Golding

This article is in response to Carolyn Cooper's "University Fi Stone Dog" published last Sunday.

By his own admission, Marcus Garvey was for the most part a self-educated man. 'Self-educated' is a term probably coined by some university board or council to differentiate between those who had passed through its hallowed walls and those who hadn't. Garvey states that while living and travelling in Europe prior to his return to Jamaica in 1914, he attended classes on law and political science at Birkbeck College in London. Of course, Birkbeck was actually a college of the University of London (I get to 'overstand' it is important that we make that distinction). The truth is, our own UWI started out as the University College of the West Indies, an external college of the same University of London. Garvey never received his degree from this distinguished institution, and in fact, it was not until his Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) chaplain general established the Endich Theological Seminary under the auspices of the African Orthodox Church in Harlem that an honorary Doctor of Civil Laws was conferred on Garvey, hence the DCL which he sometimes appended to his name.

I wish I could assure some of you that this university of theology maintained a vibrant graduate-research programme, but what I can tell you is that it was not the only educational institution established by Jamaica's first son. Garvey had also established the Booker T. Washington University in New York City and later, the Liberty University in Virginia while sojourning in the United States of America. The former was an administrative school for the secretarial training of UNIA civil servants, while the latter was a former technical training institute purchased by the UNIA and reopened as an industrial college. I guess someone should have told Garvey that neither of these schools fit the weight category to be called universities. Then again, this probably would not have deterred him.

lawsuit

Remarkably, we should note that even after Norman Manley prosecuted the infamous G.O. Marke lawsuit against Garvey that saw some of Garvey's furniture being seized by the court, including the 'university chair', he continued to teach at the School of African Philosophy by correspondence. We could even say Garvey pioneered the on-line university. Still, there were those who questioned the status of his institutions and his credentials. Come to think of it, there was a group he referred to as the 'Negro intellectuals' who warned people considering enrollment at the UNIA Liberty University that this was just another money-making scheme by the "clever administrator" and "back-to-Africa" con artist Marcus Garvey. The campaign was led by such distinguished scholars as W.E.B. Dubois, a Harvard University alumnus no less.

'Negro intellectuals'

It was these same 'Negro intellectuals' who launched the campaign that ultimately saw Garvey becoming our first deportee. They ridiculed him for wearing 'university' robes and taking the chair that he created for himself as president-general of the Universal Negro Improvement Association, which he referred to, among other things, as an educational society. These same professors with honours "fi stone dog" criticised Garvey's juvenile programme of teaching members of the UNIA from the early age of three not the Latin definition of the word university, but that the first universities were established by their ancestors in African cities, such as Memphis and Thebes.

Marcus Garvey believed in building our own institutions as a people and as a race.

Whatever the powers that be might say, I cannot imagine that an institution that seeks to cater to the complete education of our people from kindergarten to university would not find favour with our first national hero. Coupled with the fact that it represents the vision and achievements of a bona fide black woman, let us be true to the spirit of Garvey and "elevate to positions of fame and honour black men and women who have made their distinct contributions to our history". It is ironic that today we hear these same types of scholarly communities of teachers and students that once produced some of Garvey's greatest foes, claiming him as an 'intellectual' and presuming to object on his behalf.

It would seem the 'Negro intellectuals', having already stoned the bulldog to death, now seek to lay claim to his chair as their own dominion and to confine it with their hallowed walls. But we cannot 'Coop up' Garvey under the guise of 'serious intellectual enquiry'. It is time for his philosophy and life lessons to be taught and applied practically to our generations - from the suckling babe to the wise and prudent professor - so that we can become a wiser and wealthier people.

If it is true that history repeats itself, perhaps the only real choice we have is which side of history we want to be on. Now, it's time for class!

Steven Golding is the president of the Universal Negro Improvement Association. Email him at uniajournal@gmail.com