AiUsoN J. VA\N NVntiis


not practice in the country, where the play is set, but in Kingston, where
the play is performed (Seaga 4-5).4 Seaga notes,

 In Pukkumina, urban and particularly Kingston groups are more active
 than groups in the rural areas; rural groups are usually much smaller
 and they tend to meet spasmodically and sometimes only once a year.
 Kingston groups on the other hand, are much larger and have up to
 60 members in each Band.

If the same urban/rural distinctions existed in Jamaica in the late 1930s,
setting pocomania in the country tempers pocomania's potentially sub-
versive power for members of the orthodox Christian middle class. In
1937 and 1938, the lower-class members who attend pocomania meet-
ings also participate in widespread labor uprisings. Presumably, if
smaller pocomania groups meet relatively infrequently, they could not
unite as powerfully and act as subversively against the upper classes as
larger groups meeting more often in urban areas like Kingston.
 Setting Pocomania in rural Jamaica distances pocomania from the
pocomania practiced in Kingston during the late 1930s. One article
published in The Jamaica Standard on May 2, 1938, reports that Kingston
inhabitants "are preparing to make representation to the Government
with a view to ridding themselves of Pocomania, Zionism, Revivalism
or whatever new names the self-styled 'healers' may adopt.""l Know-
ing that the play's "healer," Sister Kate, does not practice in Kingston
facilitates the Kingston audience's belief in the alternative form of
pocomania seen, sensed, and expressed on stage. Distancing
pocomania from the "congested gutters, dilapidated zinc fences, ragged
circular groups bending over bone dice at crossings" in the slum area
of Kingston and situating it in rural Jamaica purifies, naturalizes, and
therefore, legitimizes pocomania as a valuable source of Jamaican folk
culture (Williams). 1 Even though the staged version of pocomania does
not seem to exist in Kingston, the play suggests it could exist beyond
Kingston, and should be considered as an integral component of the
Jamaican nation.


 14 Seaga does not note the originating date of the urban/rural distinction in his
1969 essay.
 15 For a discussion of healing practices, see p. 30 of Barry Chevannes' Rastafari:
Roots and Ideology.
 See pp. 52-53 of Timothy Brennan's "The national longing for form" to see
how this move to the folk resembles nationalist movements in Europe.