Register

Poetry as Liberation

Presented by the Hurston/Wright Foundation

Moderated by Khadijah Z. Ali-Coleman, Ed.D., this panel features local writers with compelling stories on how they have used their poetry to build awareness on important social issues, form community, impact change, and engage audiences.

The Hurston/Wright Foundation provides services, support, and opportunities that mentor, recognize and provide a community for professional and aspiring Black writers. 

About the panelists:

C. Alexandria-Bernard Thomas is a Queer Black Non-Binary, award-winning poet, teaching artist, an advocate for Child Abuse Prevention, the LGBTQIA community, and Mental Health Awareness. C. leads the popular discussion-based writer’s workshop, Writing to Wellness™, that uses poetry as a tool for healing when navigating childhood trauma with Creative Suitland Arts Center and Heard. Their work as a community organizer has afforded them opportunities to educate adults on how to respond and react to Child Sexual Abuse through Darkness to Light's Stewards of Children® and becoming a board member for Touch Me I’m Tellin (TMIT).

KaNikki Jakarta,whose name means “great writer,” is the Inaugural Poet-in-Residence for Northern Virginia Fine Arts Association. She is an award-winning performance poet who has toured the U.S. and the U.K. KaNikki is the first Black Poet Laureate of Alexandria, Virginia, a 2022 Academy of American Poet Laureate Fellow, the author of three novels, two poetry collections, a memoir, and a short story.

Khadijah Z. Ali-Coleman, Ed.D. is a cultural curator, community organizer, nationally recognized speaker, and writer. A performance poet and producing playwright, she has had more than a dozen of her plays presented publicly in venues throughout the country, including the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Theater Alliance, and Baltimore Theater Project. She was a Theater Alliance Quadrant Playwright from 2019-2021, a 2019 Fulbright-Hays scholar, a 2015 Maryland State Arts Council Independent Artist awardee and a 2012 Prince George’s County Social Innovation Fund Forty Under 40 awardee. She is the founding director of Liberated Muse Arts Group.