Belize is located on the Caribbean coast of northern Central America. It borders Mexico and Guatemala, and across the small Gulf of Honduras, to the South, lies Honduras. To its east, in the Caribbean Sea, the second-longest barrier reef in the world lines the coast, and many small cay islands sit in the reef.

The history of Belize is a complex one. Within the nation, there have always been a diverse amount of racial and cultural groups. Outside forces, such as Spanish, French, and English colonialists, have also helped to shape the population of Belize.

The oldest recorded society in Belize is that of the Arawaks and Caribs, who were hunters, fishermen, and farmers. Between 250 and 900 C.E., the Maya civilization peaked after thousands of years of development, with major centers in Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, and Belize. By the mid-10^th century, the Maya society began to decline, but there were still Mayas in Belize by the 16^th and 17^th centuries.

Starting in the 15^th century, European nations set out to conquer the Americas as part of their attempts at global colonialism. Until the 17^th century, the Maya had held their own against Spanish imperialists in Belize, turning the future country into a place of refuge for Maya fleeing Spanish rule in other parts of Central America. However, disease ravaged the Mayas and a huge population was killed. The British arrived in the 17^th century, to find no remaining Mayas near the coast, but small communities inland, which would be forced off the land by the early 1800s.

The first British settlers to Belize left few records. They were pirates and adventurers, living in small camps, from which they raided Spanish ships. They started cutting the logwood in the nearby forests, extracting a valuable dye from it to color woolen cloth. Logwood dye, along with mahogany, would become the economic basis for British settlement in Belize for the next century. This led to heavy competition between the British and Spanish forces in Central America, as well as the importation of slaves from western Africa. The colony was named British Honduras in 1840, and served the crown until 1964, when the territory was given its independence.  The official name of the territory was changed from British Honduras to Belize in June 1973. The United Kingdom agreed to defend Belize from invasion if necessary after independence, and this full official independence was granted in 1981, to defend against Guatemala, which claimed that Belize was rightfully property of Guatemala.

Like many nations that arose out of colonialism, Belize has a very diverse population, racially and culturally. The two largest groups are the Creoles and the Mestizos. The Creoles speak either English or Creole, and are of mixed African and European descent. The Mestizos speak Spanish, and come from mixed Mayan and Spanish heritages. Two other significant groups are the Garifuna, a group of mixed African and Carib ancestry originally from the Lesser Antilles, and the Maya, descendants of the original inhabitants of Belize.

This cultural diversity naturally gave rise to many different types of music within a very small area. The Mestizos developed marimba music, which combined Mayan ceremonial music and Spanish recreational music. The Creoles created Brukdown, a frenetic, danceable type of music that blends European harmonies with African rhythms, usually with an accordion player at the lead. Today, the coastal nation is home to many rising artists in the reggae, reggaeton, and hip hop genres.

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The story of the Garifuna people of Central America is as fascinating as any. It begins in 1635, when Spanish fleets were shipping slaves from West Africa to the New World. Two ships got caught in a storm and shipwrecked off the coast of St. Vincent, an island in the Caribbean. The slaves escaped the ship and began to live with the “Yellow Caribs,” a cultural group that had arisen as a result of intermarriage between Venezuelan Caribs and the Arawaks, indigenous to the island.

Fast-forward to 1750, and there are two types of Caribs on the island—yellow and black. The Black Caribs emerged through the integration of the Yellow Caribs and the Africans who had come on the slave ships. These people would later become known as the Garifuna. In the following years, the Black Caribs, as they were called then, established firm trade relations with the French, who had already partially colonized the island. The next thirty years were marked by British presence on the island, as they attempted to take it over from the French in their imperialistic surge. This was a time of large-scale European colonization in the Americas, and scenes like these were common.

In 1796, the French surrendered to the British, but the Caribs kept up the fight, earning a reputation for being “belligerent.” In response, the British torched their land, resulting in two major wars in 1795 and 1796.  The Caribs won the first one, but lost the second. Approximately 5,000 Black Carib survivors of the war were rounded up by the British and deported from St. Vincent to Roatán, an island off the coast of Honduras. The more African-looking Caribs were considered enemies, while the more Amerindian-looking Caribs were deemed to have been merely “misled,” and were allowed to stay. Some accounts claim that the alleged deportation was a flat-out genocide attempt, as the Garifuna people were forced to face harsh treatment and little food by the colonial powers.

Because the island was too small and infertile to support their population, the Garifuna petitioned the Spanish authorities to be allowed to settle on the mainland. The Spanish employed them as soldiers, and they spread along the Caribbean coast of Central America. According to legend, the Garífuna hid cassava, a mainstay of their diet, inside their clothes, where it stayed alive watered by the sweat of the tightly packed captives. They planted the cassava on Roatán, where it grew abundantly.

By 1800, the Garifuna survivors had arrived in Belize, many taking up residence in Yarborough and Red Cliff (present-day Barranco). Today, Barranco, one of the first Garifuna communities in Belize, is one of the last havens where the Garifuna culture is preserved in one of its most dynamic forms. Though their numbers in Belize were small still, and there were many left behind in Honduras, the Garifuna established communities and were able to live in peace. In 1823, five hundred Garifuna were given permission to emigrate from Honduras to Belize, marking the largest recorded exodus of Garifuna to Belize.

Today many Garifuna are settled around the Bay of Honduras, especially in southern Belize, on the coast of Guatemala around Livingston, and on the island of Roatán, and coastal towns of Honduras and Nicaragua.

Each year in Belize, when locals reenact the arrival in that land, they slip out to sea in boats, then ride the surf onto shore, waving palm fronds and banana leaves to symbolize the cassava that sustained their ancestors. This ritual, rich in music and dance, is a reminder to the Garifuna people of where they came from and of their epic tale. Belizean elementary schools today teach Garifuna history and language, as part of an effort to keep the culture alive.

Two major types of music arose out of the Garifuna culture. They are Punta and Paranda. Paranda mixes African drumming rhythms with Latin American ones, and uses the acoustic guitar as its primary instrument. Today, the scope of Paranda music is diminishing, as many of the great Paranderos are getting older and dying out. Punta rock, however, is on the upswing. It is the most popular form of Garifuna music. Created by Pen Cayetano and the Turtle Shell Band, Punta fuses Garifuna rhythms with electric instrumentation. Belize’s Stonetree Records and Andy Palacio have helped to introduce the music to the world through print, radio, television, and recordings, which only add to the growing popularity of the genre.

Contributed by: Intern1