Lillian Allen moved from Spanish Town, Jamaica, to North America in 1969. After studying at the City University of New York and York University in Toronto, she emerged as the birth mother of dub in Canada, performing alone and with de dub poets at countless events across the full spectrum of progressive organizing. She has three albums for adults and one for children, and two books for children and young people. She performs locally, nationally, and internationally. A cultural strategist and long-time key cultural worker/arts activist in Toronto, Allen is also a writer of plays and short fiction and has ventured into filmmaking.