Rudies and Rastas

I realise this is probably about 6 posts too late but I just thought I would give you a brief insight into the history which links the reggae subculture and rastas. It seems that to most people the two go hand in hand, one is never without the other, and cannot be. While this is largely the case, I wonder how many people have thought about what this link represents? And where it begun? Surprisingly it's not all about the weed and the dreadlocks, and especially in this day and age where the music has developed to become more than just a representation of Jamaica, it is important to understand the significance of the history of the reggae subculture in its original context, not just how it has helped construct alternative genres of music with great global orientation.

For Delroy Washington, a reggae artist from Jamaica who relocated to the UK when he was young, the key Rastafarian ideas remain strong... every man should only do enough to keep him occupied in his life while he is on earth. This mentality has derived from the thoughts that righteousness means equality for all of humanity and therefore only one class of people should exist in the global society.
Rastafarians are typically peaceful, christian-like people who believe in the second coming of an almighty leader. For them, they hold divinity in the late "High Selassie", or the Emperor of Ethiopia who is a signal of better things to come and is the sole guarantor of Rastafarian freedom on this earth.

The Rastafarian message is intrinsic to reggae as it provides a common basis for meaning and it captures the preservation of the African heritage which rastafarians are so homesick for.. Reggae music has managed to encapsulate a special rhythmic continuity from old traditional rasta music produced in Africa within its contemporary aesthetics.

Dick Hebdige, in his audio material from "Mass Communication and Society. Volume 10. Rudies and Rastas", believes that reggae music addresses the contradiction in Rastafarian ideas between the search for the individual self and the search for a community. And it is at this point that ganja becomes involved... in resolving this contradiction. Over a pipeful of marijuana people express their often fanciful but beautiful ideas which always are located right at the core of the soul of humanity.

In this audio tape Hebdige describes the development of the "rudeboy" culture, or the "rudies" as they are called in Jamaica. Rudeboys and Rastas have both responded in different ways to the same cultural difficulties but unfortunately authorities have made no distinctions between the two. Rudeboys stands for everything that rastas disapprove of; violence and rival fractions. Rastafarians always act peacefully and stand for brotherhood and unity. These significant ideas are what construes the ideological content of reggae music and provide reason for the shifts in the mood and emphasis, whilst still exhibiting rasta faith in all of its dynamic entities.

Stuart Hall has also made influential comments about the cultural revolution that has constructed Jamaican society and thus the reggae subculture over the course of recent years. He believes it stems from 3 key notions:
- a form of nationalism
- an immense black consciousness whereby the Jamaican society is acutely aware of their race and culture which has befallen from the African past inherent in all members of society
- social content. By this he is referring to the majority of the population that are poor, oppressed and exploited.

These factors form a 'can of consciousness' in which the expression of nationalism is coming from the lower class, not the middle class as was previously the case. The fact that these ideas come from the roots up essentially demonstrates that those located at the bottom of the class system are those who are most authentically Jamaican and they personify what it means to be authentically Jamaican and the Jamaican identity.
Ironically this therefore translates that the Jamaican identity protests about social exploitation through rastafari cultural identity and reggae music, two entities which are frowned upon by authorities.

References:
Dick Hebdige, "Rudies and Rastas" Milton Keynes : Open University Educational Enterprises, 1977.