Mathematicians from Caribbean America

Summary: The diverse islands of Caribbean America have produced notable mathematicians.

The Arawaks, Caribs, and other pre-Columbian peoples lived in the area of the Caribbean Sea before Spanish, French, English, or Scottish sea traders settled there. Linguists explore the different languages that were spoken in the Caribbean, traces of which can be found in the twenty-first century. Along with these languages, there were possibly different numerical systems. Sea merchants needed bookkeepers and accountants to keep track of their business, and although Port Royal and other places in the seventeenth-century Caribbean were notorious for piracy and lawlessness, there were also many counting houses and legitimate business operations.

The development of schools and universities led to more mathematical opportunities. According to the United Nations, the Caribbean America region encompasses Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Aruba, the Bahamas, Barbados, the British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Cuba, Dominica, the Dominican Republic, Grenada, Guadeloupe, Haiti, Jamaica, Martinique, Montserrat, Netherlands Antilles, Puerto Rico, Saint-Barthélemy, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Martin (French part), Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, Turks and Caicos Islands, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. By the end of the twentieth century, there were numerous Caribbean mathematicians, and The Caribbean Journal of Mathematical and Computing Sciences has published volumes of research articles.

Mathematicians in the Caribbean, and around the world, have also worked on mathematics history and research that is specifically related to the Caribbean area, like C. Allen Butler, who investigated optimal search techniques for smugglers in the Caribbean. Mathematicians have also discussed the high numbers of university graduates who have left the Caribbean, and they have created educational initiatives and mathematical texts designed for Caribbean children. The Caribbean and Central America areas combine for a joint Mathematical Olympiad. The most well-known mathematician in the region is perhaps Keith Michell from Grenada who, after completing his doctoral thesis from the American University, was a professor at Howard University, and then returned to Grenada, becoming prime minister in 1995, a position he held until 2008.

Barbados

On the island of Barbados, although education was an important facet of colonial life from the late nineteenth century on, few students were able to continue with mathematics. One exception was Merville O’Neale Campbell, who had become fascinated with mathematics at an early age and won a scholarship to study at Cambridge University in England. He then went to teach at the Gold Coast (now Ghana), completing his doctoral thesis, “Classification of Countable Torsion-Free Abelian Groups,” from the University of London, and is noted as the first Barbadian to have a Ph.D. in mathematics. His daughter, Lucy Jean Campbell, also completed her doctoral thesis in mathematics, and specializes in geophysical fluid dynamics, nonlinear waves, and a variety of numerical and analytical methods at Carleton University in Ottawa. Other prominent Barbadian mathematicians include Charles C. Cadogan, who has edited the Caribbean Journal of Mathematical and Computing Sciences and has contributed papers in journals around the world; and Hugh G. R. Millington, who completed his doctorate, “Cylinder Measures,” from the University of British Columbia and then worked at the University of the West Indies, Cave Hill, Barbados.

British Caribbean

Well-known mathematicians from the British Caribbean include those from Jamaica. Earl Brown, who was the head of the Department of Science & Mathematics at University of Technology (Jamaica) from 1997 to 2000, completed his doctoral thesis at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Joshua Leslie completed his doctoral thesis from the Sorbonne in Paris, and was the chair of the Mathematics Department at Howard University; and Kweku-Muata Agyei Osei-Bryson from Kingston completed his doctoral thesis, “Multiobjective and Large-Scale Linear Programming,” at the University of Maryland—College Park in 1988, and from 1993 until 1997 was the Faculty Fellow (Information Systems) for the U.S. Army, The Pentagon. Other prominent mathematicians from Jamaica, or whose ancestors were from Jamaica, include Garth A. Baker, Charles Gladstone Costley, Leighton Henry, Fern Hunt, Lancelot F. James, Clement McCalla, Bernard Mair, Claude Packer, Paul Peart, Donald St. P. Richards, and Karl Robinson.

Elsewhere in the British Caribbean, there have also been a number of mathematicians who held senior positions in the region and in the United States including Ron Buckmire from Grenada, who has specialized in computational aerodynamics; Edward Farrell from Trinidad, who has published extensively on polynomials; and Velmer Headley from Barbados, who has concentrated on the study of differential equations.

Cuba

One notable Cuban mathematician is Argelia Velez-Rodriguez, who was born in Havana and won her first mathematics competition when she was 9. She was the first Afro-Cuban to complete a doctorate from the University of Havana but left Cuba two years later to live in the United States. Since the 1959 Revolution, there has been an increased emphasis on the education system in Cuba, and Cuban students have long shown a high aptitude for mathematics.

French Caribbean

French Caribbean mathematicians include those from Haiti, with a desperately poor education system, and Guadeloupe. Louis Beaugris completed his doctoral thesis, “Some Results Related to the Generators of Cyclic Codes Over Zm,” at the University of Iowa. Serge A. Bernard completed his doctoral thesis, “A Multivariate EWMA Approach to Monitor Process Dispersion,” at the University of Maryland—College Park; and Jean-Michelet Jean-Michel completed his doctorate at Brown University. Alex Meril from Guadeloupe completed his thesis at the University of Bordeaux and worked at the University of Guadeloupe.

Bibliography

Nieto Said, José, and Rafael Sánchez Lamoneda. “Ten Years of the Mathematical Olympiad of Central America and the Caribbean.” World Federation of National Mathematics Competitions 22, no. 1 (2009).

University of the West Indies. “Caribbean Journal of Mathematical and Computing Sciences.” http://www.cavehill.uwi.edu/fpas/cmp/journal/cjmcs.htm.

Williams, Scott. “Mathematics Today in the Caribbean.” http://www.math.buffalo.edu/mad/Caribbean/Caribbean.html.