Trinidad Carnival : A Quest for National Identity

The Trinidad carnival is a complex product wrought by two centuries of history in which it has successfully undergone the cultural and ideological influences of the white planter elite, the black lower class and the Creole middle claaa process which has conferred on the festival a hybrid cultural baggage.

Does this mean that the present-day carnival has become a broken-winged festival, an innocent tourist attraction to uphold a lost folk tradition?

The author of this text argues against this. Instead the fading away of boundaries between what were orignially class-bound socio-cultural spheres within the festival provides an oportunity for entirely new forms of exchange and confrontation.

The varied influences of past centuries have combined under the auspices of the dominant Creole middle class, into a form which can reflect contemporary social conflicts and problems. This text illustrates the festival's potential to create an atmosphere where topics emerge for discussion which extend beyond the organizational and content boundaries of the carnival itself.