Cultural Erasur, Retentivity

The Caribbean cultural and society is really based on the whole process of Hybridization, which generally refers to the mixture and syncretic forms which occur in society such as the race, religion, language, food etc. This process began with the era of discovery when European and Amerindian copulated which resulted in the creation of the Mestizo. This later became entrenched in plantation society with the European and African producing the mulatto or coloured.

Through hybridization members of society can gain social mobility based on factors such as inherited wealth, lighter shade complexion, ownership of property, membership in social clubs. However this hybridization brings a process of change in culture in Caribbean such as cultural erasure and cultural retention. Cultural erasure is simply the loss of cultural practices which is a result of tension or conflict between traditional way of doing things and the modern or progressive way. The traditional way when compared to modern way seems redundant, laborious and time consuming. Along with that said erasure also occurs because traditional cultural values are not being taught to younger generation and as older folks die so do the practices with them and sometimes the younger generation are not interested in learning traditional folk forms. Cultural diffusion or the meeting of a dominant culture can also wipe out a more primitive culture for instance when the contact of Europeans with indigenous population in the region; enslavement of Africans by Europeans. Catastrophic events can also wipe out the population of an area and with it culture (wars, earthquakes, volcanic eruption, tsunamis).
However examples of this process cultural erasure found in the Caribbean is such that cottage craft pieces usually made by hand are now being versus by mass production in factories; in the Caribbean story telling by older folks is now being erased by the videos on the television, electronic games or even on the