Triennial Awards for Women

The Rt. Hon. Dame Janet Gwennett Bostwick, counsel and attorney, is known as a model politician and pioneer among women in The Bahamas. She is admired and respected as a champion for the empowerment of women, not only in her native Commonwealth of The Bahamas, but also in the region and beyond.

Ms. Shirley Pryce, a veteran advocate for Domestic workers right, motivational speaker and an “example of women’s empowerment”, joins the rank of some of the Caribbean’s most excellent and exemplary, courageous, committed and creative women. She is the recipient of the Twelfth Triennial Award for Women and, understandably, the conferral, is one of the signal highlights of the livestreamed, official opening of the Thirty-Eighth Meeting of the CARICOM Heads of Government, taking place in Grenada from 4-7 July 2017.

Marion Bethel, Bahamian by birth and quintessential Caribbean woman, is a distinguished attorney, scholar, poet, film-maker, essayist and short-story writer who has gained national, regional and international recognition and acclaim for her advocacy in the areas of gender equality and human rights. 

The acceptance of women as authority figures or as role models is an important step in female education…..It is this process of identification, respect, and then self-respect that promotes growth. Judy Chicago.

CITATION IN HONOUR OF PROFESSOR BARBARA BAILEY ON THE OCCASION OF THE PRESENTATION OF THE NINTH CARICOM TRIENNIAL AWARD FOR WOMEN, 1 JULY 2008, DICKENSON BAY, ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA

It was most likely that Nesta Patrick, first recipient of the CARICOM Triennial Award for Women, accepted the Honorary Doctor of Laws (LLD) conferred on her by the University of the West Indies at St. Augustine in 2001 with characteristic humility and pride. This marked another milestone in the accomplished life of Ms. Patrick, acclaimed women’s rights activist, social worker and advocate for the recognition of the mentally challenged.

The Honourable Madam Justice Desiree Bernard, the first female judge of the Caribbean Court of Justice was conferred with the honour of the eighth CARICOM Triennial Award for Women. A lawyer by profession, she began her career in 1963 when she attained a Bachelor of Laws Degree from the University of London. By 1964 she was a qualified Solicitor and practiced in the Guyana Law Courts until 1980, when she was appointed the first female judge in the High Court of the Supreme Court of Guyana, where she had practiced since 1965.

Professor Rhoda Reddock, national of Trinidad and Tobago and esteemed scholar of the Caribbean Community, is the seventh outstanding woman from the Caribbean Community to receive the CARICOM Triennial Award for Women.

Attaining a Doctorate in Applied Sociology in 1984 at the University of Amsterdam, she served as a Research Fellow and Associate Lecturer at the Institute of Social Studies at The Hague before returning to the Region in 1985, where she was appointed Lecturer, then Senior Lecturer at the University of the West Indies at St. Augustine.

In acknowledgement of her exceptional career accomplishments,Professor Joycelin Massiah was conferred the CARICOM Triennial Award for Women in 1996. A true Caribbean citizen, Professor Massiah’s life path transcends Caribbean boundaries having been born in Guyana, studied and worked for several years in Jamaica and now residing as a citizen of Barbados. As a renowned Caribbean academic, scholar and intellectual, she has, through her scholarly research, contributed significantly to shaping the agenda on women and development in the Region and the movement for promoting women’s rights.

Dr. Lucille Mathurin Mair is undoubtedly a Caribbean citizen of great intellectual stature and high international repute and of whom all the Caribbean is proud. For her outstanding service as a diplomat, scholar and women’s rights activist she was accorded the highly deserved honour of fifth recipient of the CARICOM Triennial Award in 1996.