Brooklyn J'ouvert

J’ouvert (daybreak) is an anarchic street party that starts early in the morning before sunrise, and lasts a few hours after the sun comes up.  It continues a tradition that began in 19th century Trinidad, when formerly enslaved people on the island created their own carnival festivities to both mimic and mock the slaveowner masquerade balls they were historically excluded from.  The tradition spread throughout the Caribbean, eventually making its way to New York in the 1960s. Today the celebration starts early in the morning Labor Day Monday on the streets of Brooklyn’s Crown Heights neighborhood. Crowds and masqueraders march to Calypso and soca music. Horned revelers in devil mas glare, Jab-Jab masqueraders dab people with paint and oil (everyone gets dirty during J’ouvert) and a man in Burrokeet mas rides his rags and paper machè steed down Empire Boulevard. And just as J’ouvert was a form of vital resistance to the colonizers and former slavers of Trinidad, so it continues today as a joyful celebration of the enduring resilience of the Afro-Caribbean community and culture, and as a form that still expresses an energetic resistance and criticism of social injustices and inequities faced by the community in 21st century America.