collections becausethey do not constitute looted
collections moved as part ofempire.
(11:39):
So people came.
They came, you know, when theCaribbean was considered the
frontier.
They came, they collected theflora and fauna because it
didn't look like anything thatthey wanted and also where
they're from, and also in themid 19th century, being a
naturalist was also part of thesocial activities that people
(11:59):
had, and so what you ended uphaving is that a lot of the
collections for the Caribbean,in the United Kingdom especially
, are of natural origin, sothey're either flora, fauna or
cultural items made from naturalcomponents in the environment.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
Wow, thank you, I think so much for, of course,
for situating, you know, thehistory of the giant gallow wasp
for us, but also providing, Ithink, a very needed background
to why this is, you know, suchan important and, as a result of
a lot of increasedconversations about repatriation
, whether, that is, you know, ona global scale, museums in
general.
You know there are even morerecent conversations I've seen
(12:55):
about Portugal specifically inrepatriation, but I think, for
the case of our discussion today, particularly between UWE and
the University of Glasgow, ofour discussion today,
particularly between UWE and theUniversity of Glasgow, and so
what was this process like interms of coordinating for the
artifacts return and thecollaboration between scholars
and the governments and, youknow, the universities, of
(13:16):
course, between the twocountries?
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Okay.
So the University of the WestIndies and the University of
Glasgow have an MOU and it'susually they were signed in 2019
, and it's usually referred toas the reparations MOU, and it's
grown within this exchange,knowledge sharing process of
MOUs kind of costed at 20million pounds.
(13:42):
So under the MOU, the Hunterianengaged in a project, an
exhibition that they calledCurating Discomfort, and the
museums and the ways in whichmuseums could engage each other
was always a part of thediscussion.
However, when my colleague atthe Hunterian, mike Mike also
(14:09):
was a zoology curator at the StAugustine campus in Trinidad for
several years before hereturned to Scotland and he's
Scottish he went to work at theZoology Museum at the Hunterian.
They had engaged communitycurators to go through the
collection and one of them hadidentified the Gallywasp.
(14:30):
As you know, they were justlike why is this lizard in
Scotland when you guys don'thave any Gallywasp's hairs?
So when it was put on display,mike wrote myself and another
colleague who actually wasretired so he never got the
email to say, hey, we have aGaliwasp here.
(14:52):
We know you guys don't have aGaliwasp.
We think this is an idealcandidate for repatriation.
Would you be interested infacilitating it?
And, of course, because I havemy IOJ background, I knew
immediately the significance ofthe request and said to him that
I will reach out to mycolleagues at the Institute of
(15:13):
Jamaica.
So what ended up happening wasthat we formed a committee.
I remember one of the radiointerviewers was like you formed
an entire committee for Alizade.
I was like, yes, we did so.
I brought in my colleagues fromthe Institute of Jamaica, which
I would have been known for allof this time, and colleagues
from the Hunterian, and we satdown and we actually worked out
(15:36):
what this repatriation couldlook like.
And that's very important,right.
And we committed to a set ofvalues our own knowledge sharing
and knowledge co-production.
And then we worked out whatdoes this look like?
Do we go to Scotland?
Do they come to Jamaica?
(15:57):
Either way, where do we get themoney to facilitate this
process?
And so we hosted, through UWEMuseum platforms, a virtual
program last year, june, calledRepatriation, natural History
Collections and KnowledgeCo-Production.
(16:18):
The case of the giant galiwaspit's on the museum's Facebook
page case of the giant gallowhas been it's on our, it's on
the museum's facebook page andum, coming out of it.
We agreed okay, what we will dois that we will have people
from jamaica go to scotlandrather than people from scotland
come to jamaica.
Um, the other thing is wedecided that we would apply for
(16:43):
funding for four persons to go,two from IOJ, two from the
University of the West Indiesand, in keeping with the MOU,
we'd have to have a graduatestudent.
We were successful in ourrequest for funding and the
Glasgow Caribbean Centre forDevelopment Research funded
(17:03):
majority of the trip and thenthe Office of Global Affairs at
the University of the WestIndies funded the student.
And we had to you know, ofcourse, through institutional
engagement show an equal whichis how universities work anyway
show an equal contribution andinvestment in the project.
In order for us to go and get it, we had to put the specimen on
(17:29):
CITES Jamaica appendices, andCITES is the international
convention that deals with theillicit trafficking of
endangered flora and fauna.
Right, it's presumed extinct,but it had to go on the CITES
appendices, so it goes on theappendix schedule.
We had to apply for an importlicense, then we had to apply
(17:50):
for a vet import license inorder to walk the specimen back
into the country, right, and sowe left April 17.
Well, we actually really lefton the 18th.
Our flight was delayed byseveral hours so we left like
after midnight on the 18th.
(18:11):
We got to Glasgow that eveningon the 18th, of course we
dropped six hours and thespecimen, by the Monday, was
taken out of ethanol, because wecan't travel with things in
ethanol.
So it was taken out of ethanol,wrapped in cheesecloth, soaked,
(18:36):
and that was then soaked inalcohol or in ethanol, and then
it was vacuum sealed, right, sothat they triple vacuum sealed,
in fact, so that the fluid wouldstay in the bag, and then we
put it in a clip box with aimage over it and I brought it.
(18:57):
It was a put in my care as thenon-scientist and I the only
non-scientist actually in thegroup and I uh took it as my
carry-on through all thesecurity checkpoints on the
Wednesday, because once weadhered to all the not security
protocols like who has controlof it?
(19:18):
Well, I guess that's calledsecurity protocols um, and then
I walked it.
It traveled with me at my footon the plane back to jamaica and
there are all the securitycheckpoints and um, and once I
got to jamaica I had to declareit right, um, using all the
paperwork that we had used,including the official
(19:41):
documentation, to say that thespecimen was handed over, the
transfer of ownership to theUniversity of the West Indies,
all the newspaper articles,everything you know.
And once it was approved, Ihanded it over to the zoology
curator who came with us,elizabeth Morrison, and it went
(20:03):
into holdings at the NaturalHistory Museum of Jamaica.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
What a long journey.
I'm sure that was.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
Yeah, the entire process took 19 months To the
date that we collected it.
It was 19 months, Wow, wow, wow.
Yeah, and that was fairly quickbecause it's happening private
institution to privateinstitution, so it doesn't get
wrapped up in the kind ofdiplomatic channels that
normally happens for repatriateditems.
And this is what a lot ofpeople, I think, don't
(20:33):
understand that repatriation isactually a very complex legal
policy thing.
Right, you know, there is anotion that you know in Jamaica,
we're like oh, if somebody teefyour things, they must give it
back to you.
Yes, I totally agree, but thethings that you're talking about
are locked behind policy andlaw.
(20:54):
Right, and when you have alegislative and policy framework
that justifies former imperialnations keeping collections
under the guise that they arepart of their heritage, you're
going to run into some issues.
Right Now, there's some standardthings that no longer come off
(21:15):
a debate.
One of them is human remains,and so what you have happening
in, generally speaking, globally, is that, without too much
contestation, I think, humanremains get repatriated and
reinterred, and there are quitea few international conventions
and there's also the kind ofpractice in the field of
(21:35):
anthropology and other fieldsaround how you engage human
remains, and so it's a bad ideato fight to hold on to human
remains unless you are doingmedical research right.
And even so the medicalprofession has developed a kind
of complex ethics framework forhandling human remains.
(21:58):
The other one is works of artright, and I think one of the
most popular debates we're awareof is the Benin bronzes out of
West Africa and the looting ofthe city of Benin.
While during military expansionof imperialists, you know,
after the 1884 Berlin Convention, where Africa is really divided
(22:20):
up in a room by someimperialists.
Right, and when you deal withlooted collections, especially
after World War II, there arevery clear ideas about how to
handle looted collections.
Now the problem is a lot ofBenin branches if you scour the
news, they're sent back onpermanent loan.
(22:43):
There isn't a transfer ofownership.
That is different from theillicit trafficking, for example
, of pre-Columbian objects thathappens out of Latin America,
for example, when a lot of thoseget transferred through
diplomatic channels.
A museum might say, oh, I havethese pre-Columbian artifacts in
(23:05):
my collection and theprovenance and provenance being
the history of ownership is alittle sketchy.
We want to distance ourselvesfrom it.
Let me contact your embassy tosee if we can get it back, and
because the Mexican governmentand quite a few other Latin
American governments CentralAmerican governments as well are
(23:25):
very clear about their materialheritage, things get
transferred on the diplomaticchannels right, and so one of
the things that is clear is that, in order to have repatriation
happen, there needs to be aprocess of giving over and a
process of accepting, and youneed the structure on both ends
(23:47):
for it to work effectively.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
And so, in that case, a natural artifact like the
giant gallow functioned a littlebit differently.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Thank you.
It functioned differentlybecause it was a private
institution to a privateinstitution, because we didn't
know that the Ontarian had agalley wasp Right and in fact it
was through this project thatthey realized that they had more
than one Right.
But it's still a universitywith a research and teaching
(24:18):
collection.
So the universities focus veryheavily on research, teaching
and engagement through knowledgeproduction right.
So at the end of the day, youstill need your research
collection.
But because it was private toprivate, uwe retains the right
to put it in permanent known inthe national collection, because
(24:40):
that is where it's mostaccessible and not at the
University of the West Indies.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Right, interesting.
Thank you so much again forthat.
I think on one hand aside, orin addition to it being a very
long process, your point aboutknowledge production is also
important.
In what ways, or you know what,have researchers already begun
to learn about its existence inJamaica beyond what we already
(25:06):
knew, sort of?
What does the timeline evenlook like for it being available
to the public?
Speaker 2 (25:12):
OK, so in this case, we've classified it as a very
rare specimen because it's theonly one in the region and it's
170 years old, so the handlingof it has to be reduced
significantly.
However, it's only just returned, and so, basically, what we've
done is that we've done the kindof public are persons who study
(25:35):
lizards, so they've alreadybeen able to see it right, and
for them it's things likecounting the scales, the fact
that, unless you went to theUnited Kingdom or went abroad to
(26:00):
a collection that had agalliowasp in it, if you study
lizards, you're never going tosee one.
And in fact, what we found outby actually seeing this specimen
was that the image, the sketchthat the institution had which
comes from Hans Sloan's accountof galley wasps, because he was
(26:22):
collecting things in the 1670sum was actually not drawn to
scale and a poor representationof what a galley wasp looked
like, right, and so, by the merefact that people can see it
right and that scientists canthink about okay, these are the
things that we need to thinkabout when you look, for galley
(26:42):
was to think about the evolutionof the species itself.
And then also, we also took DNAprofiling from it, because the
galliwasp is actually, as thezoologist explained to me,
retiring creatures, so itdoesn't mean that it's
completely extinct, and thesespecifically apparently used to
(27:02):
only come out at nightcompletely extinct, and these
specifically apparently used toonly come out at night.
So it is possible, in the moredense areas, for example, of the
morass, that it could be thereand we just don't know, and so
the DNA profiling is important.
The next step that we'reworking on and my hope is that
we can get funding for it is forartists to do sketches and to
(27:23):
develop handling items thatwould give people an access to
the Galiwas that doesn't requireus disrupting its current state
and then when it will beavailable.
So for right now.
Initially we're hoping that itwill be available May 22.
(27:46):
But it looks like it's going togo into June, unfortunately.
But we're working on it becausea lot of Jamaicans, even though
they have a really significantfear of lizards, are actually
now interested and want to seeit.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
So yes, I think that is a very interesting point that
you make.
We're always talking aboutlizards and fear, right, but um,
even within I mean, probablylots of you know, more recent
generations don't know muchabout the gallow wasp, but it
was definitely a part of ourfolklore, um, with even you know
(28:19):
saying, saying that you know ifa galley wasp stings you and
reaches the water, yeah, theydon't bite, yeah, but they don't
bite and they're more likely torun away from you and in fact,
because this specific one is inswampy areas, more than likely
you'd run into another one whiletrying to get away from the one
that you think bit you.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
But it does present a quest and I've been thinking
about it as a social historian.
They the lore is based.
In fact there must have beensomething that was happening
that has resulted in this longrecollection and long social
memory.
Because I grew up in kingston.
(28:57):
I've never seen a gallivant,I've never grown lizard.
You know the big, long greengrown lizard.
I've never grown lizard, I'venever known gallivant, right,
but I know about it.
I know that if they bite youyou run and go water.
What is the basis for it?
Because they don't sting.
We don't have any poisonousanimals in our endemic group in
(29:18):
in jamaica.
So what is the basis of this?
And it?
It poses a very importantsocial history question about
how we understand the role of um.
I want to have the better work.
I'm not sure how I feel aboutthe term folklore, but you know
how do we engage this kind ofcollective memory?
(29:40):
That is, it makes the lizardevil but right, because
technically, if it bites you,you must trouble it Like I don't
know, like you must trouble it.
That's why it bites you.
You know what I mean.
So it requires some kind ofthinking through, and you know
you can't just exclude itbecause the thing has been gone
since the 1840s.
(30:01):
So what is the basis of it?
And I think that's a legitimatequestion yeah, one may be its
size.
Speaker 1 (30:07):
I mean, I think to think of a 16 inch lizard well,
that's, and that one was a youngadult.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
While we were in scotland we saw others that were
bigger and the estimate is thatthey ran from 16 to 20 inches,
because a grown lizard is stillslim.
Even your biggest grown lizardis, like, not big.
The galley wasp is afull-figured lizard.
Like it's not just that it is16 inches, is that it ticked too
(30:34):
right?
So I can can see why it wouldbe a problem, right, but still
not so sure.
Like I think we need somebetter accounts to tell us what
the underlying cause was youknow.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
So yeah, that, I think, brings me to a general
point in terms of our discussion.
Just what are your thoughts interms of the repatriation of
artifacts, be they naturalhistory oriented or otherwise,
back to the region generally,and how do you see the return of
the giant gallow wasps being acatalyst for other artifacts
(31:10):
throughout the region?
Speaker 2 (31:12):
Well, I think if it can return, that is that it can
return anything.
So I think it is a toe in thedoor Right.
So I think it is a toe in thedoor right.
But we have a responsibility asCaribbean nations to and I'm
speaking very broadly in termsof Caribbean I'm not only
talking about the Englishspeaking Caribbean, because the
(31:32):
Dutch, especially, have beenvery focused on provenance
research.
The French have been involved inthe return of items, and there
is a lot of conversation betweenthe Dutch kingdom and the
Caribbean countries in the Dutchkingdom about repatriation and
there are these variations ofrepatriation like digital
(31:54):
repatriation, and digitalrepatriation to me makes no
sense.
But sure, if that's thelanguage that we're using, then
it is a component of the debateswithin repatriation.
But Caribbean countriesactually have a responsibility
to not only ensure that theybecome signatories of
(32:14):
conventions that deal withrepatriation even if it cannot
be applied retroactively Becausethose conventions actually
require us to develop a veryeffective infrastructure to
receive, and it requires us toput in legislation to ensure
that we are in positions toprotect the things that come
(32:34):
back if we decide to go back forit.
So I think it's a toe in thedoor.
It broadens our idea of whatcultural property is right,
because very often we don'tthink of a lizard as part of our
cultural property, ecologicaland cultural environment, then
(32:58):
things flora and fauna are alsoconsidered material culture and
should be strategicallyrequested because it may not be
everything that you needed, inthis case the giant galliwasp.
It actually helps to completethe national collection because
it's a massive gap in thecollection and also, based on
(33:19):
some research that was done, theInstitute of Jamaica did
actually have giant galliwaspsin its collection but with the
1907 earthquake it's either thatit's during the 1907 earthquake
or around the time of the 1907earthquake where they moved some
of the collections.
The specimens were lost, butdefinitely during the earthquake
(33:40):
because the building that theInstitute occupied because it's
been on East Street the entire145 years that's been
functioning, the building thatthey occupied was destroyed.
So the current building thatexists as the main plant well,
the first of several main plantsof the Institute of Jamaica was
(34:01):
built in 1911 in the aftermathof the earthquake.
Then brings into this questionabout theft.
Right, because if we are a partof the colonial empire and we
didn't steal it and you knowwe're just, you know they're not
having a war, you know, becausepeople just came and went as
they pleased and there was nolegislation preventing the
(34:23):
mobility of cultural items.
I think the first thing it doesis also demand us to have some
transparency about what is outthere, because the Caribbean
museums don't know what's outthere.
And then, secondly, it requiresus to set up the infrastructure
and to develop relationshipsthat allow us to think through
(34:46):
the process of return.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
I think, to that point, definitely necessary, as
we're, for Jamaica, particularlythinking about, you know, and
shifting towards republicanismand, you know, dealing with
these aftermaths of imperialismeven today and continually
moving forward.
So thank you for sharing thatas well.
Um, my penultimate question ofevery strictly facts episode, um
(35:11):
is always looking for ways thatwe connect these stories and
these histories to our popularculture, and so what is one or a
few even of your favoriteexamples of it doesn't have to
be the Galiwas specifically, butthe ways that, you know, our
education and even repatriationshow up in history and popular
(35:31):
culture.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
Ah, the popular culture is going to kill me,
parrot.
You know, I don't know if Ihave a favorite.
I really don't know if I have afavorite.
I really don't know if I have afavorite, and that may be
because I function in amultidisciplinary environment,
right?
Um, the things that matter mostto me is the ways in which the
(36:01):
engagement of history andculture creates opportunity for
public engagement.
So I think, you know, I alwayscome back to the Kingston Art
Walk and the murals on WaterLane and the relationship
between Kingston Creative andthe National Gallery of Jamaica.
So those are the things that Iactually cannot.
Speaker 1 (36:24):
I think it counts.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
I would yeah right or or or increasing um tours of
downtown Kingston, those thosehistory tours.
For me, because Kingston hassuch a phenomenal history right,
and I think because ofKingston's life as a space in
(36:47):
Jamaican society and in thecontemporary context, a lot of
that history gets lost.
And so we have beautifulhistoric buildings but they're
not maintained because we don'tdo urban tourism in the same way
that urban tourism occurs in,like Cuba, for example.
So you know, it's just one ofthose things that we have to
(37:10):
work through, but I'm excitedabout the new trends that have
been happening.
Speaker 1 (37:14):
Me as well, and so, finally, I think, in addition to
the sort of artifactrepatriation that we've been
specifically talking about today, what do you hope to see for
other universities and those whoyou know may even have some of
these artifacts in their ownprivate collections?
What do you hope to?
Speaker 2 (37:38):
see in terms of continuing to right these wrongs
of colonialism, increasedtransparency.
I think what worked for us wasthat the Hunterian is committed
and actually Scotland, asopposed to England, is more
committed to repatriation.
And one of the lessons I've hadto learn is that even within
the United Kingdom I've had tolearn that even within the
(38:00):
United Kingdom it's a verynuanced space and what we found
because Scotland is morereceptive and because they're
engaging there's a series ofprograms coming out of national
museums Scotland aroundcollection, exploring what
objects are in collection, andthe current focus is African
(38:21):
Caribbean collections, which wewrap up in the next year or two.
That transparency allows us toknow exactly what's out there
right, and once we know exactlywhat's out there, then we can
reevaluate what's in ourcollections and start to ask for
things right.
So in Jamaica Jamaica the mostpopular collection is a
(38:43):
Carpenter's Mountain collection,but there's so many other and
Carpenter's Mountain is part ofthe Hans Sloan collection.
So these are things Hans Sloantook during the 1670s that
became the basis of the BritishMuseum and the Natural History
Museum and one other space inthe UK.
But it is that transparencythat will allow us to get a
(39:08):
sense of what is out thereBecause, more importantly, quite
a few museums have collectionsthat they would have inherited
from the days of empire thatthey don't actually even have
proper metadata for.
So the notion of rep that theydon't actually even have proper
metadata for, so the the notionof repatriation, is also about
how do we get the informationthat you need, because you can't
(39:28):
ask for something for which youdon't have an accompanying
archive.
That's the first thing, and thesecond thing is there are these
large diasporic communities inEurope.
Do we take everything or do webuild bridges?
And I do believe that we haveto think about our current
capacity, we have to think aboutour diasporic communities and
(39:54):
we also have to think about howdo we get access to knowledge,
because it's not just onlyobjects, it's things like film
footage that you have to paycopyright and intellectual
property fees on.
That belong to the caribbean,they were filmed in the
caribbean, but they are locatedelsewhere.
The owner is probably some dudethat happened to be in the
(40:16):
right place at the right time,for which they're now charging
you like 110 pounds a second.
Yeah, so repatriation is notjust that, it's any cultural
material, and it's also thinkingabout intellectual property and
copyright, and that's one ofthe things I also learned by
being in Scotland Like what arethe implications for digital
(40:38):
repatriation in light of theevolving legislations around
intellectual property andcopyright?
So it requires very much abird's eye view of what's
happening in the heritage sector.
Speaker 1 (40:52):
Well, I think with that I will close this out,
because I'm really excited todefinitely see the Jamaican
giant gallow wasps when it'savailable.
So thank you for the work thatyou've done, as well as the
entire team on both sides, and Ihope we all take into account
this really tremendouslyhistoric moment.
I to your earlier point.
(41:13):
Right, we might think, oh, youknow, it would have, could have
been cooler if it was an oldpainting or an old yeah, not a
16 inch lizard um, but I thinkit's a start and one that
hopefully continues to transcendum and shape future generations
.
So thank you again.
Thank you, thank you for havingme.
Yes, thank you, dr roper um,and to our strictly facts family
(41:35):
.
I hope you enjoyed this episode.
I'll be sure to include linksabout what's going on across
universities, the measures forrepatriation that are occurring,
a picture I can you know.
Try to find that sketch of oneso you all can see what it looks
like.
In the meantime, until nexttime, little more.
Thanks for tuning in toStrictly Facts.
(41:59):
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