Toni Morrison Writing Program: PVAMU Celebrates Toni Morrison

Prairie View A&M University aims to educate its students to become change leaders in an increasingly more diverse globally interconnected world,” said Emma Joahanne Thomas-Smith, Ed.D., PVAMU provost emerita. Thomas-Smith is overseeing the new Toni Morrison Writing Program at PVAMU, which officially launced on September 27, 2021.  

Toni Morrison, for whom the Writing Program is named, was the exemplar of an intellectual whose sensibilities were superbly cultivated by her childhood experiences; professional experiences in teaching and editing; and her ability to interpret attitudes, behaviors, and life circumstances of not only African American people but people across the spectrum of race, ethnicity and social class. Reading critically, thinking deeply, dreaming imaginatively, reflecting incisively and then writing compellingly is the very essence of what it means to give power to voice.”

Training by a ‘Living Legend’

Organizationally housed in PVAMU’s Marvin D. and June Samuel Brailsford College of Arts and Sciences, the program features an annual writer-in-residence. The writer-in-residence is a “top-tier literary artist with a very substantial body of known work, prominent standing in the literary community and beyond, and a genuine interest in inspiring and guiding other writers, especially students and faculty at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs),” the program website states. The writer-in-residence will offer public readings, master classes, lectures, class visitations, and critiques of students’ works.

In August, PVAMU announced one of the most celebrated African-American poets, Nikki Giovanni, would be its inaugural writer-in-residence through 2022. The appointment of Giovanni, a University Distinguished Professor at Virginia Tech University, officially begins with this week’s virtual series. She will host a public reading and lecture on September 27 and a master class on September 29.

“The opportunity for students to develop their voices as writers, thinkers, and leaders is immeasurably enhanced by having the tutelage of such a noted, gifted, caring and literary notable, such as Nikki Giovanni,” Thomas-Smith said.

https://www.pvamu.edu/blog/pvamu-set-to-launch-toni-morrison-writing-program-with-public-reading-lecture-by-nikki-giovanni/