I had the privilege of being involved in the institute as a doctoral student, when my dissertation was still in the early stages. The richly stimulating intellectual environment of those weeks was invaluable for helping to formulate what became my dissertation—which is now, as of just last year and after much revision, my first academic monograph!
Conversations led by the institute’s visiting scholars left significant footprints on the thinking that has became the book’s foundation, particularly in terms of enriching how I historicize the early-21st-century African American poetic landscape through attention to the precursor period of the Black Arts Movement. And several of the relationships I forged with fellow participants (both faculty and graduate student peers) during conversations about poets like Tyehimba Jess and Brenda Marie Osbey over dinners or late-night snacks have led to enduring collaborations on co-edited volumes and lasting mentorships.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that the career I am now making as a teacher-scholar of Black poetry would not have been possible without the initial willingness of those colleagues to invest in my growth, which has transformed into the bedrock of cherished friendships and professional guidance without which I would many times have felt lost in this field. I also regularly teach works by poets whose writing I first encountered during the institute.
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