In 2013, a decision was made to inaugurate an annual distinguished lecture series named in honour of Kamau Brathwaite. This decision was made because although the lectures and visits hosted by the programme over the preceding decade had an undeniable great impact in helping to firmly establish the discipline of Cultural Studies within the academic and public communities, these lectures has nonetheless functioned in a fairly ad hoc manner with some years having as many as four lecturers and in the following none. Our decision to establish an annual Lecture Series was thus part of our interest in establishing a consistent visible presence on campus.  
The naming of the series after Kamau Brathwaite reflected an overdue appreciation at UWI, Cave Hill of his status as one of the leading poets writing in the English language today, and a distinguished Caribbean cultural theorist. There is simply no finer living figure who has contributed to the cultural imagination of the region, in both the creative and theoretical spheres, and who also has contributed decades of distinguished service to the University of the West Indies. In the annual Cultural Studies lecture series, inaugurated in March 2015, we will, through our selection of scholars, artists and cultural practitioners, honour the important range, creativity, daring and legacy of Kamau Brathwaite’s contribution to Caribbean Cultural Thought and the creative intellect.

Past Lectures: 

• 2025, March 27 - Dr. L'Antoinette Stines, "Word Sound Dat Daaance"

• 2024, April 5 - Professor Curwen Best, "Strategic Space: Kamau Brathwaite, Video Games and the Age of Spiritual Machines" 

• 2023, May 4  - Professor Kei Miller, "The Wreck and the Record".

• 2022, May 11 - Professor Emeritus Gordon Rohlehr and Dr. Christian Campbell, "Bridges of Sound: Travelling with Kamau Brathwaite" - An           Intergenerational Conversation.

• 2021, May 11 – Sonia S Williams, "Growing Trees for Shelter: The Performance Praxis of a Brathwaitian Paradigm"

• 2020, March 5 – Professor David Austin, "A Tale of Two Caribbean Islands: The Poetics of Politics in the Making of the Modern World"

• 2019, January 31 – Professor Kelly Baker Josephs, "Inna de Digital Yaad: Brathwaitian Models of Engagement"

• 2018, February 2 – Professor Gina Ulysse, “Black Liberation Rasanblaj Redux”

• February 2017, February 2 – Professor Robin Kelly, “Trumpism and the Crisis of Black America”

• 2016, February 26 – Professor Carolyn Cooper, “’Mek We Talk Bout de Bottom of de Sea’: Submerged Narratives in Caribbean Literature and Popular Culture.”

• 2015, March 22 – Professor Hazel Simmons-McDonald, “Literature, Culture and the Politics of Deprivation”, Inaugural Kamau Brathwaite Lecture.

Flyers from Past Lectures