Brooklyn Poetry Slam | Sept. 10, 2024

Mahogany L. Browne is a writer, playwright, organizer, and educator is a Kennedy Center Next 50 Fellow and the inaugural Distinguished Writer in Residence at Wesleyan University, she is also a MacDowell Arts Advocacy Awardee and a New York Emmy nominee for How to Build a City (All Arts). Browne has received fellowships from Cave Canem, Arts for Justice, Baldwin for the Arts, Hawthorden, Mellon Research, Rauschenberg, UCross, and more.

Her acclaimed books include Vinyl Moon; Chlorine Sky (optioned by Steppenwolf Theatre); Black Girl Magic; and the frequently challenged works Woke: A Young Poet’s Call to Justice and Woke Baby. She is also the founder of the Woke Baby Book Fair, a national celebration of diverse children’s literature.

Browne’s poetry collection Chrome Valley, praised by The New York Times and Publishers Weekly, won the 2024 Paterson Poetry Prize. She is the recipient of the Holmes National Poetry Prize from Princeton University and an NAACP Image Award nominee. Her most recent young adult novel, A Bird in the Air Means We Can Still Breathe, was longlisted for the National Book Award. Browne holds an honorary Doctor of Philosophy from Marymount Manhattan College and serves as the inaugural Poet-in-Residence at Lincoln Center.

Jive Poetic is a writer, organizer, and educator based in Brooklyn, New York. He received his BA in Media Studies from the State University of New York at Buffalo, and his MFA in Writing and Activism from Pratt Institute. In 2017 Jive was the first recipient of the John Morning Award for Art and Service. He is the founder of Insurgent Poets Society, Carnival Slam: Cultural Exchange, and co-founder of the Brooklyn Poetry Slam. His work has been showcased on season four of TVONE’s Lexus Verses and Flow, PBS NewsHour, and BET. International recognition and support for his work has come from the British Arts Council; US Embassies in Australia, Brazil, and Poland; and the Minister Of Culture in Antigua and Barbuda. He has received fellowships from Air Serenbe and Rhode Island Writers Colony, and when he is not on tour or hosting, he teaches poetry and hip hop workshops to at risk youth in New York City and the surrounding area.

Ursula Rucker is an interdisciplinary poet, performer, and recording artist whose work reflects on personal history, family, and place. She characterizes her work as situated “along the edge of the terrains of poetry.” Rucker has released five albums and collaborated with a wide range of artists outside of the field of poetry, including The Roots, musicians and Pew Fellows Jamaaladeen Tacuma and King Britt, and, most recently, Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Clarence Williams III. She has toured with her live performance memoir, My Father’s Daughter, which she describes as “90 minutes of self-truth and discovery.” In 2017, she collaborated with Nigerian sound and installation artist Emeka Ogboh to create Logan Squared: Ode to Philly, which featured an epic poem by Rucker that reflected Philadelphians’ voices and visions for the city. The work was presented as part of Mural Arts Philadelphia’s Center-supported, citywide Monument Lab exhibition. A Philly 360 Creative Ambassador and recipient of Leeway Foundation’s Transformation Award, Rucker is the subject of the 2008 documentary Ursula Rucker: Poet, directed by Michael J. Dennis.