THE annual Revivalist Pilgrimage to Watt Town in St Ann in rural Jamaica has been inscribed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) on the Global List of Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH).

Jamaica has been highly commended by the UN body for proposing the Revivalist event’s nomination which it said “highlights the links between living heritage and cultural spaces”.

The Watt Town revival pilgrimage has been inscribed on UNESCO’s Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity (ICHH). The inscription took place during the 19th Session of UNESCO’s Inter-Governmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, which was held in Asunción in the Republic of Paraguay from December 2-8.

The evaluation was done on December 4, supported by Jamaica’s Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport Olivia Grange.

Grange said the event was a signal of honour for Revivalists and for Jamaica, “giving it its rightful place among the cultural elements of humanity”.

She also thanked “the people who worked towards the inscription, including the Revival community, African Caribbean Institute of Jamaica/Jamaica Memory Bank, Jamaica Cultural Development Commission; and Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information.

The pilgrimage to St Ann has been an annual spiritual commemoration and celebration by Jamaican Revivalists (Pocomania), which started just before the Great Revival of 1860, and is a testament to the endurance and vibrancy of some of the country’s African retentions.

It is said to have joined the Maroon Heritage of Moore Town (2008) and Reggae Music (2018), which were already listed as Jamaican elements to be inscribed on the intangible cultural heritage list.

The minister pointed out that Watt Town is considered a sacred site, which was once a refuge for enslaved Africans and groups that were called bands. Each year, on the first Thursday in March, bands across Jamaica would journey to the revered hilltop location.

“The bands engaged in songs and dances, adorned in uniforms of vibrant colours, and travelled to the steep hill that houses what they call the Jerusalem schoolroom, which is a place of worship and thanksgiving,” Grange explained.

She pointed out that the Pilgrimage to Watt Town had met all five criteria outlined by UNESCO’s evaluation body in order to obtain the inscription.

The minister also informed that the inscription was indicative of the global recognition once again accorded Jamaica’s rich cultural heritage by UNESCO.

She explained that the rise of Revivalism in Jamaica is said to have “served the loudest purpose and expressions of the ancestors’ defiance to secular injustice and recognition that the long arc of their worship of God must bend towards an Afrocentric trajectory”.

Revivalism in Jamaica evolved out of Myalism, another Afrocentric religion. The emergence of Revivalism came in the 1860s, with two different branches: 60 (1860) or Zion; and 61 (1861) or Pocomania.

The Great Revival began from 1858-59 as a great Christian revival, known as The Prayer Meeting Revival. Myalism reached its zenith after Emancipation to around the time of the Great Revival of 1860-61 and seems to have become absorbed into what is now called Revival.

The church was founded as Sacred Heart Spiritual Church International by Bishop Ray Anthony Foster, who is regarded as a “man of God”, prophet, singer, and doctor.

The rise of Revivalism in Jamaica is said to have served the loudest purpose and expressions of the ancestors’ defiance to secular injustice and recognition that the long arc of their worship of God must bend towards an Afrocentric trajectory, according to Minister Olivia Grange.