‘Dunce Culture Started In The Classroom, Not Music’ – Grounation Tackles ‘Fully Dunce’ Trend And More

The “fully dunce” slang has been problematic since it gained popularity on social media in 2018, manifesting itself in trending songs like Valiant’s Dunce Cheque to the critique of information minister Robert Morgan late last year.

While dancehall music is often made the scapegoat for societal ills, panelists at the 11th staging of Grounation argued that music should not be blamed for dunce culture.

“The first place someone hears dunce is not on the radio, it’s in a classroom from a teacher calling them dunce and organising the classroom in a particular setup so that the kids at the front are smart and anyone in the back is dunce, so, it’s learned very early on,” University of the West Indies’ (UWI) Reggae Poetry lecturer Dr. Isis Semaj Hall said.

The topic arose from a patron’s question about improving today’s lyrical content posed during the Jamaica Music Museum’s (JaMM) free symposium unfolding at the Institute of Jamaica all Sundays this month at 2:00 p.m. on East Street, Kingston. 

Semaj Hall added that “dunceness” is reinforced by parents who use the label when met with undesirable grades.

“When we consider the music that’s talking about a dunce culture, we need to take that critical step back and say, ‘What’s going on in our culture that we would have this?’, and then consider how that word is being reappropriated to be something else because it takes a lot of skill and intelligence to successfully scam someone.”

UWI Cultural Studies lecturer Dr. Sonjah Stanley Niaah echoed the sentiment of music being a mere reflection of society, adding, “the lyrical content can’t change unless the context in which we are living changes.” She did, however, suggest that schools prioritise and invest in music education programmes as a way to dissuade possible criminal activity, an initiative currently active at Calabar High School. 

Event curator and director at JaMM Herbie Miller balanced that “culture artistes” are still represented in contemporary music, stating, “There are a lot of young artistes who are quite uplifting people like Sizzla, Capleton, Protoje, Kabaka Pyramid, Chronixx and Jah 9.”

But are society’s expectations a burden on the arts?

Semaj Hall discouraged the figurative crucifixion of artists and defended their right to freedom of expression. Still, “I think what we are missing overall in Jamaica is that interrogation of the arts – not judgement – just asking these seemingly simple questions and being able to answer them or starting to answer them will get us on the path to the freedom we say we want to have.” 

A reggae/black history month staple, Grounation 2023 is themed Sounds and Society: 60 Years of Music, Political Activism and Social Change, with Sunday’s instalment examining music and political advocacy in colonialism, through federation and post-independence. 

Other matters discussed were the role of the state in cultural expressions, inspiring action behind “message music”, Rastafari’s messages of self-pride and national identity, and the sound system as Jamaica’s national instrument. The event culminated with the JaMM orchestra’s musical take on the programme, performing songs like Tommy McCook’s Federation Sounds and Don Drummond’s Addis Ababa.

Miller was pleased with the turnout.

“Obviously, we were a bit apprehensive after two years since we’ve been able to do this (because of the COVID-19 pandemic), not knowing if people would just resign to locking themselves in, especially the senior citizens among us,” he told DancehallMag. “For those unable to attend, I do know that they missed a wonderful opening, the re-emerging of Grounation, and I expect to see them all and I know we will before the end of the month.”