March 2012


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Professor Rhoda Reddock was conferred with an Honorary Doctorate by one of the leading tertiary level institutions in South Africa earlier this month. The UWI Deputy Principal for the St. Augustine Campus is well known for her research, scholarship and community service, which has been recognized by the University of the Western Cape in Bellville. Past honorees include Nelson Mandela, Basil Davidson, Oliver Tambo and Graca Machel. The University’s Chancellor is Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu.

Rhoda Elizabeth Reddock is professor of Gender, Social Change and Development and former head of the Centre for Gender and Development Studies at The UWI St. Augustine Campus. Her research and teaching interests have been multidisciplinary but have been concentrated in the broad areas of development studies, women, masculinities and gender. She has served as consultant to a number of regional and international agencies, including the CARICOM Secretariat, European Union (EU), Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the International Labour Organisation (ILO), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), AWID and the Government of Trinidad and Tobago.

She holds a BSc Social Administration from The UWI (St. Augustine and Mona Campuses), a Masters of Development Studies from the Institute of Social Studies, The Hague and a Doctorat, Social Sciences (Applied Sociology) from the University of Amsterdam. A graduate of Bishop Anstey High School, Prof Reddock’s academic career began as a lecturer at Cipriani Labour College and associate lecturer at the Institute of Social Studies, The Hague. She began her UWI career as a research fellow at the Institute for Social and Economic Research of the UWI St. Augustine Campus in 1985; then became a lecturer in the Department of Sociology in 1990. She was actively involved in the process leading up to the institutionalisation of gender studies at UWI and assumed her former position as head, Centre for Gender and Development Studies, St. Augustine in 1994.

Prof Reddock was a founding member and first chair of the Caribbean Association for Feminist Research and Action (CAFRA); an advisor to the Global Fund for Women and a member of the Regional Advisory Committee of the Global Coalition on Women, Girls and AIDS established by UNAIDS. She is also a founding member of the Caribbean Network on Studies of Masculinity. In addition she has served as deputy chair and Chair of the personnel committee of the Board of NIHERST (The National Institute, Higher Education Science and Technology) from 1996-2003 and on the board of the Mount Hope Patients’ Trust Fund. More recently she has been lead researcher of the action /research project – Breaking the Silence: Child Sexual Abuse and Implications for HIV which is spearheading a national campaign.