Brooklyn’s West Indian Carnival Grapples with Costs and Cultural Evolution

 

Nell Hirschmann-Levy remembers the West Indian American Day Carnival from 13 years ago when she had just moved into her place on the parade route on Eastern Parkway in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn. “It used to be this big,  joyful event with music, costumes, celebration, and Caribbean food.”

 

But for the past 4 years, Levy has made sure to go away during the parade and return well after. The West Indian American Day Carnival, held every year on Labor Day, is one of the city’s biggest celebrations of Caribbean culture. After this year’s parade, some asked questions about affordability and safety, which could prompt broader change for future parades. 

 

And as parade planning for next year gets underway, a big question remains around one of the most visible parts of the celebration. 

 

At the heart of the parade are the mas bands which play Caribbean music during the event. Mas (as in masquerade) also take on the cultural weight of the carnival by designing and selling elaborate costumes to parade-goers. 

 

But, many mas bands have started withdrawing from the parade. Back in 2017, 35 mas bands participated in the parade. The number has dropped gradually. This year, 18 bands participated. 

 

Michelle Mathison, development director at Sesame Carnival, a mas band that’s performed at the parade since 1991, has noticed a waning interest in the cultural engagement that used to be the parade’s hallmark. 

 

“A lot of the people that were pioneers of the parade are kind of over it,” she said. “Right now, more kids are coming. They don’t even know about mas and its history, and they storm the bands, which doesn’t make it a fun experience for masqueraders.” 

 

The shrinking attendance is also apparent to Cecille Ford, board secretary for the organization behind the parade, the West Indian American Day Carnival Association (WIADCA). Ford attributed it, at least partly, to other well-known carnivals in Toronto, held a month earlier, and Miami, which takes place a month after, that siphon off revelers. Miami, in particular, she said, is gaining in popularity because it’s viewed as “a vacation, a last summer hurrah.”

 

In order to play in New York’s West Indian American Day Carnival, mas bands have to register with WIADCA and pay the organization $1,000. Last year, WIADCA started paying the registered mas bands a $500 stipend towards materials for costumes, money that came from a city grant. Some of the mas bands think WIADCA needs to offer them more money to encourage band participation. 

 

“All these bands dropped out and started participating in other carnivals because they had to pay for costumes, light, and music and it didn’t make sense anymore,” said Rodney Snell, director of Big Boy Productions which has participated in the carnival for three years. Snell added that designing and crafting a queen costume can cost upwards of $8,000.  

 

“Some Caribbean islands give mas bands $5,000 and up just for registering,” said Nathaniel Lewis, director of Royale Mas. 

 

WIADCA says it raises money for the carnival through city grants, private sponsorships, and funding. But getting on Eastern Parkway is expensive, said Ford, citing costs associated with city permits, security, bathrooms, and insurance. WIADCA board secretary Cecile Ford said that post-Covid, arranging and producing the carnival has gotten at least 25 percent more expensive. With all it spends setting up the event, there’s not much money left over for anything else. “WIADCA is not in a position to financially support it [mas bands],” Ford said. 

 

If lack of monetary support is driving away the bands, it may also be driving away the revelers. In recent years, fewer attendees have been registering with mas bands and buying their costumes.

 

“Mas has truly declined over the years. Our numbers [of buyers] are pretty steady, but they aren’t that great, either,” said Mathison. The Sesame Carnival band sells costumes to parade-goers for roughly $300 to $700 dollars. 

 

The costumes that the mas bands design and showcase are vibrant, elaborate, and culturally expressive, featuring bright, tropical colors, sequins, feathers, and headpieces. They draw inspiration from traditional carnival attire seen in Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados, and Jamaica. Bands often design costumes around a theme that depicts historical, mythical or contemporary concepts. These costumes are integral to West Indian history, rooted in slavery. 

 

“The masking and the performance aspect of it was to invert and place themselves in a temporarily superior position over the plantation master or mistress,” said Nigel Westmaas, Professor of Africana studies at Hamilton College. “The carnival keeps reinventing itself, but the oldest forms have to do with the inversion of power.”  

 

Nathaniel Lewis of Royal Mas said that new bands need $15,000 to $25,000 to get ready for the parade. The money helps bands hire a costume designer, buy costume materials, and rent space to make and sell the costumes. It also goes to pay the musicians who play along the parade route. These bands – which make money from selling their costumes to parade-goers and winning prizes for them – say that an influx of non-masquerading participants has brought down interest in buying costumes. 

 

Young, non-masquerading attendees have also made the West Indian Day Carnival less of a cultural celebration and more of a party. 

 

“Our event is more open on the street, and we have these young people who do not understand our culture, who just think it’s a time to have fun and jump in, and join the bands. It makes it difficult for those who have paid for their costumes to really enjoy it,” said Ford. 

 

Mathison says the younger generation has a different connection to the old ways.  

 

“When the carnival was starting, you had people who were actual immigrants who were just happy to celebrate their culture. And as time went on, you had the first generation whose parents’ lifestyle was Caribbean. But now, with the second generation, it’s not quite the same.”

 

However, some members of the younger generation say there’s nothing wrong with focusing on the party. Janii Nevaeh and Mar Bucks, both high school seniors, attend the carnival with their friends, and they aren’t interested in mas. 

 

“We wear whatever, as long as we have the flag,” said Nevaeh, referring to the Barbados and Jamaican flags which are the countries where they have roots. “There’s music and food and we wanna have a good time. But costumes are a hassle and I don’t want no paint on me,” said Bucks. Nevaeh said that she might attend the carnival in costume when she’s older, but doesn’t see herself spending money on it anytime soon. 

 

 

For Samantha Rodrique, a high school sophomore, playing steel pan on parade day is her way of participating in her Trinidadian-Granadian culture. And even though Rodrique grew up watching the parade with her grandmother, “We never really had conversations of culture and history of the carnival,” she said. 

 

Community Board 9 helps plan the carnival. Board chairperson Fred Baptiste thinks that public safety — or the perceived lack of it — is also driving people away. This year, 25-year-old Denzel A. Chan from Texas was shot and killed during the parade. Four other people were shot and injured. The police haven’t made any arrests yet. 

 

“We’ve unfortunately had too many incidents, shootings, and losses of life,” Baptiste said. “So I think that’s one of the things that we’re trying to figure out: how do we accommodate that growth, but at the same time, keep the spirit of what’s going on.”

 

Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso made a similar point. “Our job is to prove that 2024 is the exception and not the norm. We need to understand and address the systemic drivers of violence,” Reynoso said.  

 

Hirschmann-Levy shares the concerns of local lawmakers. She’s lived on Eastern Parkway for 13 years and said “the festival is heavily over-policed, which does not end up making the experience any safer.”

 

Carnival organizers like Mathison worry that the safety issues, cultural dilution, and waning interest put the event’s future at risk. 

 

 

“New York City’s cachet is arts and culture,” he said. “This [potential loss] rips the very fabric of our city and what makes us so unique.” 

 

Mathison thinks there needs to be a collective, citywide effort to engage the next-generation attendees. 

 

“We can use digital advertisements and citywide campaigns to encourage people to know more about the carnival, costumes, and masks and eventually, buy it,” Mathison said.  

 

Community Board 9 Chairperson Baptiste said his plan for the next parade would involve bringing participants, organizers, and community stakeholders to the table for a conversation on the cultural gap as well as the safety concerns. 

 

“Typically, this is not something the board has been a part of, but I think that’s the direction we should go,” he said.  

 

Other organizers agree that the culture needs to be highlighted. 

 

 

“People could just party, but this is a party with a purpose,” said Sandra A.M Bell, co-founder of JouvayFest. “There’s depth of information. It didn’t just happen. It’s come out of struggle and resistance and resilience.”

 

Professor Westmaas believes that change is inevitable, and needs to be embraced and adapted to the future of the carnival. 

 

“Old aspects of the carnival are not given enough credence in the modern education system, whether in the formal sense of understanding carnival or in the organizational sense of educating the participants in the process,” he said. “It becomes a new invention every time, which becomes normal. And the organizers and funders have to find a balance of capturing that change with the younger generation while trying to keep the educational aspects alive and to keep it going.”

 

City Council District 35 hosts the parade and gives WIADCA $15,000 a year to help organize. A spokesperson for District 35’s representative Crystal Hudson expects the carnival to morph with the participation of the new generation but remains optimistic about the parade’s future. 

 

“The hope is that it gets bigger every year,” he said.