Kumina

Encyclopedia : K : KU : KUM : Kumina

Music of Jamaica
Kumina	Nyabinghi
Mento	Ska
Rocksteady	Reggae
Sound systems	Lovers rock
Dub	Dancehall
Dub poetry	Toasting
Raggamuffin	Roots reggae
US	UK
Timeline and Samples
Anglophone Caribbean music
Anguilla - Antigua and Barbuda - Bahamas - Barbados - Bermuda - Caymans - Grenada - Jamaica - Montserrat - St. Kitts and Nevis - St. Vincent and the Grenadines - Trinidad and Tobago - Turks and Caicos - Virgin Islands
Other Caribbean
Aruba and the Dutch Antilles - Cuba - Dominica - Dominican Republic - Haiti - Martinique and Guadeloupe - Puerto Rico - St. Lucia

Kumina is both the religion and the music practiced by the people of eastern Jamaica. These people have retained the drumming and dancing of the Bantu-speaking peoples of the Congo. Like the Kongo practitioners from Cuba, they have kept a large amount of the Kongo language alive. In the Americas there are many Kongo-derived religions still being practiced today.

There are two main aspects of Kongo religion that are quite distinctive. One is the practice of bringing down spirits of the dead to briefly inhabit the bodies of the faithful. The purpose of this is so that the ancestors may share their wisdom, providing spiritual assistance and advice to those here on Earth. Without exception, all such faiths in the Americas retain this central feature of Kongo faith. The other feature is the extensive work with Inquices (Enkises, Nkisi). The Inquices are very like the Orishas of Yoruba tradition, but also different. In Cuba and Brazil, where Yoruba influence was strongest in the Americas, they are often syncretized with the Orishas. They may best be described as being both the most ancient of ancestors as well as being associated with specific powers in nature. The Inquices do not tend to possess as detailed a mythology as the Yoruba gods.