ABSTRACT
CARNIVAL New World urban carnivals have their immediate roots in the pre-Lenten celebrations of medieval and Renaissance Europe. On such occasions, large numbers of people took to the streets to frolic and engage in satirical performances that often challenged social hierarchy and everyday order. These festivities were times of excessive eating, drinking, dancing, masquerading, and general revelry before the populace fell into a six-week period of moderation and temperance leading up to Easter. When European Catholic carnival practices were transplanted to the New World by French, Spanish, and Portuguese settlers, they mixed and mingled with the traditions of the African slaves and their descendants, resulting in the emergence of spectacular creolized celebrations in cities such as Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; Port of Spain, Trinidad; and New Orleans. Increasingly these festivities took on an African flavor, as African masking traditions and neo-African music styles featuring call-and-response singing, improvisation, and syncopated dance rhythms became hallmarks of urban carnival.
