Salaam Green, the poet laureate of Birmingham, has been awarded the esteemed Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellowship, which will help fund her project for teenagers who are incarcerated.
Green and 22 other fellows will receive $50,000 from the Academy to assist their poetry projects in the community. Lyrics for Life Birmingham is a 10-week poetry and hip-hop workshop program that Green’s project, in collaboration with Radical Reversal and the Magic City Poetry Festival, sponsors. Green will conduct weekly workshops on self-expression, personal growth, and rehabilitation for teenagers at the Jefferson Youth Detention Center.
Green remarked in a statement that receiving this fellowship is an incredible honor. Poetry helps us deal with joy, sorrow, injustice, and peacemaking. My practice is centered on teaching literary brilliance as a healing tool. We can mend what systems have broken through the literary arts, and I can’t wait to use this work with young people who are incarcerated.
Green, a poet, educator, and activist, hails from Greensboro, a Black Belt historic town famous for its involvement in the Civil Rights Movement, sharecropping, and slavery.
Her art is centered on spirituality, resistance, racial healing, and Southern storytelling.
As part of the fellowship, Green will share excerpts from her recently published book, The Other Revival, which is a compilation of poetry that tells the tales of descendants of slaves who lived on a plantation in Alabama.
Green has received awards for her work, including Healing Arts Practitioner, Alabama Humanities Foundation Road Scholar, and Kellogg Foundation Racial Healing Facilitator.
Additionally, Green has resided at Auburn University, the Wallace Center for Arts and Reconciliation, and the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
The voices of people who frequently go unnoticed have been elevated by Green’s efforts in the community and on paper.
She joins other nationally renowned trailblazers, leaders, and changemakers as a result of the fellowship.
Tess O. Dwyer, the board chair of the Academy of American Poets, stated in a statement that the organization is excited to support diverse poetry initiatives created by poets laureate in both large and small locations around the nation.
American poets are shining examples of free speech, cultural awareness, and civic involvement at a time when more people are using poetry to make sense of the world.
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Alaina Bookman
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