Literacy acquisition and development among primary-age children is a main focus of inquiry and research for different institutions and organizations in the Caribbean. In Jamaica, educational bodies such as the School of Education, University of the West Indies, and the Ministry of Education, Youth and Culture (MOEYC), have implemented literacy projects like the Language Materials Workshop (LMW), the New Horizon Project, the Jamaica All-Age School Project, and UNICEF-Jamaica Literacy through Literature in Zone 40, Clarendon (Webster and Walters 1998).

McKenzie describes this work as 'the result of one philosopher's response to ten West Indian novels' (ix). As a philosopher and an academic, the author is concerned to develop and promote Caribbean philosophy and it is therefore fitting that much of the introduction is taken up with a defence of his approach. His book is not, he asserts, a way of understanding philosophy through the study of literature nor is it a 'philosophy of literature' since, as he rightly claims, this is 'close to what is now called literary theory' (2).

In this paper qualitative research in literature is considered. It is suggested that this is problematic because work in the field of literary studies is intrinsically qualitative. This does not mean however, that literary studies has avoided the attention of those like highly quantitative bureaucracies who are more interested in quantitative concerns. Historical manifestations of the tensions regarding qualitative and quantitative evaluation in literature are highlighted and a conclusion drawn that these do not serve the best interests of the field.

The Caribbean Poetry Project (CPP) is a collaboration between The University of the West Indies (UWI), and the University of Cambridge, that has been running from 2010 to 2015. It began with a recognition that with all the changes in the UK’s literature curriculum, Caribbean poetry was not getting the exposure it deserved.