The Centre for Caribbean Thought at the University of the West Indies (UWI), Mona will honour Jamaican-born Stuart Hall in the Third Caribbean Reasonings to be held on the Mona Campus on June 17-19, 2004. The conference will be held under the theme “Culture, Politics, Race and Diaspora: The Thought of Stuart Hall”. Prof. Stuart Hall is an internationally renowned scholar best known for his contribution to cultural studies, political thought, film and media studies and critical theory. This conference is a “homecoming” in many respects, as it will be the first time that a conference at the UWI will focus entirely on his work.

Approximately 25 scholars from Africa, the Caribbean, the United States of America and Europe will focus on Hall’s political writings, issues of race, diasporicity, globalization and the politics of identity, representation, popular culture, and gender. The conference features three plenary sessions in which Lawrence Grossberg (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill), David Scott (Columbia University), Anthony Bogues (Centre for Caribbean Thought & Brown University) and Don Pease (Dartmouth College) will speak on topics related to Stuart Hall’s ethics, Cultural Studies, and the politics of representation.

Five panel sessions will feature accomplished scholars including Charles Mills (University of Illinois, Chicago), Sherene Razack (Ontario Institute for Studies in Education), Harry Garuba (University of Cape Town), Michael Rustin and Barnor Hesse (University of East London). Other eminent panelist, Percy Hintzen (University of California, Berkeley), Joseph Jordan (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill), Nicole Castor (University of Chicago), as well as Angella McRobbie, Julian Henriques and Denise Noble (Goldsmiths College), and Susan Mains (UWI, Mona).
Two publications will also be launched officially as part of the conference proceedings. These are George Lamming’s Sovereignty of the Imagination, the first publication from the Centre for Caribbean Thought, and Dennis Benn’s The Caribbean: An Intellectual History.

This promising intellectual feast is scheduled to take place at the Social Sciences Lecture Theatre at the UWI. The official opening will commence at 6:00 p.m. Thursday, June 17 at the Undercroft. The guest speaker will be Prof. the Hon. Rex Nettleford, UWI Vice Chancellor and Convenor of the Cultural Studies Initiative at the University.

The closing ceremony will feature a response from Stuart Hall as well as presentations to him from the Centre for Caribbean Thought. The event will be of interest to cultural practitioners, artists, cultural scholars and students of culture generally. The public is
invited to attend.

For further information contact Sonjah Stanley Niaah Researcher, Centre for Caribbean Thought, Department of Government UWI, Mona, telephone 977-5935, 927-2592.