Prof. Rex Nettleford
Rex Nettleford was a teacher, international scholar, historian, choreographer and one of the Caribbean’s most eminent intellectuals. Coming from humble beginnings in Bunkers Hill, Trelawny, Nettleford won a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford University, embarking on a lifelong mission of service in education. Part of the team who researched and wrote “The Report on the Rastafari Movement of Kingston, Jamaica” in 1960, Nettleford helped to give legitimacy to the group considered outcasts of Jamaican society. Nettleford also founded the National Dance Theatre Company and eventually became Vice Chancellor of the University of the West Indies. A true patriot of Jamaica, and a recognized educational and cultural ambassador of the Caribbean, Nettleford spent his life serving the Caribbean and his country through education and the performing arts.—Sherman Escoffery