No Costume? No Carnival!

It’s Carnival season, time to take to the streets for a party and see the spectacle. But Carnival is about so much more than that. At its heart is the idea that with costumes and masks, people can become shapeshifters, and transform themselves for a short period into someone else. Carnival is the work of a community and a chance for the powerless and the poor to be free for a day and claim equality with the rich and powerful. Each Carnival is different and takes its traditions and ideas from its own culture and the needs of its own people.

This episode looks at how different Carnivals developed and how textiles and masks play a central role in the political ideas behind them. It starts in Venice a thousand years ago as the poor were allowed to let off steam once a year. It crosses the Atlantic as the rich plantation owners brought Mardi Gras to the Caribbean, and saw it creatively developed by the enslaved and the poor into a series of glorious feasts of costume, music, and dance. It tracks Carnival as it was brought to Britain by Caribbean migrants as a celebration of their culture and community. And in all of these, it thinks about how textiles and clothing play a central role.

If you would like to see a full script of this episode, pictures of the carnival traditions discussed in this podcast, or discover links to further information about the topics discussed you can find all this information at www.hapticandhue.com/listen.