During slavery, there were many resistances and faces of maroonage in French Guiana. That of the Bushinengué, descendants of Maroons who took refuge in the forest and came from neighboring Suriname, challenges us with the strength of their destiny and the vitality of their unique culture. Journey between western Guyanese and the coast, between past and present to encounter a living history.
Traveling in the footsteps of the maroonnage in what is today a French department measuring 83,000 km2, located between Suriname and Brazil and covered more than 95% by the Amazonian forest, we quickly understand to what extent this geography of mountains and swamps, tumultuous rivers and dense forests, could have constituted a refuge – hostile but possible – for these fugitives, these maroons during the time of slavery which lasted in Guyana for almost 200 years.
To brown is to resist the oppression of slavery. It is both using trickery within the system but also fleeing the home to form, sometimes, parallel, brown societies on the fringes. A margin between the coast and the interior, immense in Guyana, where the Maroons fled but also the Amerindians who found refuge here far from the colonial yoke of slavery. A margin also between Guyana and neighboring Suriname, where Maroon communities from Suriname have established themselves along the Maroni River.
And it is precisely in this margin, past but also present, that we will navigate. Guided by Maroon cultural associations, activists and artists from the Tembé tradition but also Guyanese historians who strive to highlight all forms of resistance to slavery, and not just the great maroonage of the Bushinengué.
It must be said that in French Guiana, if the maroons from the homes located on the coastal strip once fought, fled, pillaged, formed into bands led by chiefs Simon, Linval, Gabriel or even Pompey…, sooner or later, they were caught by the slave militias chasing them. On the other hand, in the case of neighboring Suriname, the Bushinengué literally “forest blacks” have managed to maintain original, autonomous societies; some signing peace treaties with the Dutch authorities, others like the Bonis fleeing to the other side of the Maroni River to settle permanently on the French banks.
Today, the Bushinengué, these descendants of maroons from Suriname, still live mainly along the Maroni, in the historic strongholds of Papaïchton, Maripasoula, Grand Santi and Apatou located much further down the river. More and more, this proud people, who have managed to maintain their traditions in isolation and relegation, are joining the cities and the coast. Also, it continues to span the Maroni River from Suriname to Guyana, as it has always done throughout time. Which raises questions of recognition and papers of this decidedly cross-border people.
In the 21st century, in a mixed Guyanese society, but often divided between the Creoles, the Bushinengué and the Amerindians, the “Bushi” come out of the woods and proudly claim their history, their cultures or their Tembé art, this art of escape which, once served as a coded language for escape and communication in the great woods. Today, this tradition, initially sculpted and now painted, fascinates the world with its colorful and magnetic interlacing. And like the indigenous people, long marginalized with the Bushinengué in the so-called tribal zone, they are now demanding their rights. The Bushinengué today represent nearly a ⅓ of the Guyanese population.
A 2-episode series by Céline Develay-Mazurelle and Laure Allary initially broadcast in December 2023.
Learn more :
– On maroonage in Guyana. An illustrated and synthetic educational document. In PDF
– On the different resistances to slavery in Guyana. The work edited by the Young Guyanese Historian in Editions Ibis Rouge
– « Maroons in Guyane, Past, Present, Future », the reference work of historians Richard and Sally Price. It was republished in an updated version in 2022 by the University of Georgia Press.
– The “Mama Bobi” cultural center has been working for decades for the knowledge and sharing of the cultures of the people of the river, the Bushinengué
– On Western Guyanese, its peoples and its issues, current and past : the blog “A witness in Guyana” hosted by Joël Roy, community activist and former teacher based in Guyana.
– On Tembe art and the maroons of Guyana: two exhibitions were held in 2022 and 2023 in Paris. At the House of Latin America and to the Dominique Fiat Gallery
– On the work of Tembe artist Franky Amete. A recent article on his work and his trajectory
– On the odyssey of the Boni, a Bushinengué group from Suriname to French Guiana: the reference book: « The World of the Maroni Maroni in Guyana (1772-1860). The birth of a people: the Boni », published by Éditions Ibis Rouge, 2004. By the historian Jean Moomou
– The Bushinengue, in pictures. Through the work of Italian photographer Nicola Lo Calzo.
