Faces of the Caribbean
September 5 - 8, 2024
As a sort of fundamental stack of building blocks, the stories we tell via oral and written words, anecdotes, parables and memories anchor Caribbean people firmly to our connected histories. With the movement of Caribbean citizens widening through the diaspora, these stories essentially become a bridge facilitating free movement between time and space, here and there, and generations and worlds.
Our stories connect us. The Caribbean literary space is an opportunity to present a more accurate representation of the variegated nature of the Caribbean experience. Our stories repudiate the dangerously insidious single narrative. It shatters monolithic tropes. It seizes the pen to demand that our rich creative contributions be credited to the source.
Faces of the Caribbean brings together scholars, writers, artists, archivers, preservationists and practitioners of the Caribbean to discuss, reckon with and interrogate the relevance and expansive value of Caribbean writing and the Caribbean writer to the modern world.
Highlights from BCLF 2024
Tiphanie Yanique, Jasmine Sealy and Angie Cruz chat about Caribbean love and the Caribbean as setting in our romance stories. Moderated by journalist, Kellie Magnus.
Caribbean essayists share their submissions from the longstanding Caribbean journal, The Caribbean Writer. Hosted by editor-in-chief, Alscess Lewis-Brown at the historic Weeksville Center.
Death in the Dry River is a new work of noir fiction by Lisa Allen-Agostini, based on the real-life Trinidadian gangster Boysie Singh. As this conversation’s guide, P. Djèlí Clark will take Lisa’s hand as they roam through the shadowy corridors of Agostini’s pre-colonial Trinidad.
An interactive gathering of poets and griots from the Diaspora and the ancestral lands of Home. Featuring Lauren k. Alleyne, Mercy Tullis-Bukhari, Richard Georges, Yesha Townsend, and Roberto Carlos Garcia.
Edwidge Danticat and Roxane Gay, two award-winning Haitian-American novelists, celebrate Edwidge's latest literary offering, a nonfiction essay collection, We're Alone with a launch conversation at Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival 2024.
There’s nothing more Caribbean than the informal practice of casual truth-bearing conversations between friends. Jive Poetic holds conversation with poet Mahogany Browne.
Prizegiving for BCLF 2024 Short Story Contest. Winners Stefan Bindley-Taylor and Diana McCaulay read their work.
Roberto Carlos Garcia sits in conversation with Cleyvis Natera discussing his collection of essays’ relevance to contemporary politics, intersections with the Caribbean.
Prof. Sir Hilary Beckles and Dr. Richard Georges discuss reparations, the framework of reparations and the value of the Caribbean in the ongoing fight for justice and freedom.
A conversation of intriguing reveal of Taylor's personal journey and the shaping of his work, his diasporic nostalgia and his resettlement.
Award-winning journalist and archivist Dominic Kalipersad and Kevin Adonis Browne explore the interplay of memory, fact, and imagination that help us remember who we were, see who we are, and imagine who we can be.
2024 Partners & Sponsors
Special thanks to Consul General Mr. J. André Laveau, Ms. Melanie McNair, Ms. Gemma Garcia, Ms. Tanya Pessoa and Ms. Theresa O'Neal Redd for their efforts in making BCLF 2024 possible.