Performances

Jean Small

Jean Small is a Guyanese Jamaican living in Jamaica since 1954. She graduated from the University of the West Indies in Foreign Languages: French, Spanish and Latin, and her profession all her life has been as an educator. She has worked in Guyana , Trinidad , Nigeria , Australia and here in Jamaica as a teacher of French at both Secondary and University levels. Mrs. Small is retired from the University of the West Indies where she last headed the Philip Sherlock Centre for the Creative Arts from 1992 to 2002. From 2002 to 2006 she hosted the programme “A Festival of Words” on Radio Mona FM 93, discussing the creative process with Caribbean poets. She is currently the Convenor of the Fine Arts Board of the University Council of Jamaica. As a Toastmaster, she is currently the 2007-2008 Caribbean Champion of Public Speaking. Her other awards include the ACTOR BOY AWARD in 1995 for her performance in Hot Flashes , and the Charlotte and Isidor Paiewonsky Prize for the Best first publication of a poem in the Caribbean Writer. In 1998 she performed her French language play, A Black Woman's Tale , in France where it was selected as the best Jamaican play.. Mrs. Small is also a storyteller. Currently, she lectures part time in Theatre, Public Speaking and Caribbean Literature at the University College of the Caribbean . She is divorced and has one child, Seretse Small who is a guitarist and the “CEO of Griot Music.”