Jump Nyabinghi: Black Radical Militancy, Rastafarianism, and Jamaican Cultural Influence on Black America

Abstract

While African Americans were in the midst of the zenith of the Civil Rights Movement, Afro-Jamaicans endured civil unrest, Black militant activism, and political changes that eventually resulted in its independence in 1962. While the global impact and influence of African American activism, especially of leaders like Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, and Stokely Carmichael, among others, is well known, little has been written on the influence of Jamaican culture, ideology, and nationalism on the global freedom movement. This research article situates Jamaican activism and ideology as central to the transnational, Pan-African Black resistance movements, specifically in the United States, illustrating that African Americans were deeply influenced by and interested in Jamaican activism and culture.