Dr Zakiya McKenzie is a Senior Research Associate in History at the University of Bristol. Her PhD from the University of Exeter focused on Caribbean journalists and newspapers in post war Britain. In 2023, Dr McKenzie won the Olivette Otele Prize for research in Black British studies for her work on the Empire Windrush as a cultural motif.

Zakiya is also creative writer whose work explores botanical knowledge and the material legacies of colonialism. In 2019, she was Writer in Residence for Forestry England during its centenary year. Zakiya is the author of Testimonies on the History of Jamaica Vol. 1 (Rough Trade Books, 2021), a pamphlet that reimagines archival fragments of the Caribbean's past.