ABSTRACT
In 1491, the Caribbean was inhabited by peoples of several different ethnic and language groups; estimates of their total numbers vary widely, from a few hundred thousand up into the millions. The largest groups were those called Tainos, a kind of catch-all term for peoples who spoke languages in the Arawak family and lived in the Greater Antilles, and the Caribs, a group found in the southeastern Caribbean from Dominica down the line of the Windward Islands. Taino contributions to modern Caribbean culture have long been a subject of scholarly inquiry, and are debated. As more Europeans settled the Caribbean islands, they had occasion to view Taino areitos in which hundreds of participants danced together. In the late twentieth and early twenty-first century, some Dominican musicians invoke the Taino in their recordings and performances. Dominican performances of “Taino” music can be understood in more than one way.
