Anthony Gabby Carter (1948 - ) is a living Barbadian cultural icon best known for his artistry through the lens of folk music and calypso. A thorough examination of Gabby’s oeuvre will fit him squarely into the movement of resistance art. This presentation seeks to delve into the creative process to interrogate what were the sparks that ignited some of Gabby’s masterpieces, especially, the hits Jack, Culture and the iconic Wuk-up. Scientists across the globe are now examining what happens in the brain during this so-called creative process and we are beginning to gain some interesting insights from the likes of Professor Charles Limb. Dr. John Hunte, the current cultural officer for dance at the National Cultural Foundation of Barbados, in his own work, has been interrogating and advancing the issues surrounding the dance form wuk-up in Barbadian culture. As such, this paper posits that Gabby is the embodiment of the ‘total’ performer who does not separate his voice, his pen and his dance all in an effort to reclaim and tell the story of his Africanity. The three become one in his completeness of performance, space and messaging. Through Gabby’s work, we see the emergence and/or re-presentation of wuk-up as a critical movement in the cultural and social resistance of a post-independent Barbados.

1. The Mighty Gabby:
Embodying
Resistance in the
Creative Process
ANALYSIS OF TEXT AND PERFORMANCE –
JACK, CULTURE AND WUK UP (1981-2000)
IAN W. WALCOTT-SKINNER,
PRESENTED AT CULTURAL STUDIES AT 10 SYMPOSIUM, UNIVERSITY
OF THE WEST INDIES, CAVE HILL CAMPUS, BARBADOS
APRIL 11, 2014

2. Who is the Mighty Gabby?
Anthony Carter, known as
Mighty Gabby (Mar 30, 1948 - )
• Barbadian calypsonian
• Cultural activist
• Folksinger
• Actor
• Cultural Ambassador for
Barbados - 2003
• Politician - 1994
• Hon Doctorate, UWI - 2012

3. DEATH OF PM
ADAMS
MARCH 11.
GABBY WINS
CROWN WITH
“WEST INDIAN
POLITICIAN”
AND
“CULTURE”
20001984 1985 1986 1991 1994 19991981 1982 1983
THE GRENADA
INVASION
END OF FIRST
DECADE SINCE
CARIFESTA 81.
EARLY SIGNS
OF DECAY OF
THE CULTURAL
PLANT.
GABBY WINS
CROWN
AGAIN SINCE
HIS 1985 WIN
GABBY WINS
THE CROWN
AGAIN WITH
“WUK UP”
THE BLP RETURNS TO
POWER UNDER OWEN
ARTHUR. GABBY LOSES
TO BILLIE MILLER ON A
DLP TICKET
ERROL
BARROW
RETURNS TO
POWER
GABBY’S PENS THE
CONTROVERSIAL
SONG “JACK”
GABBY PENS
“BOOTS”
CARIFESTA IN
BARBADOS –
CULTURAL
WATERSHED
FROM JACK TO WUK UP - 20 YEARS OF SONGS OF RESISTANCE

4. Charting the creative process
Conception
“The Creative
Design”
PROCESS
Expression
“The Creative
Product/Performance”
OUTPUT
Perception
“The Creative
Spark”
INPUT

5. Who or what is Gabby resisting?
The Dominant Power Structures
Who has the power?
Gabby responds to those who
influence through
position and policy.
THE ESTABLISHED
CHURCH OF ENGLAND
BARBADOS TOURISM
AUTHORITY
NATIONAL CULTURAL
FOUNDATION

6. What are his instruments of
resistance?
Force of
Resistance
His Pen
His
Voice
His
Dance

7. The pen as the sword
1.TEXT
2.SUB-TEXT
3.MEANING

8. 1.The Song
2.The Melody
3.The Rhythm

9. Articulation
Movement
Unspoken
Statement
Wuk-up
Freedom
Pièce de résistance
The I and I
Wine
“Rebolation”

10. The Creative Sparks - Jack
1. Controversy over statement
by Jack Dear – then
Chairman of Barbados Tourist
Board
2. Fear of “new apartheid”
where Black majority would
not have the right to the
beaches
3. Gabby was very anti the BLP
government led by Tom
Adams

11. The Creative Sparks –
Culture
1. Despite strides made since
1981 there were persistent
opinions that Barbados had no
culture of its own
2. Gabby felt need to prove that
we had a culture
3. There was little defense by
public intellectuals of a
Barbadian culture
4. Gabby took up the mantle in
song

12. The Creative Sparks –
Wuk Up
1. Ongoing debate on vulgarity
of wukking up
2. Public statements against
the art form by Church
leaders
3. The Church’s double
standards
4. Persistent devaluing of
African retentions of our
culture

13. What is Gabby resisting? Jack 1982
Jack - 1982
Culture - 1985
Wuk Up - 2000
The reaction was to the Chairman of
the Barbados Tourist Board – Jack
Dear
Here Gabby attacks the Establishment
1.Tourism policy and policymakers
that alienate locals from the process
Tourism vital, I can’t deny
But can’t mean more than I and I
My navel string buried right here
But a tourist one could be anywhere.

14. What is Gabby resisting? Jack 1982
Jack - 1982
Culture - 1985
Wuk Up - 2000
2. It also represents a broader critique against the
State during a period when it was thought that
there was a rapid militarization of Barbados by
creating a Defense Force especially in the wake
of the Grenada invasion
Cause Jack don’t want me to bathe on my beach
Jack tell them to keep me out of reach
Jack tell them I will never make the grade
Strength and security, build barricade
But that can’t happen here in this country
I want Jack to know that the beach belong to we
That can’t happen here over my dead body
Tell Jack that I say that the beach belong to we.

15. What is Gabby resisting? Culture 1985
Jack - 1982
Culture - 1985
Wuk Up - 2000
By 1985 Gabby had become frustrated with the direction of
Barbadian and West Indian culture and speaks out
vehemently against North American cultural penetration,
especially through mass communication media
1. Again he targets the policymakers
All o’ this talk ‘bout culture
Driving me mad
I taking it hard
All ‘f this talk ‘bout culture
It driving me mad
I taking it hard
How them expect
To have culture plan
For Caribbean man
From North American?
We got to start here at home,
Then we will no longer roam.
2. He privileges: local cuisine, aspects of the local life,
Caribbean literature and our choice of sports.

16. What is Gabby resisting? Wuk Up 2000
Jack - 1982
Culture - 1985
Wuk Up - 2000
By 2000 Gabby is perhaps is dismayed that there
are still naysayers to what represents Barbadian
culture and his frustration turns to anger. This is
one of the most defiant pieces in his entire
oeuvre.
I am angry, I am mad
I goin’ in the street and wuk up real bad
The priests can talk what the hell they like
I wukking up me body day and night
They want to take the African out of the picture
But Africa is buried in me
So we jooking, yea we jamming
On the streets Kadooment morning
For all of the church to see.

17. What is Gabby resisting? Wuk Up 2000
Jack - 1982
Culture - 1985
Wuk Up - 2000
1.Gabby lashes out against the Church (priests)
whom he sees as an embodiment of
European and Western oppression of Africans
and Africanity
2.Once more, the Police, the symbol of the
State comes under attack for their complicit
behavior.
Tell the priest for me
This is me [sic] my body
I wining up bad on the highway
Them [sic] they could call police
I going like a beast
I don’t give a damn what they say
I’m African
Not from Babylon
The highway belong to we

18. Gabby’s Embrace of Elements of
Rastafarianism as Resistance
 Wuk up – “I’m African, not from Babylon”
 Babylon refers to Marley’s “the Babylon system is a vampire”
 Babylon represents the West and Roman-Greco system of political governance
 Jack – “Tourism vital, I can’t deny, But can’t mean more than I and I”
 The central dominant “I” becomes the focus of Rastafarian and Black resistance
 During the 1970s, it was common to hear the term ‘I and I’, this emphasis on a new self
of resistance

19. Forms of Wuk-Up From The African Continent
throughout the African Diaspora

20. Gabby’s Use of Wuk Up in Performance
 Jack
A youthful Gabby took off all his clothes in this performance
Wuk up was used in his on-stage performance to symbolize
1. Resistance against the system
2. Defiance against Jack himself
3. Freedom
4. His negritude
5. His culture

21. Gabby’s Use of Wuk Up in Performance
 Wuk up
An older Gabby (with full grown locks) was more ‘graceful’ in
his movements in spite of the more angry lyrics
Here wuk up in his performance represented
6. An ode to the dance as an art form (note the dance is better
choreographed than in the free form used in Jack)
7. His declared Africanity
8. His defiance against the “Babylon system”
9. His “I and I’ – I the African, I who will not yield, I who will not succumb
to Western cultural penetration and hegemonic dominance
embodied by the Europeanized church

22. Conclusion – Gabby’s Art of
Resistance
•Defiant
Jack: Policymakers, The State
•Frustrated
Culture: North American Cultural
Penetration
•Angry
Wuk Up: The Church (mainly Church of
England)
Gabby’s Art
• Draws a pictorial of
local culture
• Stands up to
schizophrenic creolized
policymakers
• Defies and rebels
against the status quo
• Call to action
• Call for pride in our
Black selves as peoples
of African descent

23. Gabby
receives
honorary
doctorate
from UWI
2012