Opal Palmer Adisa

University of the West Indies

Opal Palmer Adisa (PhD), Writer, Gender Specialist, and Cultural Activist, is​ ​the Former University Director of The Institute for Gender and Development Studies, RCO at The University of the West Indies. Adisa believes that literature and the performance arts are the best approaches to interrogate gender inequality and formulate an approach to gender justice. Adisa is the Principal Director of Adisa Consulting.
A feminist/activist for over four decades, Adisa has published 22 collections, that includes, essays, novels, short stories, poetry collections and children’s books. Her areas of focus are gender-based violence and ending child sexual and physical abuse. Adisa the initiator and organizer behind Thursday In Black, an island-wide campaign to educate and bring awareness about gendered-based violence.

Publications

She has just completed the authorized children’s biography of Portia Simpson Miller, entitled, Portia Dreams, 2021 Jamaica’s first female Prime Minister. Adisa is the editor of 100+ Voices For Miss Lou: Poetry, Tributes, Interviews & Essays, The UWI Press, 2021. She is also the editor-in-chief of two major journals, Interviewing the Caribbean, a literary/visual; and Caribbean Conjunctures, scholarly essays and book reviews. Her new story poems, The Storyteller’s Return  released, April 2022. Her essays, stories, poems and articles have been anthologized in over 500 publications.