Talk:Kalinago

A few questions. Above in talk, it is noted that the Arawaks of Hispaniola told Columbus that the Caribs were cannibals. The article itself implies that the accusations of cannibalism were made up by the Spanish to justify enslaving the Caribs. (This latter seems especially unlikely, given that, well, the Caribs weren't especially noted for being enslaved by the Spanish, unlike the never-accused-of-being-cannibals Arawaks).

At any rate, what I want to know is - is the case for the cannibalism of the Caribs really so weak as this article makes out? Cannibalism is a reasonably common practice of primitive human societies, although the Caribs seem as though they were more advanced than most known cannibalistic societies. On the other hand, the Aztecs were considerably more advanced than the Caribs, and certainly practiced ritual cannibalism. I do not know a great deal about the Caribs, but what I vaguely remember from my Caribbean History class a few years back does not include anything nearly so dismissive of the Caribs' alleged cannibalism as is present in this article. The Columbia Encyclopedia says simply that they did practice cannibalism. Britannica only says that they were alleged to, but does not make the rather sweeping claim that there is no evidence that they did practice cannibalism. I suggest that we remove the sentence that says there is no evidence of cannibalism, and probably also remove the sentence about the Queen's proclamation, since it's a weird one. Instead, I think we should simply have what we currently have about them being accused of cannibalism, and then say that the evidence for cannibalism is inconclusive. john k 07:39, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

I have heard both people who argue strongly that they were not cannibals, and those who say the evidence is inconclusive. But with regards to slavery, it was a big issue. See History of Trinidad and Tobago. The demand for slaves was great, but the Spanish could not enslave "peaceful" Arawaks, so just a few years after Trinidad was described as have the only "friendly" population in the area, demand for slaves in the pearl fisheries of Margarita resulted in the Trinidians being declared "Caribs". Guettarda 10:42, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

Shouldn't this sentence: "Claims of cannibalism, however, must be seen in light of the fact that in 1503, Queen Isabella ruled that only cannibals could be legally taken as slaves, which gave Europeans an incentive to identify various Amerindian groups as cannibals" then really end in ".. as Caribs, who were considered cannibals"? Caribs were accused of cannibalism already in the 1490's and that ruling was meant to protect the "good" indians such as the Tainos. 213.243.181.233 00:56, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Okay, gotcha on that. (But they did enslave "peaceful" Arawaks, didn't they?) At any rate, I'll will revise my suggestion for changes: remove teh sentence that says there is no evidence, and instead say that the evidence is inconclusive. Leave in the sentence about Isabella's proclamation, although perhaps clarify a bit. john k 21:07, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

I know wiki's amateurish, but how about some attempt at research and citation in this article? I also suggest people spouting uninformed garbage about 'primitive' and 'advanced' peoples should refrain from making any edit on a topic dealing with indigenous, non-western societies. Go learn something first.

"Narrative of the Proceedings of Pedrarias Davila" written in 1865 by Pascual de Andagoya... states "Castellanos says that these Indians were called Caribs (or Cannibals), not because they ate human flesh, but because they defended their houses well. "No porque alli comiesen carne humana⁠ Mas porque defendian bien su casa." In reading the entire book and learning about all the different "indians" they met along the way, some were cannibals and some were not.^[2]--The Eloquent Peasant (talk) 22:47, 6 October 2019 (UTC)

I believe that the term African is misused and serves in many respects to mask the genuine history of autochithonous races.

I'm saying that in fact the black peoples found by Europeans to be living alongside or separate from the yellow and red races termed as Amerindian, are actually the remnant of the original inhabitants of the Americas.

The influx of disparate racial traits did not occur in the way almost all discourse on this subject presents it.

Blacks were there before anyone else.

The term African is a general term applied in recent times to anyone with dark skin and curly hair. This is an erroneous title. Africa is in fact a Roman word derived from a member of the Anemoi or indigenous Roman pantheon of deities. AFRICUS is the Roman god representing the wind coming from a South Westerly direction. The territory which is now modern Tunisia was a new province acquired from the Carthaginians by the Romans.

They called it Africa (feminine form of Africus) because it lay to the SW across the sea from Rome (Africus being a possible derivative of an early Aryan language word for "Apricot" - on account of the wafting smell of that fruit coming across the Mediterranean - from a land then teeming with prolific vegetation; thus was deified a directional wind).

Just as Asia was named by Aryan language speakers describing an attribute (a land in the direction of the rising sun), so were other continents. Even Europe has an obscure and surprising meaning based on what was found in that land: Euros + Ops or Black Face.

So you see, to call the black indigenous peoples of the Americas African is misleading. They may not have come from the continent named Africa to begin with. Postulation says that many came across the Pacific Ocean or via land bridges existing at the time of their migration.

I believe the original people of these lands were supplanted by novel strains of humanity and that the white Europeans who arrived in the Americas were merely a second wave of non-black migration. They simply stumbled upon the consequences of an original influx of non-blacks; the remnant of the first wave constitutes the red and yellow straight haired inhabitants wrongly labeled as Indian, or this case Caribs. For the sake of ownership rights the Europeans simply masked the true identities of the original peoples claiming they were African slaves.

Why do I say this? Please explain how there can be an African slave trade responsible for the marooning of African blood in these islands BEFORE "European" intervention!

Read Rafinesque in the Atlantic Journal and Friend of Knowledge 1933. Page 85. - the same responsible for the pre-Carib term: Taino. He states clearly that the people of the Orinoco were Negro.; he cites various observations which confirm the blackness of the original Americans and their Caribbean migrations, all prior to any kind of maritime slave trade.

How could there be black tribes in the Caribbean before the arrival of Columbus?

And yes quite obviously the non-black Caribs were found there in a position of dominance. They had the same propensity for land grabbing as the Europeans who arrived later. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 112.198.90.157 (talk) 04:48, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

Rafinesque is not a source we would use for this - or much else other than his own opinions. Dougweller (talk) 10:56, 6 March 2013 (UTC)

Very interesting. The article 'Genetic evidence for two founding populations of the Americas' by Skoglund, Patterson, Reich et al in the July 23, 2015 issue of 'Nature' presents DNA evidence that may support this hypothesis. See: Skoglund et al -- P999 (talk) 19:23, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

Two etymologies for the word "Carib" have been given in the article, I'm moving them here as neither are referenced. This was added by an anon:

The word Carib is derived from the Arabic word Qaarib (قارب) literally meaning "boat" or "that which approaches (as a boat's approach)" and the Qaaribee (قاربي) is one who is associated with boats. One plural form of Qaaribee is Qaaribeeyeen (قاربيين) from where Caribbean is derived.

This was added by Blakwolf (I edited it some):

Carib or Caribe signifies "brave and daring", from Tupi caryba, or superior man.

They are contradictory, and I don't think they should be put back in w/o references.--Cúchullain ^t/c 17:08, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

The Arabic root is nonsense. The Tupi root would need to be sourced. Guettarda 22:31, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

The account of Carib cannibalism from Columbus's first voyage is persuasive (p. 407, SE Morrison). At that earliest European encounter, Columbus was not looking for slaves. He was looking for China and was pleased to have "Indian" help. It is clear from his accounts that the Taino and Arawak as far from the Lesser Antilles as the Bahamas were terrified of the Carib -- for good reason, because the Carib were more warlike, better armed and had a culture and economy based to a large extent on raiding and slaving, of which cannibalism was a prosaic part. Of course, Spanish colonists subsequently enslaved natives of many tribes, but they needed no excuse of cannibalism to do so, slavery being a reflection of a widespread contemporary norm. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Burke242 (talk • contribs) 19:57, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

"Narrative of the Proceedings of Pedrarias Davila" written in 1865 by Pascual de Andagoya... states "Castellanos says that these Indians were called Caribs (or Cannibals), not because they ate human flesh, but because they defended their houses well. "No porque alli comiesen carne humana⁠ Mas porque defendian bien su casa." In reading the entire book and learning about all the different "indians" they met along the way, some were cannibals and some were not.^[1]--The Eloquent Peasant (talk) 22:47, 6 October 2019 (UTC)

They spoke Kalhíphona, a Maipurean language (Arawakan), although the men spoke either a Carib language or a pidgin. If they're Caribs, shouldn't they all speak Carib? Rather vague and ambiguous. Teke 01:06, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Caribs did migrated from Venezuela to Caribbean islands, but it is wrong to say that they are from this islands,because the main of the carib race remained(to this day), in Venezuela and Colombia.--Andres rojas22 23:19, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

According to Saint Vincent and the Grenadines#Demographics, some Caribs live there today. According to Dominica, the only population of Caribs lives there. According to this article (Carib) they live now only in Dominica and Tobago. It does not mention Saint Vincent.

My question: where exactly do Caribs live today? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 80.178.128.196 (talk) 19:05, 23 March 2007 (UTC).

The Facts: If you like to find out the truth about the caribs of St. Vincent visit http://www.svgtourism.com/channels/1.asp?id=60 it was writen by people that was born there. And yes there still a lot of caribs there.They are fownd in dominica.

IMHO this sentence is pointless: However, women were highly revered and held substantial socio-political power.
Women were "highly reverted" in which way?
by whom?
references?
which "substantial socio-political power" they had?
references?
--Dia^ (talk) 20:25, 19 December 2007 (UTC) If women were the agricultures and " revered" then it was a matriarchal society. This article pushes a current day agenda for patriarchy instead of accepting a likely hood of a even a dual rule society where women and men both had first class status. a closely related question is Soldier versus war waging? Today we have food industry, military ,republic and patriarchy. So again , the combination of farmer and warrior clash as much as the pointless sentences above. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.220.127.110 (talk) 17:32, 6 August 2014 (UTC)

So I added a ^{[citation needed]} to the statement "While Columbus was there, three young Carib slaves that had been castrated, fled to him and sought shelter, claiming they were soon to be eaten."

I removed this from the article page:

"== Beliefs =

The caribs believed in the king snake (this is a huge snake, it is 250 metres high, it has a crown of a chicken, it crows like a chicken in the morning.) the caribs believed that the king snake emerged out of the sea and came onto the land. if the snake was to be removed, the earth would be destroyed. The king snake left a concrete path when it came out of the sea.every full moon the king snake were given virgin females as sacrefices to prevent famine and to not destroy the earth. Up till this day, some caribs still believe that the snake resides in the earth."

I think it's interesting, but dubious enough to need a citation and (obviously) some style cleanup before being added back in. Anyone feel free to do it! --auk (talk) 04:35, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

This article focuses almost entirely on the Caribs in centuries past. There is no discussion of the modern people and modern culture. Though the modern tribe is small that still seems to me a glaring omission.

http://www.avirtualdominica.com/caribs.cfm

http://www.caribindians.net

Garifuna

192.88.165.35 (talk) 14:32, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Our articles on the various Carib groups and associated topics are extremely confused. Currently we have:

• Carib people, this article, which mostly discusses the people more usually called the Island Caribs or Kalinago
  • Island Carib language, the language of the Island Carib, also known as Igneri - not a Cariban language
• Kali'na people, which appears to discuss the mainland Caribs or Kalina
  • Carib language or Kalina, a Cariban language spoken by the mainland Caribs but not the Island Caribs
• Cariban languages, a language family including Carib/Kalina but not Island Carib

To make matters worse, this article includes a bit of material on the mainland Caribs but doesn't sufficiently point to the article that focuses on them (Kali'na people). Similarly, Kali'na people doesn't even mention the term "Carib" and doesn't point back to this article.
We definitely need a good article on the Island Caribs. I propose we:

• Move Carib people to Island Caribs, since it mostly covers them, moving non-Island Carib material to the Kalina people article and explaining appropriately
• Move Carib (disambiguation) to Carib and clean it up to include Kalina people
• Match the name of Carib language to the Kalina people article

All these articles need much more work, but this should be good for a start.--Cúchullain ^t/c 20:57, 22 May 2014 (UTC)

I was bold and went ahead with these moves. If anything, it should help with the many articles that link to "Carib" or "Kalina..." intending the other people or their language.--Cúchullain ^t/c 11:36, 23 May 2014 (UTC)

I'm working on tidying up the History section.Mikesiva (talk) 11:01, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

the article states: "Early Carib culture was patriarchal. Women carried out the important domestic duties of rearing young children, processing and producing food and clothing . . ."

isn't this true of nearly all known societies, i.e., that men control most or nearly all political power, women raise young children, cook and make most clothes?

even in our modern age with washing machines, dishwashers, ovens and all the rest, and baby formula and disposable diapers, women and older girls still do the vast majority of these tasks, and raise small children? even most early education teachers are women.

..................................

What is the point of the above comment? Melba1 (talk) 05:38, 11 April 2021 (UTC)

There is no consensus among academics about cannibalism among the Caribs, but it reviewing the literature it seem like the majority believe there was at last endocannibalism. The Wikipedia entry suggests that there was no cannibalism, but that view is held by a minority of academics. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ArboristSF (talk • contribs) 22:01, 12 October 2015 (UTC)

• Seems like this has been discussed a bit earlier. You're suggesting that the majority of academics believe that Caribs were cannibals - do you have sources for this? The prose on cannibalism should only be modified on sourced information, as this is a contentious issue and the manner of presentation does cross into the realm of history revisionism (that goes both ways). Perhaps bring the majority academia you reference this talk page first, let folks discuss it, and if there's consensus then move the changes to the main article. --  R45  ^talk! 22:07, 12 October 2015 (UTC)

The problem currently with that section is that it heavily contradicts itself. On one side it says that cannibalism was "apparently religious" and they only ate war enemies, while on the other side it says that there was no cannibalism whatsoever..ever..at all. The second point seems unlikely anyhow. If there is no concensus, quotes by individual historians should not be shown as if they are the consensus IMO. Bataaf van Oranje (Prinsgezinde) (talk) 16:59, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

"Narrative of the Proceedings of Pedrarias Davila" written in 1865 by Pascual de Andagoya... states "Castellanos says that these Indians were called Caribs (or Cannibals), not because they ate human flesh, but because they defended their houses well. "No porque alli comiesen carne humana⁠ Mas porque defendian bien su casa." In reading the entire book and learning about all the different "indians" they met along the way, some were cannibals and some were not.^[2]--The Eloquent Peasant (talk) 22:47, 6 October 2019 (UTC)

I expected to see some information on the pre-Columbian indigenous cuisine in the "Food" section, but instead there are references to Old World foods such as pepper, lemon and pig. The section needs work. Tmangray (talk) 17:13, 1 May 2016 (UTC)

After reading through this document, I have a few critiques on this document. The Garifuna are used far too often, and the article disproportionately discusses the African/Carib ethnicity. The article seems to be far too much about people of African descent than of Carib ancestry. The addition of the section 'Garifuna Music' seems to be misplaced as about one variant of Carib music. Maybe this should be expanded to include other options of surviving Carib music. Such as music from the Kalina people. Another worrying aspect is the lack of citation in the article. One example of this is from this passage:

"They intermarried with the Carib and formed the last native culture to resist the British. It was not until 1795 that British colonists transported the so-called "Black Caribs" to Roatan Island, off Honduras. Their descendants continue to live there today and are known as the Garifuna ethnic group. Carib resistance delayed the settlement of Dominica by Europeans. The so-called "Black Carib" communities that remained in St. Vincent and Dominica retained a degree of autonomy well into the 19th century.

The last known speakers of Island Carib died in the 1930s, and the language is extinct."

How can you prove this? Where is the proof that the Island Carib language died in the 1930's? A recommendation would simply be to expand the amount of citation or attach all the available information that comes from the available sources.

All together my recommendations is to take less of an emphasis toward the Garifuna people and add more citations to the document or at least attach proper citations to the necessary information.

(Eris Pinto (talk) 02:11, 11 March 2017 (UTC))

This article's content is substantially plagiarized from [Aspiring Minds Trinidad and Tobago|https://www.aspiringmindstandt.com/caribs], a source which appears to be of dubious reliability.

Compare:

"They did not farm very well so they relied less on maize and cassava but still knew how to grow them. Although they were not very good farmers, the Kalinago were excellent fishermen and were not afraid of long voyages. Their diet consisted of lots of protein: they ate manatees, ducks, iguanas, and lots of fish among other foods."

"They did not farm very well so they relied less on maize and cassava but still knew how to grow them. Although they were not very good farmers, the Caribs were excellent fishermen and were not afraid of long voyages. Their diet consisted of lots of protein: they ate manatees, ducks, iguanas, and fish, among other foods."

Other sections are similarly lifted. I will be deleting the plagiarized content until such time as it can be rewritten. TallNapoleon (talk) 03:17, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

It seems to me that the plagiarism is in the other direction. Most of the article in the "Our History" part of their site are partially or completely lifted from wikipedia pages. In the case of this page, the citations are poor, so it is hard to tell. But the colonial histories from that site are lifted from History of Trinidad and Tobago, including stuff that is decently referenced in the wikipedia page (but isn't in theirs). I'm all for pushing this page to have better citations, but I don't think there is plagiarism here. Also, for what it is worth, here is the edit where the material you removed was added. Smmurphy^(Talk) 03:48, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

The Wayback Machine doesn't have any captures from https://www.aspiringmindstandt.com/caribs earlier than March 2017. While that isn't definitive, it strongly suggests that the October 2015 edit here came first. Nick Number (talk) 05:37, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

Hmmmm, we had it cited as a source on the relevant sections, which were written in an oddly conversational and not particularly Wiki-like tone. DNS lookup shows that that site was created December 2016; the citations were added in March of this past year: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Island_Caribs&type=revision&diff=770863367&oldid=769251653. As I've not generally been involved editing this page, I am fine with my deletion being reverted, so long as unsourced content is either sourced or removed. TallNapoleon (talk) 06:30, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

I'm flagging that this content was never restored. Why not reintroduce it while slapping 'citation needed' notices on the restored sections? J. E. C. E. (talk) 14:42, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

I have recently started learning about the Kalinago and came across this Wikipedia page. I read the section about the Canoe project and how they got attention for their canoes, but I wondered why the canoes were so important to the Kalinago. I did some research and wanted to add background information about the canoes and discuss why they were and still are important to their economy and material culture. I am new to Wikipedia but I wanted to put this idea out there before I uploaded it to the page or made any changes. Thanks! --Ashyfire2024 (talk) 16:47, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

I notice while reading this article that the language used in the article is often self-contradictory. "Kalinago" is said to be the correct term with "Caribs" being a historical term with derogatory connotations. Despite this, the term "Caribs" is used throughout the article as if it is an acceptable modern term for the Kalinago. When reading this, the article is difficult to understand because of this. It also seems at some points to rebuke previous myths about the Kalinago but later claims these things are true of the "Caribs." Just difficult for a layperson to understand, and unfortunately, I am one of those laypeople so I can't fix it.

Another related issue is that the article varies from present to past tense when discussing a people group who still exist, e.g. "[T]hey spoke an unrelated language known as Island Carib." Do they still speak this language? Has the language been renamed in the meantime? I have no idea. 32.220.167.21 (talk) 23:36, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

I can only speak for Trinidad where Caribs call themselves "Caribs" or "first people". See Carib Queen. Also, they speak English, and the Carib/Arawak language heritage mainly remains through names of places. Kind regards, Grueslayer 08:20, 21 August 2023 (UTC)

Many of the Garifuna people (previously called "Black Caribs") of Central America speak the Garifuna language, an Arawakan language with many European and African loan words that developed on Saint Vincent and Dominica. As far as I know, no Arawakan language has survived in the West Indies. "Carib" has been traditionally the name applied to certain peoples of the Lesser Antilles, and was used even in scholarly sources until quite recently. As content in Wikipedia is supposed to be based on reliable sources, many of which use "Carib", it is not surprising that the term is often used in this Wikipedia article. Retrospectively applying current naming standards to older sources can raise its own neutrality issues. Donald Albury 13:37, 21 August 2023 (UTC)

You raise valid points about the internal consistency of the article, but I do not think it is a matter of lacking neutrality.

The Name section of the article clears up the naming problem, but I agree that the introduction needs to be clarified/rewritten to be consistent with the Name section.

IMO, the neutrality notice could be removed.

Jolta (talk) 08:19, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

Sylvanie Burton appears to be the only one who looks even remotely Kalinago. I also struggled to find any sources for the Kalinago ancestry for the majority of the people other than that they are from Dominica, or their parents are. Even if they have some degree of Kalinago ancestry it feels weird to include them as examples of Kalinago people, it would be like listing Elizabeth Warren as an example of a Native American. Qwexcxewq (talk) 01:05, 22 November 2024 (UTC)

I've removed those who don't at least mention it on their own articles. We should go with what RSes describe them as, in the end.

Let's avoid any contentious "self-ID" labels unless that terminology or similar is used by multiple reliable sources both "commonly" and "consistently" as per WP:DEFINING. WP:BLP trumps WikiProject essays, as does the requirement for labels to be defining when it comes to categorisation.

As a side note, US law and custom is inapplicable here, since this largely covers the Caribbean. There's no singular way to confirm citizenship or national affiliation in the Caribbean. Lewisguile (talk) 07:51, 22 November 2024 (UTC)

I've added RSes to all the remaining people in the list. Lewisguile (talk) 08:51, 22 November 2024 (UTC)

'Chief Kairouane and his men from Grenada jumped off the "Leapers Hill" rather than face slavery under the French invaders, serving as an iconic representation of the Kalinago spirit of resistance.'

Yet nothing of the sort is stated in the main article about him. 62.73.72.101 (talk) 20:34, 11 August 2025 (UTC)