Much interest in Montréal as a group of young people with black faces and Jamaican accents assembled at the Université de Montréal stadium for a light workout in track and field sports.Much consternation when it turned out the athletes were students at the Hautes Études Commerciales, the Université de Montréal’s business school. Evidently inspired by the almost-forgotten black-and-white minstrel shows -- popular in Canada and Britain as well as the USA well into the 1950s -- the kids painted themselves in blackface and chanted "Ya man!" for a frosh-week stunt.
Participants were encouraged to dress in Olympic-themed costumes, with one group choosing to portray Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt. Along with donning the colours of the Jamaican flag, several students also covered their face, arms and legs in black paint.
The colourful attire included at least one Rastafarian hat and a pair of green shorts patterned with monkey faces. A large stuffed animal resembling a green monkey -- "un vrai Jamaican eh" -- was paraded around as a mascot.
Much soiling of silks by the school's administration and university officials, who were predictably accused of racism the moment vids appeared on YouTube and the lamestream media. One witness, who is of Jamaican descent, said he was shocked to hear some students chanting, “Smoke more weed.” More shocking still was the fact that they were chanting in English, contrary to Québec's language laws!
Law student Anthony Morgan said he found the display deeply offensive because of "the troubling historical connotations of blackface.... It is connected to a longer tradition of minstrel shows, reducing black people to pretty much jokes. They're put on as a spectacle, to almost look grotesque."
A spokesman for the business school said Morgan must have misunderstood the point of rap and hip-hop concerts, not to mention such events as the Caribana weekend. There were no ill intentions, said Michael Lartigau, but "the students interpreted the theme poorly."
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