The languages of Jamaican popular music, both literal and metaphorical, are first imitated in pursuit of an undeniable “originality”. Over time, as the music is indigenized, the Jamaican model loses its authority to varying degrees. The revolutionary ethos of reggae music is ranslated into local languages that articulate the particular politics of new cultural contexts. Echoes of the Jamaican source gradually fade. But new hybrid sounds return to their Jamaican origins, engendering polyvocal, cross-cultural dialogue. From the inter/disciplinary perspectives of historical sociology, musicology, history, media studies, literature, anthropology, sociology, cultural studies, the creative/cultural industries and, above all, the metaphorical “life sciences”, the contributors to this definitive volume lucidly articulate a cultural politics that acknowledges the far-reaching creativity of small-islanders with ancestral memories of continents of origin. The globalization of reggae music and its “wild child” dancehall is, indeed, an affirmation of the unquantifiable potential of the Jamaican people to reclaim identities and establish ties of affiliation that are not circumscribed by the Caribbean Sea: To the world! Co-published with Institute of Caribbean Studies and the Prince Claus Fund.