As a tribute to the contribution made by African communities and their descendants to the culture and history of Panama, every May the country celebrates the month of Black Ethnicity.
The decision to dedicate the month of May to the Black Ethnicity dates back to the year 2000, when the Panamanian government approved Law 9, which established that May 30 would henceforth be called National Black Ethnicity Day, to pay tribute to the contributions made by the country’s Afro-descendants to different spheres of development.
Consequently, from that time on and throughout the month of May each year, a series of activities are held, ranging from exhibitions of the legacy of the culinary culture, clothing and musical rhythms with instruments that have endowed the music and dances of an Afro-descendant identity with a high heritage value.
In addition, colloquiums and events are held to share the results of studies aimed at promoting inclusion and acceptance of the diversity that characterizes Panamanian society.
A look at history and migration
The presence of the Black Ethnic Group in Panama is a consequence of a series of historical and social conditioning factors, mainly in the 19th century. By 1850 Panama was a department of Gran Colombia, called the Department of the Isthmus, and therefore had a high population of slaves from Africa.
According to historical references, the construction of the Canal that would link the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans to facilitate commercial activity between America and Asia, needed a strong workforce to guarantee the execution of the work in the shortest possible time. Although slaves were brought in from landowners in the United States, black people were also hired from Jamaica, where slavery had been abolished in 1834.
The presence of black people in the then Department of the Isthmus as slaves, on the one hand, and as wage laborers, on the other, created fractures in those who longed for the abolition of slavery. Consequently, the struggle for emancipation from Spanish colonialism increased and on May 21, 1851, legislation was signed to protect the freedom of slaves, which began to be applied in January 1852.
Data from the University of Panama show that currently 41% of the Panamanian population is of African descent, with only 5% of the population being black, while the rest is considered mestizo. Most of the Afro-descendant populations can be found in the territories of Colon, Rio Abajo, Darien, Bocas del Toro and Parque Lefevre.
On the other hand, from the linguistic point of view, it can be seen that there are communities of current Afro-descendants who not only speak Spanish as the main language of Panama, but also English. In most cases, they are descendants of those Americans and Jamaicans who worked on the construction of the Interoceanic Canal, and ended up settling in the country.
Inheritances to national identity
Panamanian Afro-descendants have made significant contributions to the Panamanian identity heritage. This is expressed in the cultural heritage in areas such as gastronomy or culinary culture, dances and body movements and the characteristic rhythms of musical instruments.
In terms of culinary and gastronomic culture, the production of seafood, seasoned with spices and high content of garlic, chili peppers and onions, is part of the heritage of the communities of Panamanian Afro-descendants. The descendants say that their grandparents learned to cook for them with the leftovers of the people they served as slaves, so today Panama has highly sophisticated dishes based on shrimp, snapper and cod that have earned a special place in the gastronomic offer.
In this regard, dishes such as the One Pot, made from rice sauteed with shrimp, pork rib and beans, seasoned with a special sauce based on aromatic spices; the codfish torrejitas, made with cooked cod crumbled and mixed with a variety of peppers, onions and salt, to which wheat flour is added to create a thick dough that is then fried in hot oil in small rounded portions; the Patty, consisting of an empanada stuffed with ground meat, preferably beef, onion, garlic and hot pepper.
Many of the dishes that make up Panamanian Afro-descendant cuisine are named in English, due to the influence of those from Jamaica or the United States who arrived in the country in the mid-nineteenth century.
Contemporary Afro-descendants also keep alive the legacy of their ancestors through the use of clothing. Mainly on special occasions, they wear clothes reminiscent of those early men and women who founded cultural communities of their ethnicity in different regions.
In this respect, the costumes of women are brightly colored and not tight to the body, accompanied by typical turbans on the heads, with which they are usually dressed to participate in church activities or other celebrations. The preservation of braided hairstyles is also attractive.
For men, the kufi cap stands out, very common in North African populations, and comfortable to wear due to its softness, freshness and fit behind the ears.
Furthermore, the music that emerged from Panama’s Afro-descendant communities enriches the national culture. Rhythms such as the conga, tamborito, calypso and cumbia have achieved international recognition, as each of them describes the daily life of the Panamanian slave populations who, in the 19th century, by means of improvised instruments such as drums or güiros, found ways to transmit their contradictions with the prevailing system and consequently, their longing for struggles and dreams of liberation.
Black Ethnicity: Present debates and challenges
Currently, scholars from the Latin American Council of Social Sciences (Clacso) who have conducted in-depth research on the Afro-descendant ethnic issue in Panama, warn of the need to reflect on the existence of a single black ethnic group or several, given the linguistic and cultural diversity and breadth that characterizes Afro-descendant communities.
Likewise, Clacso proposes to lead research to characterize the current situation of Afro-descendants in the country, in particular the construction of negative stereotypes about belonging to a community of black ethnicity, the situation of women, access to education, health, jobs and the struggle for the vindication of other social rights, to draw effective roadmaps to address the structural racism that still persists in Panamanian society.
