Rastafari and I

What does it mean to inherit a faith that served as a fortress for your father, but feels like a contradiction to you? Throughout his childhood in Oxford, Silas Gray was surrounded by the sights, sounds, and symbols of his father’s Rastafarian identity. He was even named after the Rastafarian spiritual figurehead, Emperor Haile Selassie I.

But this legacy weighs heavily. It anchors him to a complex world leader he is not sure he is aligned with. And he feels like an imposter carrying a name associated with a faith he does not practise.

Desperate to find a version of this legacy he can comfortably own, Silas decides to do what his father spent 40 years dreaming of but never actually did - he books a flight to Ethiopia and travels to the Rastafarian spiritual motherland of Shashamane, the land granted to the global black diaspora by the Emperor himself.

Silas encounters a living, breathing community where three generations of Rastafarians exist under one roof.

This is a deeply personal pilgrimage about a son trying to see what his father sees, heal a generational disconnect, and finally make peace with his name.

(Photo: Silas Gray and a resident of Shashamane pose for a photo against a sunflower yellow wall. Silas wears a white T-shirt and sunglasses and the resident has a white T-shirt, long, black dread locks held back by a red, yellow and green headband. Both make a gesture with their thumb and forefinger and are smiling. Credit: Sorafel)

Producer/presenter/sound designer: Silas Gray
Executive producer: Peggy Sutton
Sound engineer: Richard Ward
A Reduced Listening Production for BBC World Service