Xan-Xi Bethel
Xan-Xi Bethel is a visual artist and poet. She has been painting and writing for the past ten years. She is currently working on her first book, a compilation of illustrations and poetry, and is best known for her spoken word performances.
Lindsay Braynen
Lindsay Braynen graduated from the College of the Bahamas with an AA in Art in May, 2009. She’s currently studying at Emily Carr University in Vancouver, Canada, where she’s majoring in Visual Arts with a concentration in Illustration.
Stevie Burrows
Stevie Burrows studied Media Arts at the Illinois Institute of Art, Chicago. In 2008 he was commissioned to create a mural at the National Art Gallery of The Bahamas for their public offices. He is currently an illustrator and comic in Nassau, The Bahamas.
Christi Cartwright
Christi Cartwright lives, works and writes in The Bahamas. She earned her undergraduate degree from The University of Sussex and her graduate degree from The University of the West Indies, Mona.
Nancy Devine
Nancy Devine teaches high school English in Grand Forks, North Dakota where she lives. She co-directs the Red River Valley Writing Project, a local site of the National Writing Project. Her poetry, short fiction and essays have appeared in online and print journals.
Alina Doodnath
Alina Doodnath is a English Literature graduate from UWI St. Augustine currently wrapping up an MSc in Journalism at Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen. Her favourite writers include Ernest Hemingway, Earl Lovelace, James Joyce, C.S. Lewis, Derek Walcott, Eric Roach, Carl Sandburg, Pablo Neruda, Sylvia Plath, and Adrienne Rich, amongst others.
Summer Edward
Born and raised in Trinidad and Tobago, Summer Edward is a Master’s student at the University of Pennsylvania. Her work has appeared in BIM, Philadelphia Stories, St. Somewhere and tongues of the ocean. She blogs at http://www.summeredward.blogspot.com and is the Managing Editor of Anansesem, the Caribbean children’s literature ezine.
Keisha Lynne Ellis
Keisha Lynne Ellis feels as though writing may very well be her only hope for gaining and maintaining sanity in a world entrenched in absurdity. She writes short stories, spoken word poetry and critical essays.
Danielle Jennings
Danielle Jennings is a Jamaican writer who contributes creative non-fiction, fiction and poetry to the major Jamaican newspapers. With dreams of becoming a successful, published writer she divides her time writing, blogging and volunteering for charity.
Helen Klonaris
Helen Klonaris’ work has appeared in two anthologies including Our Caribbean: A Gathering of Lesbian and Gay Writings from the Antilles, and several journals, including Yinna, The Caribbean Writer and HLFQ. She is the co-director of the Bahamas Writers Summer Institute and teaches creative writing in the Bay Area.
Simone Leid
Simone Leid was born and resides in Trinidad and Tobago. She is a fellow of the Cropper Foundation Creative Writers Workshop.
Janice Lynn Mather
Janice Lynn lives and writes in Vancouver, Canada, but will always be a Nassau gal.
Susan Moir-Mackay
Educated at Edinburgh College of Art, Freeporter Susan Moir-Mackay’s work deals with her fascination with the discrepancies between life and the portrayal of this reality by society, media, etc. She aims to “reveal elements of truth and contradiction present in the individual and collective experiences of life.”
Janice Pariat
Janice Pariat is ethnically all mixed up: some days Portugal, others Kent, mostly Shillong, India. She studied English Literature at St Stephen’s College, Delhi University and then Communications at Westminster, London, where she spent more time at the Embankment than in class.
Jace McKinney
Jace McKinney graduated with a BFA in the Rhode Island School of Design in 2008. He currently works as an illustrator and storyteller in Nassau, The Bahamas.
Nancy Anne Miller
Nancy Anne Miller was born in Bermuda and has a MLitt in Creative Writing from the University of Glasgow. Her poems have appeared in Edinburgh Review, Stand, The Caribbean Writer, Journal of Caribbean Literatures, The Dalhousie Review, The Fiddlehead, Via, Hampden-Sydney Poetry Review and The Cordite Poetry Review. among others.
Kishan Munroe
Award-winning artist, photographer and filmmaker Kishan Munroe obtained his BFA and MFA in painting from the Savannah College of Art and Design, and spent 2009 travelling across the globe for his most recent project, “The Human Experience”.
Lavar Munroe
Lavar Munroe completed a degree in illustration from the Savannah College of Art and Design. He placed in the Central Bank of The Bahamas’ Art Competition top three six times including his first place in 2009. His work is in numerous private collections in The Bahamas.
Angelique V. Nixon
Angelique V. Nixon is a Bahamian writer, cultural critic, teacher, and poet. Her poetry has been published in Julie Mango, Proud Flesh: New Afrikan Journal of Culture, Politics, and Consciousness, Journal of Caribbean Literatures, and Black Renaissance Noire. Angelique is deeply committed to social justice, gender equality, and Black liberation.
Sergio Ortiz
Sergio Ortiz is a retired educator, poet, and photographer. His poems and photographs have appeared in journals as varied as W5RAn.com, The Neglected Ratio, The Monongahela Review, Poor Mojo’s Almanac(k), WTF PWM, and The 13th Warrior Review. Flutter Press published his debut chapbook, At the Tail End of Dusk.
Holly Parotti
Holly Parotti received a BFA in painting and printmaking from Virginia Commonwealth University. Since 2004, she’s held a series of successful exhibitions, including a solo show featuring her etchings. Though printmaking remains a foundational aspect of her work, she experiments with various materials and the reinvention of accepted forms.
Nakia Pearson
Having worked as a freelance journalist for Nassau papers, Nakia Pearson’s taken her writing abroad, producing articles for expat magazines in Japan and China. She writes poetry, nonfiction, essays, and short stories. She is currently publishing short anecdotes of her bike trek from Beijing to Paris in the Nassau Tribune.
Jackson Petit
Jackson Petit has won the Central Bank of The Bahamas Art competition six times in various categories and received top honors in the Clico Caribbean Art Competition in 2003. A gifted painter, Petit has turned in recent years to filmmaking. He and his brother operate the company Small Art Pictures.
Heino Schmid
Heino Schmid received an MFA from the Utrecht Graduate School of Art and Design, Netherlands, teaches at the College of The Bahamas, and serves as Curator of the Central Bank of The Bahamas Art Gallery. Schmid has exhibited his work widely: Netherlands, Germany, the UK, the USA and The Bahamas.
Obediah Michael Smith
Obediah Michael Smith has published thirteen books of poems, a short novel and a cassette recording of his poems. He has published widely in journals, and his work has begun to be translated into Spanish and included in anthologies and journals in South America, Mexico and Spain.
Heather L. Thompson
Heather L. Thompson is a lawyer who writes poetry as time permits. For the past 3 years, she has attended a workshop at the Palm Beach Poetry Festival and has been published in tongues of the ocean.
Martin Willitts
This is Martin Willitts Jr’s third appearance in tongues of the ocean. His latest collections include The Hummingbird (March Street Press, 2009), Baskets of Tomorrow (Flutter Press, 2009), and two forthcoming chapbooks True Simplicity (Poets Wear Prada Press, 2010) and The Girl Who Sang Forth Horses (Pudding House Publications, 2010).
tongues of the ocean 