January 2014


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Senior Lecturer Dr Dennis Brown of the Department of Behavioural Sciences in the Faculty of Social Sciences, passed away on Tuesday January 7, 2014. Dr Brown graduated from The UWI, Mona Campus where he received the BSc (1975) in Sociology, the Diploma in Population Studies (1986), the MSc (1987) in Sociology – specialising in Demography, and the PhD (1994) which incorporated one year of study at the London School of Economics.

He lectured in Development Studies and in Industrial Sociology. He also conducted a development course through distance education to the Sir Arthur Lewis Community College in St Lucia. Dr Brown had worked at The UWI, St Augustine Campus since December 1996. He was promoted to Senior Lecturer in August 2008 and served in this post until his passing.

A memorial service was held on January 11, at the Daaga Auditorium, and his funeral was held in his homeland, Jamaica on January 18.

At the moving memorial, Dr Michelle Rowley, of the Department of Women’s Studies at the University of Maryland, shared some memories.

“Dennis for me, has always been an embodiment of Walter Rodney, moved as he was by any condition of injustice that he encountered. His professional choices showed that he lived, on a daily basis, with a commitment to justice and fair play. After graduating with his first degree, Dennis worked briefly with the Government in the Ministry of Agriculture. In time his truck was contracted to deliver foodstuff throughout the parishes of Kingston and St. Andrew. The stories that he would later tell about those times reveal a close involvement-with and deep knowledge of the lives of the rural folk with whom he interacted. Here, I really want us to pause so that we can grasp the picture of the man. A man who emerged from a generation where people embraced the difficult choices that had to be made around issues related to colour, class privilege and cultural identity. The man for whom, education, if it was to be of value, it had to be of service. The man who took his degree and knowledge back to the people and was humble enough to learn from them. Dennis was a man who understood the importance of grounding,” she said.

“I know his students, in fact, we will all remember that iconic hat bobbing as he walked the campus, like a kind of academic rude bwoy. In the closing years of his professional life, illness forced him to curtail his professional activities, but nonetheless, he continued to teach, write and publish until quite recently. He never lost his passion for social justice, and as a professional he developed a keen interest in the area of poverty. He did extensive research on the poor in the English-speaking Caribbean and British dependencies in collaboration with Kairi Consultants, and his publications in this area as well as on International Migration have only added to the international reputation of the university,” she said.

His widow, Lynette Joseph-Brown, also shared some memories.

“There is no doubt that in the professional, public space many persons would know of Dennis as an intellectual of high standards and unshakeable integrity; a man who was also deeply concerned about high standards in academia and the administration that was needed in order to facilitate these high standards throughout the institution. Undoubtedly therefore, many in his department and faculty could tell you about his uncompromising stance around many issues which he felt strongly about and which he continued to lament even during his illness.”

…“He also referred to himself as a father of the world, indicating his love and concern for young people in general. He has always welcomed his children’s friends into the home with quiet consent and facilitation; picked up and dropped off many of them uncomplainingly after parties or outings and to and from school. He was also always ready to provide children who needed material and emotional support due to disadvantageous circumstances when asked,” she said.

His three children, Imani, Chinyere and Jabari also spoke warmly, as did other members of the family and university community.

Dennis A. V. Brown
(7th April, 1950-8th January, 2014)

Eulogy
Crafted by the friends and loved ones of Dr. Dennis Brown and delivered by Michelle V. Rowley

Saturday 11th January, 2014

Daaga Auditorium, The University of the West Indies, St Augustine campus

Today, we are here to mark the passing of a dear friend and loved one. And even though I stand here, alone, friend of the family, and having watched these children grow up—a member of the family, I stand representing the many voices that have gone into crafting this eulogy, and I’m sure you will not be surprised to know that that includes Dennis’ voice as well. I will speak each sentence, mindful of the memories and love that poured in from the many corners of the earth to celebrate the life of Dennis Arthur Vivian Brown.

So for those of you who may have missed it in your interactions with him, Dennis was Jamaican—born in Kingston, Jamaica—on the 7th of April, 1950 to Myrtle and Arthur Brown. He was the brother of Neville Brown; Yvonne Franklin; Raymond (now deceased); and Fara Brown, and he will be remembered by his first wife Jennifer. He grew up in the seaside town of Port Antonio and at the age of 12, he and his family moved to the capital city of Kingston, where he spent most of his adolescent and adult life. He attended Jamaica College (JC) for his high school years, a JC boy, and on graduation he attended The UWI, Mona Campus where he studied Sociology.

Port Antonio a sea port and Kingston, the heart of Jamaica—two very telling places about who Dennis would become. So while I said it somewhat facetiously—Dennis was Jamaican, a man of the soil of Jamaica. Dennis was also a regionalist, a man who saw the Caribbean sea as what connected rather than divided us.

Dennis, for me, has always been an embodiment of Walter Rodney, moved as he was by any condition of injustice that he encountered. His professional choices showed that he lived, on a daily basis, with a commitment to justice and fair play. After graduating with his first degree, Dennis worked briefly with the Government in the Ministry of Agriculture. But, soon, he acquired a truck and moved to the rural countryside, where he farmed and transported country folk to and from the market so that they could sell their produce in Coronation and Heywood street markets. He eventually moved to the parish of St Mary (banana country) where he continued these two activities. After a number of years he returned to Kingston and still, he continued these activities. In time his truck was contracted to deliver foodstuff throughout the parishes of Kingston and St Andrew. The stories that he would later tell about those times reveal a close involvement with, and deep knowledge of the lives of the rural folk with whom he interacted. Here, I really want us to pause so that we can grasp the picture of the man. A man who emerged from a generation where people embraced the difficult choices that had to be made around issues related to colour, class privilege and cultural identity. The man for whom, education, if it was to be of value, it had to be of service. The man who took his degree and knowledge back to the people and was humble enough to learn from them. Dennis was a man who understood the importance of grounding.

In this sense the world was Dennis’ classroom and he inspired others to live in this way as well. His niece, Kara, for example, described Dennis as someone who taught her a lesson that I think we should all hear—that it is never too late to reinvent yourself and that we can all become students of lifelong learning. The call of academia encouraged his return to The UWI to engage in postgraduate work, earning his doctorate in 1993. After working with the Planning Institute of Jamaica as the Head of the Social Policy Unit, Dennis and his family decided to migrate to Trinidad. He was appointed Lecturer at The University of the West Indies, St Augustine in January 1997. He served in this position for approximately 16 years and was a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Behavioural Sciences up to the time of his death.

Dennis set out in his own way to make a difference, including joining the Rastafarian movement, a movement which Rodney, who I invoked earlier, once described as “the leading force of the expression of black consciousness in the Caribbean.” Sometimes referring to himself as a christafarian—Dennis for nearly 40 years, until his illness resulted in their loss, wore his dreadlocks as a symbol of his commitment to social justice and his identification with his African roots.

I know his students, in fact, we will all remember that iconic hat bobbing as he walked the campus, like a kind of academic rude bwoy. In the closing years of his professional life, illness forced him to curtail his professional activities, but nonetheless, he continued to teach, write and publish until quite recently. He never lost his passion for social justice, and as a professional he developed a keen interest in the area of poverty. He did extensive research on the poor in the English-speaking Caribbean and British dependencies in collaboration with Kairi Consultants, and his publications in this area as well as on International Migration have only added to the international reputation of the university.

Dennis’ sense of community began in the home. I have always marvelled at how open Dennis and Lynette’s family home is, they have parented many; a reflection of both their early upbringing, which taught them that there was always room for family, and that there were many ways to make family. Dennis grew up at one time or another and for various reasons with a number of cousins, some of whom were as close as his siblings. These cousins included Cecil and Alafia, Geoffrey and Pam, and Doreen. He was also close to his cousins on the Brown side of the family; these persons included Janet, Richard, Heather, Maurice, Andrew, Pam and Paula. As I read a few of their vignettes about Dennis, I got a glimpse of a young man who was fun and enjoyed a little adventure. A young man who, to quote his cousin Alafia, could tear up the rug with his dancing skills. And I should tell you that it is being hotly contested by cousins Janet and Alafia whether it was the quick-step or the three-step, but what is unquestioned is that Dennis Brown could step. And I saw that mischief and adventure were very much part of his youth. Richard, his cousin, tells his own funny tale of the boys riding their bikes over the hills of Kingston, and he, Richard, finding it just reward that on the day he was told he was too young to go with them, that Dennis and the others all came back covered in cow-itch. For the record, let it be noted that Dennis hadn’t taken on a life of farming as yet.

But, I want to tell you when Dennis grabbed my heart, it was long before he and I would ever talk. Dennis, Lynette and I all overlapped in Jamaica, while I was at the Consortium Graduate School of Social Sciences, we young ones knew of them as part of the Consortium’s alumni. I would see Lynette, who was then pregnant with Jabari, but I had only heard of Dennis as the man who was in charge of Planning Institute of Jamaica. Mind you, he was the head of the social policy unit but Dennis’ reputation was so large that for us he was the PIOJ at that time, and the stories we heard were none too nice—he gave two of my classmates as we say in Trinidad, a good bouff, after they came back five minutes late from lunch on the first day of their internship. But then one day I saw Dennis in the UWI bookstore at Mona and he had his two girls with him. We didn’t know each other, barely a nodding relationship, so I got to watch him with these two little girls, and they were so little. He didn’t hover over them; Imani and Chinyere were weaving in and out, looking at one book, exploring it then taking their new found treasure back to him. That scene moved me, especially when he took Chinyere’s little hand, as they left. I didn’t have the language for it then; now, I can tell you that he was teaching them his love of the mind by allowing them to explore this world on their own. When I saw him with his girls, gentle, kind, and interested in fostering their curiosity, I immediately recognized his goodness. A goodness that made me know that despite his exterior Dennis’s heart was gold.

You see, Dennis had a brilliant, questioning mind and many of us were privy to this, we saw his commitments to justice in his work and community involvement, but it is in the context of family that you saw his shining heart. Dennis Brown loved his wife and he adored his children. Dennis became a softer, gentler man because of his children. I say this without an ounce of chauvinism, Dennis Brown taught his son Jabari how to be a man—the importance of being responsible, tending to and anticipating what needs to be done, that the vulnerability of love is a true strength. He also fostered a love of learning in his son, I will never forget the slide presentation that Jabari crafted capturing the experience he had with his father while accompanying him to a conference in South Africa. Jabari was now learning that the world is a classroom.

Dennis is now numbered among the ancestors and his children and the many young people he has mentored and fathered will call his name. His nephew, Zwide, will remember that before he called Dennis uncle, he called him daddy. Nephews Luke and Damion will remember him teaching them to play football. And Josiah will remember how Dennis had a way of teaching that did not always require words, and that he was blessed to join Dennis’ family at a point where he could step up to be of tremendous support through very difficult times.

Lynette lost her daddy last year, and I stayed at the house so that cousin Orchid, Miss Helen, Josiah and I could tag team so that Lynette could attend the funeral. I always knew that Dennis loved Lynette but in that period of one on one time with him, I saw his worry, his disappointment that he could not travel with her, his voiced concern that she had been carrying so much with him being ill—such a strong sense of wanting her to be okay. Dennis was enlivened, made better and stronger from the love of Lynette, Imani, Chinyere and Jabari—and we saw it again, where toward the end, he looked to the heavens for one last Christmas and so was he blessed. Transitioning while surrounded and calmed by the love of his family.

Lynette has written a tribute to Dennis that I will now ask her to come up and share with us.

Lynette Joseph-Brown:

A friend of mine has always marvelled at what she called the private and public face of Dennis Brown. This is because, as a very reserved person, only those who have had the opportunity of seeing Dennis operate in both spaces can really ever get the measure of the whole person.

There is no doubt that in the professional, public space many persons would know of Dennis as an intellectual of high standards and unshakeable integrity; a man who was also deeply concerned about high standards in academia and the administration that was needed in order to facilitate these high standards throughout the institution. Undoubtedly therefore, many in his department and faculty could tell you about his uncompromising stance around many issues which he felt strongly about and which he continued to lament even during his illness.

Many of his students have also expressed their gratitude for his support to their work and commitment to high standards. This has been evidenced by the feedback that they provide about the ways in which they continue to make their impact nationally, regionally and internationally.

Then within that serious disposition and countenance, many persons have experienced the gentleness and caring of which he is also capable, accompanied by his warm smile and … shall I say it? … yes, his sexy Jamaican drawl.

Although not a church goer, Dennis was a religious man. He read his Bible constantly and tried to live an ethical life. He was soothed by the Book of Psalms. In the final stages of the disease, Dennis drew much peace and comfort from the reading of the Bible.

In the home, he was a doting father. He thought of himself as a great singer—though his children often begged to differ, a dancer and a lover of pretty much all types of music. Dennis was also an adventurer who loved to travel; going for drives through the hills with the family all packed in the car. He also referred to himself as a father of the world, indicating his love and concern for young people in general. He has always welcomed his children’s friends into the home with quiet consent and facilitation; picked up and dropped off many of them uncomplainingly after parties or outings and to and from school. He was also always ready to provide children who needed material and emotional support due to disadvantageous circumstances when asked.

Dennis was the kind of father who wrote letters to his children, taking his daughters out to dinner one on one, and going on special outings with his son—man to man. I remember him saying quite dutifully, when after two daughters and a third child was on its way, that it didn’t matter whether it was a boy or girl once the child was healthy. Later he confessed to me that returning home late that Sunday night, after the birth of his son, he jubilantly shouted in the quiet of the night—Jah Rastafari!

As a husband Dennis saw himself as a knight in shining armour, even though he readily admitted that sometimes the armour needed polishing in order to arrive at its shininess. Nonetheless, a true romantic, I have experienced surprise roses held behind his back and delivered with a flourish; slow dancing for no reason in the privacy of our home; being swept off my feet causing our son to say when he grew up that he too would lift up his wife; and numerous other expressions of love and romance.

We were life partners and our intellectual compatibility was parallel to none. I will most certainly miss my husband and intellectual sounding board, as we would all miss a father, friend, brother, cousin, uncle, teacher and a committed regionalist.

Michelle Rowley:

I now end here – there is a proverb that says “sticks in a bundle are unbreakable” Imani, Chinyere and Jabari stay close to each other always. This is non-negotiable and the community of loved ones surrounding you here will always be ready to support you. Lynette, you have given me such a deeper understanding of what the word steadfast means. You have been steadfast and I learn how to be better in this world from watching you. I join in with your family, as we all do here today in this time of grief and in this moment of celebration for the life of Dennis Arthur Vivian Brown. May we all find meaning in the life he lived.