Age: 20
Hometown: Washington, DC
Now Lives: Nash lives on-campus at Brown University within the Harambee House, a residence for Black college students on the Ivy League college in Providence, Rhode Island.
Claim to Fame: Nash, a sophomore at Brown, is a journalist, activist and poet who was named Washington’s Youth Poet Laureate in 2021. He was a part of a spherical desk dialogue with Vice President Kamala Harris on homosexual and transgender points final summer time, and wrote concerning the politics of poetry for Washingtonian journal. “Poetry gives me a way to say things that I wouldn’t otherwise be able to say,” Nash stated.
Big Break: A lifelong lover of phrases, Nash gave his first public poetry studying throughout an honors English class throughout his sophomore yr on the Duke Ellington School of the Arts, a public highschool in Washington. The piece, titled “Between the Stars,” was primarily based on “coming into acceptance as a queer man,” he stated.
In an undated picture from Amiri Nash, copies of his publication, The Black Star, at Brown University. In February, Nash began the Black Star Journal, a scholar newspaper that covers “masculinity, Afro-Latinx representation, Black womanhood, Black art and Black music,” he stated. (Amiri Nash through The New York Times)
Encouraged by his English trainer, he utilized to Press Pass Mentors, a writing-focused nonprofit, the place he was arrange with an internship with Washington Post political reporter Eugene Scott. “Eugene is also Black and gay, he showed me how writing was healing for him,” Nash stated.
Latest Project: In February, Nash began the Black Star Journal, a scholar newspaper that covers “masculinity, Afro-Latinx representation, Black womanhood, Black art and Black music,” he stated. (Recent articles embrace an evaluation of using assonance by rapper MF Doom and a chunk on how British Vogue covers Black magnificence.) He additionally printed 1,000 copies to “show that Black people take up space,” he stated. “You can literally walk into our dining hall and see stacks of the newspaper and other students reading it.”
Next Thing: A group of fifty poems written by Nash will probably be printed this yr by Words, Beats and Life, a hip-hop and training nonprofit in Washington.
From the archives: Before he began his personal journal, Nash discovered from different publications began by Black college students at Brown, together with BOP (Blacks on Paper), a literary journal from the Nineteen Seventies, and The African Sun, a tradition journal edited by members of the Black Student Union from the Nineties. “I want future generations of students to be able to have that same access to what day-to-day life is like for Black people at Brown,” he stated.
For extra way of life information, comply with us on Instagram , Twitter , Facebook and do not miss out on the newest updates!
,
With inputs from TheIndianEXPRESS
