Sunday, December 25, 2011

2012 Split This Rock Poetry Festival Panels

Antoinette Brim will participate in two panels during the 2012 Split This Rock Poetry Festival in Washington, DC. These panels are:

Continuous Fire: A Panel on the Work of Sonia Sanchez
Friday, March 23, 2012 @ 2:00 PM

Description: Although her protest efforts and activism began as an architect and central figure in the Black Arts Movement, Sonia Sanchez’s poetry is not limited to that historical context. Over the last fifty years, her work has shaped and been in dialogue with several social movements: multiracial and third wave feminism, anti-militarism, the lesbian and gay movement, and the global peace movement. As an elder, her work spans several genres: poetry, drama, children’s books, eulogies of key national and world leaders/artists, articles, and essays. This panel allows the participants to illustrate Sanchez’s influence on a wide range of contemporary artists and activist initiatives.

Panelists include: Becky Thompson, DaMaris Hill, Antoinette Brim, Lita Hooper, Danielle Hall, Patricia Biela, and Sandra Staton-Tiawo.

Even in Polite Company: Women Write Their Own Truths
Saturday, March 24, 2012 @ 9:30 AM

Description: As young girls, many women were told that some things were not to be discussed in polite company. Subsequently, women’s issues and/or truths were discussed only amongst themselves in hushed whispers in hot kitchens, over scrub boards or on playgrounds. This resulted in shame and isolation. While networks of women are affirming and necessary to the mental, emotional, physical and financial health of women as a whole, the absence of open, plain talk about women’s issues leaves a void in the social and political dialogue. Issues left out of the national dialogue are left out of the legal, legislative and budgetary dialogues, as well. Subsequently, as a demographic, women are often left unprotected. This panel discussion will focus on the necessity of writing about feminist/womanist issues in a nation leaning toward conservatism; teaching women’s issues in co-ed classrooms and the perils for women writers who unreservedly write and speak their truth in polite company.

Panelists include: Antoinette Brim, Lita Hooper, Demetrice Anntia Worley, Niki Herd and Renee Simms.

For more information about the Split This Rock Poetry Festival, visit: http://www.splitthisrock.org/festival2012/festival2012.html