This 1998 New Edition of Mirror Mirror is augmented by a New Introduction. In revisiting Mirror Mirror, Professor Nettleford presents a current perspective on the ever prevalent issues of Identity, Race and Protest in Jamaica. It is the hope of the publishers that this timely "revisit" preceding the New Millennium will compel Jamaicans of all hues to realise that social and racial cohesion is an absolute for national survival and development.
Mirror Mirror demonstrates Mr. Nettleford's deep knowledge and understanding of issues which are currently galvanizing the attention of people in Third World countries beyond Jamaica's borders.
"These essays have been concerned mainly with problems of the Jamaican black majority and the uncertainties and contradictions of their role in what is supposed to be their country. The sixties, goes the argument, was marked by the threatening trinity of identity, race and attention to the threat - whether through the piecemeal social engineering of a government in power, economic nationalism of a party in opposition, cultural rediscovery and definition by sensitive intellectuals and artists, or through the cleansing purge of instant revolutionary action as some of the arduous young would have it.
-Nettleford-
"In five beautifully written essays on specific topics, [Rex Nettleford] succeeds in presenting to the outsider, a picture of his society, of people in it, of their motivations and of the conflicts between them".
Times Literary Supplement. London 1971
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"Rex Nettleford's book Mirror Mirror-Identity, Race and Protest written way back
in 1970 is still the most important and accurate commentary on the ambivalence and complexity that surround black ethnic identity in Jamaica and should be read by all those black-conscious persons who are inclined to confuse rhetoric with social reality".
Carl Stone, Daily Gleaner, April 5, 1989
About the Author
PROFESSOR REX NETTLEFORD is a leading Caribbean intellectual, writer and creative artist. As a Rhodes Scholar, he pursued postgraduate studies in Politics at Oxford after his undergraduate work in History at the University of the West Indies, Mona. He is currently Vice Chancellor of the University of the West Indies (UWI). He is also the founder, artistic director and principal choreographer of the renowned National Dance Theatre Company of Jamaica. He has lectured in many countries of the world on development and cultural dynamics and is the author of such works as Inward Stretch Outward Reach: A Voice from the Caribbean; Manley and the New Jamaica; Caribbean Cultural Identity; Dance Jamaica, Cultural Definition and Artistic Discovery; The Rastafarians in Kingston, Jamaica (with M G Smith & F A Augier) and The University of the West Indies: A Caribbean Response to the Challenge of Change (with Phillip Sherlock). He is also the editor of Caribbean Quarterly, the UWI's journal on cultural studies. He has received the Order of Merit for his internationally acclaimed artistic and scholarly work and is a Fellow of the Institute of Jamaica and of Oriel College, Oxford. In the New Millennium, he has been conferred two honorary degrees - Doctor of Letters from Grand Central University, U.S.A., and Doctor of Letters, Sheffield University, U.K. Both were in recognition of his outstanding contribution to education and culture.
