|
 |
|
Association of Caribbean
Women Writers and Scholars
13th International Conference |
Invited Artists, Writers, and Scholars
 |
Olga Buckley, born in Aruba in 1950, is a poet and writer of children’s books. Curashi was her
first poetry collection; Sin Wan Patra appeared in 2008. Bencho is the title of a series of
children’s books about the boy Bencho. Olga writes mostly in Papiamentu, one of the
official languages of Aruba, but she also has work in Dutch, another official language of
Aruba. She was one of the translators of Anne Frank’s Diary into Papiamentu. Olga is
also fluent in English and Spanish. Bon Nochi, Drumi Dushi is one of her priorities, a reading
project for children age 4- 12. The project includes visiting children at home and a television
program that appears three times per week. Olga is a regular participant in literay events.
|
| | |
 |
Kit-Ling Tjon Pian Gi is a female visual artist. She was born, works and lives in Paramaribo,
Suriname, South America. Kit-Ling studied visual art in Suriname and the Netherlands. She was
traditionally trained with an emphasis on painting, drawing and graphic art (etching, dry point,
etcetera). In 2005, after successfully attending a workshop on the "oneminute" video film
(organized by the Sandberg Institute [Amsterdam, the Netherlands] and the Akademie voor Hoger
Kunst en Cultuuronderwijs [AHKCO - Art Academy, Paramaribo, Suriname]), Kit-Ling Tjon Pian Gi
added the short video-film as a medium to her artwork. Kit-Ling Tjon Pian Gi made paintings
and drawings, inspired by the tropical rainforest, and the richness of the diverse cultures
in Suriname. In 2008 Kit-Ling was focusing on the inner strength of women. At the moment she
is in search of the strength of hybridism’ and she wants to tell the story of her hometown,
the "City of Paramaribo" to the world. www.kitlingtjonpiangi.net
|
| | |
 |
Antigua/Barbuda native Joanne C. Hillhouse (who also writes as "jhohadli") is the author
of three books of fiction: The Boy from Willow Bend and Dancing Nude in the Moonlight and Oh Gad!,
the last of which is set to be published in 2012. She’s a 2004 Honour Award recipient from the
Antigua and Barbuda UNESCO office, a 2008 Breadloaf fellow, and 2011 recipient of the David Hough
Literary Prize from the Caribbean Writer; she also earned a spot in 1995 at the University of
Miami&rquo;s Caribbean Fiction Writers Summer Institute. Her fiction and poetry have appeared in
Calabash, The Caribbean Writer, Small Axe, Tongues of the Ocean, Mythium, MaComère, Sea Breeze,
Women Writers: A Zine, St. Somewhere, and elsewhere. Hillhouse founded the Wadadli Youth Pen
Prize – wadadlipen.wordpress.com – in 2004; and
is a longtime volunteer with the Cushion Club kids reading group. She’s performed in local
stagings of the Vagina Monologues and homegrown version When a Woman Moans to which she also
contributed as a writer. She’s worked in print, internet, television and film mediums as freelance
writer, journalist, editorial consultant, and/or producer. www.jhohadli.com
|
| | |
 |
Rihana Jamaludin (Paramaribo, 1959) worked as a visual artist and later on as a teacher and a coach
for new immigrants in Holland, before she took up writing in 1996. Her short stories were noticed
and she received a few awards, resulting in the publication of Minnewake in 2008. By then she was
already working on two other books, and in 2009 the historical novel De Zwarte Lord was published.
In 2011 the novel Kuis was released. This story, about a Hindu jeweller in Amsterdam who has
dedicated his chastity to the goddess Parvati, but falls in love with a girl, for whom he has to
design a chastity belt, is this year’s reading choice for students in Suriname and at Aruba.
www.rihanajamaludin.com
|
| | |
 |
Cynthia McLeod was born in Paramaribo (1936) as Cynthia Ferrier. She is the daughter of Johan Ferrier,
the first President of Suriname. McLeod graduated in Dutch Language and Dutch Literature and taught
several years at pre-university level in Paramaribo. She fondly remembers this as the time that her
students loved to listen to her stories about life in Suriname during colonial times. After her
husband became ambassador, she lived in the United States, Belgium and Venezuela. She was able
to do research in many colonial archives. In 1987 her debut novel, Hoe duur was de suiker?, a
historical work set in colonial Suriname during slavery times, was published and was an immediate
success. Many other books followed and several attracted international attention, amongst which
Elizabeth Samson, about a free, black, rich woman who lived in the first half of the 18th century
and managed to marry a white man, in spite of the law that forbade marriages between whites and
blacks. www.conserve.nl
|
| | |
 |
Annie Paul is a writer and critic based at the University of the West Indies, Mona, where she is
head of the Publications Section at the Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies.
Editor of the book Caribbean Culture: Soundings on Kamau Brathwaite Paul is the recipient of a grant
from the Prince Claus Fund (Netherlands). She was one of the founding editors of Small Axe (of which
she remains an associate editor) and the original Caribbean Review of Books; she has been published
in international journals and magazines such as Slavery & Abolition, Art Journal, South Atlantic
Quarterly, Wasafiri, Callaloo, and Bomb. Paul has also been a contributor to the Brooklyn Museum’s
Infinite Island show; the 2008 GZTriennale, Documenta11; the AICA 2000 International Congress &
Symposium at the Tate Gallery of Modern Art, Bankside, London; Meridien Masterpieces, BBC World
Service; Dialogos Iberoamericanos (Valencia, Spain) and to forums sponsored by inIVA (Institute of
International Visual Art, London). www.anniepaul.com>
|
| | |
 |
Sylviane Vayabouri (Cayenne, 1960) was raised by her grandparents and lived most of her life in
Cayenne, but spent also time in Guadeloupe, Martinique, and France. After taking her bachelor’s
degree in Literary Arts, she specialised in Education for disabled children. At the moment, she is
chief documentalist of a pedagogical documentation center in La Guyane. Her first novel, Rue
Lallouette prolongée, is autobiographical and invites the reader to accompany her on the triangular
road between La Guyane, France and the Antilles. One will encounter changing traditions, culture
shocks, precious old memories and wounded feelings. Her second book, La Crique, deals with
multiculturalism and living in a place like Cayenne. Her style is word-moving.
www.editions-harmattan.fr
|
|
 |
