Rex Nettleford, one of Jamaica’s cultural icons, died Tuesday
at George Washington Hospital in Washington, D.C., a week
after suffering a heart attack at a hotel on Jan. 27. He was 76.
Nettleford, who was vice chancellor of the University of the
West Indies, was also a sociologist and choreographer who
founded the National Dance Theatre Company.
Nettleford, who was born in rural Trelawny parish in February
1933, long called for positive portrayals of Jamaica's black majority.
His 1969 book, Mirror Mirror, examined the status of black
Jamaicans nearly 10 years after the island became independent.
He reportedly called for Great Britain to pay reparations to
Caribbean residents for its part in the transatlantic slave trade.