Bio

Aviston Downes is a UK Commonwealth Scholar who specialises in Commonwealth Caribbean social and cultural history with particular focus on gender identities, sport, fraternal organisations and black economic enfranchisement. He is Coordinator of the Oral History Project and of the History Postgraduate Programme.

Qualifications

DPhil (History) York, UK, 1995; BA (Hon) UWI, 1990 

Research Areas

Oral History: especially life histories and recovering narratives of socio-cultural institutions (For example, the Barbados Landship; Freemasonry; migrants.) Received extensive grant-funding and have had most results widely published. 

Oral History: especially life histories and recovering narratives of socio-cultural institutions (For example, the Barbados Landship; Freemasonry; migrants.) Received extensive grant-funding and have had most results widely published.

Digitisation and Dissemination of Oral History Collection- UWI-Funded Bds$10,000;
The Pioneers Speak: Interviews with Founders of the Cooperative Credit Union Movement in Barbados.  UWI Funded. About BDS$10,000 with Dr Henderson Carter & PG Student.
Publication:  co-edited. A Leg Up or a Hand Out: Philanthropy in Barbados. Publishers: UWI and Barbados Museum and Historical Society
 

Select Publications

Forging Africa-Caribbean Solidarity within the Commonwealth? Sport and Diplomacy during the Anti-apartheid Campaign.’ In Heather L. Dichter & Andrew L. Johns (eds.) Diplomatic Games: Sport, Statecraft, and International Relations since 1945. Lexington, Kentucky: University Press of Kentucky, 2015. 117-149.
`Constructing Brotherhood: Fraternal Organisations and Masculinities in Colonial Barbados since 1740.’ In Eudine Barriteau, (ed.) Love and Power: Caribbean Discourses on Gender. Kingston, Jamaica: UWI Press, 2012. 453-487.
‘Black Economic Empowerment in Barbados, 1937‑1970: The Role of Non‑Bank Financial Intermediaries’ In B.W. Higman and Kathleen Monteith (eds.). West Indian Business History‑ Kingston: UWI Press, 2010. 151‑177.
‘The Contestation for Recreational Space in Barbados, 1880-1910.’ In Alvin Thompson (ed.) In the Shadow of the Plantation. Kingston, Jamaica: Ian Randle Press, 2002. 376-390.
‘Boys of the Empire: Elite Education and the Socio-cultural Construction of Hegemonic Masculinity in Barbados, 1875-1920. In Rhoda Reddock (ed.) Interrogating Caribbean Masculinities: Theoretical and Empirical Analyses . Kingston: UWI Press, 2004. 105-36
‘Gender and the Elementary Teaching Service in Barbados: A Re-examination of the Feminization and Marginalization of the Black Male Theses.’ In Eudine Barriteau (ed.) In Confronting Power, Theorizing Gender: Interdisciplinary Perspectives in the Caribbean. Kingston: UWI Press, 2003. 303-323.
 
 

Additional Info

Barbados-UK  Migration Project- UWI Funded;
‘Remembering the W.I. Federation’ jointly with Federal Archives Centre and EBCCI- UWI funded fBDS$ 45,000+.

Keywords

Oral History, culture, sport gender, masculinities, education, fraternities, digitization.