Participants by Genre

Participants: Activist

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2022 Fall Resident
activist, editor, poet, scholar, translator

Judith SANTOPIETRO (poet, translator, editor, scholar; Mexico) has published the poem collections Palabras de Agua and Tiawanaku. Poemas de la Madre Coqa [Tiawanaku. Poems from the Mother Coqa]. Her poems appear in many anthologies, and her translations from the Spanish and the Nahuatl have received several awards. Between 2005 and 2016, she directed Iguanazul: literature on indigenous languages, a project to revitalize native languages through oral tradition, literature, and arts. Currently, she is working on narratives about enforced disappearances in Mexico. She participates courtesy the Paul and Hualing Engle Fund.

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2022 Spring Resident
activist, fiction writer, non-fiction writer

Felix K. NESI (fiction writer, activist; Indonesia) is the author of Orang-Orang Oetimu [People of Oetimu], which won the 2018 Jakarta Arts Council Novel Competition, and, in 2016, the story collection Usaha Membunuh Sepi [Effort to Kill the Quiet]. With the support of the Indonesian National Book Committee, he has researched Timorese slavery in the Netherlands. He is also the founder of a street bookstore, a library, and the book festival Kencan Buku Fesek, all in West Timor. His participation is made possible by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.

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2022 Spring Resident
activist, poet

Raghavendra MADHU (poet, activist; India) has authored three books of poetry: Make Me Some Love to Eat, Stick No Bills, and Being Non-essential, all published by Red River (New Delhi). The founder of Poetry Couture, a movement to create free spaces for poetry in many cities of India, he regularly curates events at American Center libraries in India and conducts performance poetry workshops for young adults. His poems have been widely published and translated. He participates courtesy of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.

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2023 Resident
activist, fiction writer, journalist, non-fiction writer

Martha Cecilia RUIZ (nonfiction; fiction; editor; arts promotor; Nicaragua) has for the past three decades worked as a reporter, scriptwriter, and a host of radio and tv programs. The organization she founded, “Proyecto365MCR,” promotes Nicaraguan women’s creative writing. The author of Familia de cuchillos [Family of knives] (2016), she has also contributed fiction and non-fiction to a dozen national and regional anthologies. Her participation was made possible by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.

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Happening Now

  • We regret the passing, on April 11, 2024, of the distinguished Romanian author and critic Dan Cristea, who served as the editor in chief of the Luceafărul de Dimineață cultural monthly. In addition to being an alum of the 1985 Fall Residency, Cristea received his PhD in Comparative Literature at the University of Iowa.

  • Our congratulations to 1986 Fall Residency writer Kwame Dawes, who has been named the new poet laureate of Jamaica.

  • Congratulations to our colleagues Jennifer Croft and Aron Aji, who are among those serving as judges for the National Book Awards this year, in their case in the category of translated literature.

  • Ranjit Hoskote’s speech at the 2024 Goa Literary Festival addresses the current situation in Gaza.

  • In NY Times, Bina Shah worries about the state of Pakistani—and American—democracy.

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