Trinidad and Tobago

Surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and North Atlantic Ocean, the island republic of Trinidad and Tobago is located northeast of Venezuela on the eastern Caribbean chain. The two islands are located 21 miles (1 mile = 1.609 kilometers) apart, and together constitute a nation of nearly 1.3 million people almost evenly divided between Afro-Caribbean Christians and immigrant Indian Hindus and Muslims.

Trinidad was established by Spain in 1754 and Tobago, by Dutch, English, and later Latvians in the 18th century, as part of the New World colonies. As plantation and sharecropping economies, the two islands collectively switched colonial hands more than 30 times in two centuries. Populations soon practiced African-influenced religious traditions interspersed with European Christian practices. Following slavery's outlaw and the British Caribbean's full emancipation of Africans in 1838, large numbers of contracted immigrants from India and China were brought over to continue the harsh labor of sugarcane production. Fueled by capital colonial demand, the nation's fusion of African, Indian, Chinese, European, and Syrian-Lebanese cultures has promoted numerous locally created musical genres that have spread regionally and globally, including chutney soca, calypso, rapso, ragga soca, and other hybrid steel band genres.

Trinidad and Tobago gained independence from Britain in 1962. Eric Williams aided the nation's success in its infancy, though the ethnic politics of the country has created some tensions since. In the first decade of the 21st century, the president and titular head of the country was a Christian, George [Page 1308]Maxwell Richards, while the prime minister, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, was a Hindu. Though increasing crime has been an issue, the nation's wealth, strong education, and quality-of-life index make it one of the most prosperous countries in the Caribbean today.

English is the national language, though Spanish, Chinese, French, and Caribbean Hindustani are also spoken by the nation's multicultural inhabitants, who hark from four different continents and mostly reside on the island of Trinidad. Tobago mostly consists of descendants of African slaves. According to the 2000 census, the two-island nation is religiously 31.6% Protestant (Anglican, Baptist, Pentecostal, Seventh-Day Adventist, and other), 26% Catholic, 22.5% Hindu, 5.8% Muslim, and 14.1% unspecified, none, or other. Hybrid forms of African religion are still noticeably present. In diaspora, the nation's residents collectively practice many of the world's religions along with syncretistic mixes of those religions, such as the many forms of Orishas.

Recognized for innovations in the music, food, and tourist industries and having one of the highest literacy rates in the world, the nation has entered the global stage through its discovery of oil and gas reserves, which have aided the country's development for the past 30 years. The nation is most famous for its annual Carnival festivities held the day before the beginning of the Christian pre-Easter season of Lent, which bring in tens of thousands of foreign visitors to street celebrations, music venues, costume parties, and art performances, virtually doubling Trinidad's population overnight. While Port of Spain, Trinidad, is a bustling fast-paced city, Tobago's relaxed style and azure waters draw in thousands of European and South American tourists on vacation each year.

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