Professor Says She’s Still Being ‘Cursed’ For Inviting Vybz Kartel To Deliver University Lecture
Culture and Development specialist, Professor Carolyn Cooper, says up to this day, 10 years after she invited Vybz Kartel to deliver his Pretty Like a Colouring Book: My Life and My Art lecture to students at the University of the West Indies (UWI) Mona Campus, she is still being vilified by many Jamaicans for her decision.
Professor Cooper, who is the author of Sound Clash: Jamaica Dancehall Culture at Large, made the revelation in an article today, in which she addressed several current affairs topics, as well as objected to an assertion made by a commenter that she would be delighted if Vybz Kartel were to be conferred with the title of National Hero of Jamaica.
Professor Cooper had earned the wrath of many Jamaicans in 2011 after she invited Kartel, whose given name is Adijah Palmer, to deliver a lecture at the UWI, after students, who were enrolled in Reggae Poetry, made the request.
“It was the students in my ‘Reggae Poetry’ class at the University of the West Indies (UWI) who made me start listening to Kartel’s lyrics,” she noted in her column.
“We studied Burning Spear, Jimmy Cliff, Peter Tosh, Bob Marley, Steel Pulse, Buju Banton and Tanya Stephens. Every year the students complained about why Kartel was not on the course. He’s good. I would tell them that everybody can’t be on the single course. To satisfy them, I invited Kartel to give a lecture at UWI in 2011. Up to now, certain people are still cursing me,” Professor Cooper said.
Contrary to the ‘Kartel for national hero’ comment which came following her opinion piece in the Gleaner last week Sunday where she batted for “Louise Bennett and Bob Marley ” and people in popular culture to be considered for hero status “like Rihanna”, Cooper categorically denied that she would support the Fever artist being given Jamaica’s highest national award.
“Look what ‘Marcus Garvey II’ posted on The Gleaner’s website: ‘I am almost sure that Dr Cooper would not object to Kartel being named a hero’,” the linguistics lecturer noted on her website this morning. I deliberately did not refer to dancehall in the column. I knew they would claim that I’m promoting dancehall national heroes. I said ‘popular culture.’ That’s music, dance, style and fashion, film, theatre, all kinds of things.”
Similar to how she vehemently opposed Reverend Al Miller being conferred with a national honour, she pointed out that it would be a travesty to confer Kartel with hero status.
“I never thought I would have needed to shout it out and put it in writing that I would ‘object’ if any attempt was made to turn Vybz Kartel into a national hero,” she noted.
“I would protest vigorously, just as so many of us did when crazy people gave a national honour to Al Miller. Dishonourable, irreverent convicted criminal!” she wrote, referring to the clergyman who was chosen to be presented with the Commander of Distinction National Award despite two convictions, including “negligence resulting in the loss of his licensed firearm in 2011” and attempting to pervert the course of justice for which he was found guilty in 2016.
In her column last week, Sunday, Professor Cooper had also written that politicians of both the Opposition Peoples National Party and the ruling Jamaica Labour Party, among other things, have not been listening to their compatriots who think it is time to appoint national heroes who embody the best of Jamaican popular culture and that they “have no vision of the kind of modern hero that is needed to inspire young people”.
She had also said that while Bob Marley and Louise Bennett were ideal candidates for national hero, “even they are distant from today’s youth”.
“Many senior citizens do not realise that reggae is no longer current music for most young people. It’s like what mento is for old people. An earlier generation’s music! Of course, we have to teach the youth to appreciate the culture of the past. But they need their own heroes,” she had stated.
Professor Cooper said that, notwithstanding, the Any Weather artist, were he not convicted of a crime, and were a free man, would have been worthy of receiving a national honour similar to many others of his Dancehall predecessors, as his contribution to the music and culture has been indelible.
“All the same, if Kartel had not become a criminal, I think he could have gotten a national honour. Just like Shabba Ranks, Lt Stitchie, Sean Paul, David Rodigan and many more entertainers! Kartel has written a lot of gun lyrics. But he has also written many, many conscious lyrics,” she argued.
She also pointed out that Kartel was expelled from Calabar High School, due to him skipping school to go to the recording studio, and suggested that Jamaica’s secondary schools could harness their musically-inclined students’ musical skills and provide guidance instead.
“I wonder how Adidja ‘Vybz Kartel’ Palmer’s life would have turned out if Calabar had a recording studio for their music programme; and the teachers took dancehall seriously. And it’s not just Calabar. All high schools must review the subjects they teach to see how they can reach students,” she stated.
“Adidja should never have had to skip school to go in studio. That’s why he was expelled. And, perhaps, he wouldn’t be in prison. Adidja Palmer might have had another career, in addition to dancehall DJ, that could have turned Vybz Kartel away from badness,” she added.