The British link-up crew: Consumption Masquerading as Masculinity in the Dancehall

Abstract

This paper examines identity construction and performance in Jamaican dancehall culture. It suggests that by utilizing publicly consumptive practices in the fluid space of the dancehall, the British Link-Up Crew draws on local and global factors to re-present a form of masculinity that has arisen organically from Jamaican society. I do not argue for the homogeneity of this form of masculine identity but suggest that this highly consumptive and performative identity reflects the socio-political and economic status of particular groups of black men in Jamaican society who are denied real access to resources and power in the formal structures in the society. These men draw on different and often symbolic strategies, including consumption, masquerade and performance, to seek and extend their identity and masculine status. Through popularized lyrics and exaggerated performance styles, popular dancehall culture re-presents these discourses of identity and provides a key space for the negotiation of black masculinity and identity in Jamaica within the race/class/colour and gendered structures of power that create and maintain hierarchies of personhood. My main argument is that the consumptive and performative sites and strategies of masquerade used by men in the dancehall, as exemplified by British Link-Up, provide an arena where these actors can re-present their economic capital and refine their masculinities as power brokers in the dancehall community.