A New ‘Pum Pum Palitix’: Carnival and the Sex Education the Caribbean Needs

Mar 1, 2017
Bianca Campbell & Samantha Daley

Carnival is about body positivity and resistance. But we need that freedom of physical expression all year long—and in school curricula and the broader culture.

Bright colors, glorious headpieces, glitter. Steel drums and xylophones. As people with Caribbean roots, we feel our chests swell with pride and our hips begin to sway immediately when we think of Carnival (which ended yesterday) and the ancestral rhythms of island cultures from Trinidad to Jamaica.

The costumes are sexy, sassy, and everything we aspired to be as Caribbean-American preteens. We fawned over Carnival outfits like many tweens do for their future prom gowns. The feathers, the strings, and the beads became our markers of someone no longer a child, but a grown individual who could finally do grown things: show off your body, stay up late, drink, wine the night away, and of course have sex. Without a doubt, Carnival is about ownership of our bodies, about an annual recommitment to our sexuality and broader sense of liberation.

Continued at source: https://rewire.news/article/2017/03/01/new-pum-pum-palitix-carnival-sex-education-caribbean-needs/