Politics
The West Indian American Day Parade: A Caribbean Celebration
The annual Labor Day extravaganza lights up Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn on Monday. Preparade festivities begin Sunday.
Good morning. It’s Friday. Today, and on Fridays through the summer, we’ll focus on things to do in New York over the weekend.
Credit…Jordan Macy for The New York Times
Labor Day weekend in Brooklyn means one thing — time to “mash it up.”
On Monday, the 57th annual West Indian American Day Parade will sashay its way up Eastern Parkway to close out a long weekend of Carnival activities. Parade participants adorned in vibrantly sequined, feathered and spectacularly scant costumes will “wine”(a traditional circular hip movement) atop or alongside bouncing floats booming the latest soca, afrobeat and dancehall music. The route is almost two miles, beginning at Rochester Avenue and ending at the Brooklyn Museum.
“The parade is the culmination of a year of hard work and dedication and sort of like a commercial for not just New York City’s Caribbean culture, but the entire Caribbean community that comes together and shows off its pageantry,” said Jelanie DeShong, a board member of the West Indian American Day Carnival Association.
The goal is to introduce a taste of the Caribbean to the city.
“Even if you’re new to the Caribbean culture, you know that distinctive soca music, you know the distinctive reggae music,” DeShong said. “We’re just trying to put on a commercial for those new and old to the culture to come and enjoy. This weekend is a love story that we put together every year for the Caribbean community and the larger Caribbean culture.”
The parade was started in the 1930s by Jessie Waddle, a Trinidadian immigrant, and a few friends, originally as an indoor costumed Carnival gathering in Harlem. Carnival celebrations usually precede the religious observance of Lent and so are held outdoors in February.