Opal Palmer Adisa

Opal Palmer Adisa (born 6 November 1954) is a Jamaican and American poet, novelist, performance artist and educator. Anthologized in more than 400 publications, she has been a regular performer of her work internationally. Professor Emeritus at California College of the Arts, Adisa is also the current Director of the Institute for Gender and Development Studies at the University of the West Indies, Mona Campus in Jamaica, where she currently resides.

Early life

Adisa was raised ten miles outside Kingston, Jamaica, and attended school in the capital. In 1970 she went to study at Hunter College, New York, and in 1979 moved to the San Francisco Bay Area to pursue an MA in creative writing. As noted by David Katz, "Adisa’s work has been greatly informed by her childhood experience of life on a sugar estate in the Jamaican countryside, where her father worked as a chemist and her mother as a bookkeeper. It was in this setting that young Opal was introduced not only to the art of storytelling, but also, after her parents divorced, to the ceaseless oppression faced by women and the ongoing injustices heaped on the poor. Such formative experiences, coupled with her mother’s efforts to improve the lives of those around her, gave Adisa the desire to “give voice to the voiceless” at an early age."

Work and writing

Opal Palmer Adisa has two master's degrees from San Francisco State University, and a PhD from the University of California at Berkeley. She has previously taught undergraduate and graduate courses at California College of the Arts, Stanford University, University of Berkeley, and San Francisco State University. From 1993 to 2017, Adisa taught writing and literature, and served as Chair of the Ethnic Studies/Cultural Diversity Program at the California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland. In the spring of 2010, she was visiting professor and editor at the University of the Virgin Islands (UVI), St. Croix Campus, and for two years she edited The Caribbean Writer, UVI’s famous journal of Caribbean literature. In September 2017, she was appointed to the position of Director of the Institute for Gender and Development Studies at the University of the West Indies in Mona, Jamaica, where she currently resides. In 2018, Adisa was awarded Professor Emeritus status, in honor of her 25 years of contributions to California College of the Arts and in her field.

An important element of her poetry is the use of nation language, about which she has said: "I have to credit Louise Bennett for granting me permission, so to speak, to write in Nation Language, because it was her usage that allowed me to see the beauty of our language. Moreover, there are just some things that don’t have the same sense of intimacy or color if not said in Nation language.... I use nation language when it is the only way and the best way to get my point across, to say what I mean from the center of my navel. But I also use it, to interrupt and disrupt standard English as s reminder to myself that I have another tongue, but also to jolt readers to listen and read more carefully, to glean from the language the Caribbean sensibilities that I am always pushing, sometimes subtly, other times more forcefully. Nation language allows me to infuse the poem with all of the smells and colors of home."

Artists residencies

Writer-in-Residence, Binational Fulbright Institute, Cairo, Egypt, December–February 2007

Writer-in-Residence, Sacatar Institute, Itaparica, Bahia, Brazil, December–March 2006

Writer-in-Residence, McColl Center for Art + Innovation, Laurel Hill, NC, March 2001

Writer-in-Residence, McColl Center for Art + Innovation, Charlotte, NC, September–December 2000

Writer-in-Residence, Headlands Center for the Arts, Sausalito, CA, February–December 1996.

Awards

Council for a performance of "Daughters of Yam", with Devorah Major

Pushcart Prize for the short story "Duppy Get Her", 1987

PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Literary Award for Tamarind and Mango Women, 1992

Writer in Residence for Wadastick Artists & Scholars at Laurel Hill, North Carolina

Writer in Residence for the McColl Center for Visual Art in Charlotte, NC

Distinguished Writer for the Middle Atlantic Writers Association

Creative Work Fund Grant for West Oakland Senior Citizen Oral History Project, San Francisco, CA

Nominated International Woman of the Year International Biography Center, England

Canute A. Brodhurst Prize for "The Brethren", in The Caribbean Writer, University of the Virgin Islands, St Croix

Writer-in-Residence, Headlands Center for the Arts, Sausaulito, California

Daily News Prize for best poems in The Caribbean Writer, University of the Virgin Islands, St Croix

Master Folk Artist for Storytelling, California Arts Council

Distinguished Bay Area Woman Writer Award/California Legislative Assembly Certificate of presented by the National Women's Political Caucus

Master Folk Artist for Storytelling, California Arts Council

Creative Work Fund Grant for West Oakland Senior Citizen Oral History Project, San Francisco, California

Creative Artist Fellowship Award for Storytelling, Cultural Funding Program, City of Oakland