ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the use of the cultural icon of Carnival, built from experiences in Brazil and Trinidad, for example, from traditional masquerade of Junkanoo to a commercialised performance of culture for tourist consumption. The comparison between the traditional aspect of Bahamian cultural performance on Bay Street between rival communities with spectator participation and the music of goat skin drums and cowbells has been eclipsed by a money-making event where participants are required to pay to observe the parade, no longer able to participate from the bleachers beyond the barriers. Carnival shifts this to dynamic to what the Christian Council has rejected as the spectacle scantily clad women gyrating in the streets and the shift of Bahamian culture. Government has opted to spend on tourism promoting carnival yet they have not developed a strategy where they can advertise sufficiently in advance to attract the numbers they argue for. Culture has become linked to tourism and mass consumption. The politics of sea, sand and sex trumps the resistance of Junkanoo.
