Caudeiron, Mabel "Cissie" (1909-1968)

Folklorist and teacher. As a child Mabel “Cissie” Boyd was always involved in plays and concerts and later composed many Creole songs highly influenced by the beguines of Martinique. A time at Arima in Trinidad also contributed to her knowledge of the wider Caribbean forms of folk culture. She was away from Dominica for many years following her marriage in 1938 to Jean-Albert Caudeiron, a French engineer. They moved to Venezuela, where she raised her family, returning to Dominica in 1957 with renewed energy and determination to continue her earlier work for the greater recognition of Dominican folk heritage and traditional culture. She opened a small school of her own and was a teacher at the Wesley High School. Supported by the Chief Minister, Edward Le Blanc, she helped to organise the first National Day celebrations of 1965. She founded the Kairi Artistic Troupe, the first group of its kind to be formed in Dominica, which represented the island abroad. Locally she researched and wrote articles on the heritage of music, dances and traditional dress. She was a Creole nationalist similar to others elsewhere in the Caribbean at the time who raised the national perception of folk culture to the forefront of national consciousness. She died while in the process of carrying on that legacy, collapsing on 20 February 1968 during a practice in preparation for that year’s upcoming Carnival.

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