A Celebration of Words with Yomi Sode, Jennifer Bartell Boykin & Students

Richland Library will coordinate a series of poetry workshops and a culminating presentation featuring Black British poet Yomi Sode in partnership with education consultant Peter Kahn. In March 2023, workshops will take place at two colleges and two high schools that will explore identity, black culture, literary elements of poetry, and the craft of poetry. A public culminating event will take place at Richland Library on Friday, March 17. SC Humanities supported this program with a Major Grant.

Yomi Sode is an award-winning Nigerian British writer. He is a recipient of the 2019 Jerwood Compton Poetry Fellowship and was shortlisted for the Brunel International African Poetry Prize 2021. He was recently a finalist for the prestigious T.S. Eliot Prize. Peter Kahn is an Ohio-based poet-educator, seen in Louder Than a Bomb, America to Me and on PBS NewsHour. This team will present workshops at Allen University, the University of South Carolina, Keenan High School, and Spring Valley High School.

The “Celebration of Words with Yomi Sode, Jennifer Bartell Boykin, & Students” is an evening event that will take place from 7-9pm on Friday, March 17th at Richland Library Main. It will include readings by high school and college students (and potentially teachers/professors) from Allen University, the University of South Carolina, Keenan High School and Spring Valley High School who participated in the workshops. Select students will share the stage with Spring Valley teacher and newly appointed City of Columbia Poet Laureate, Jennifer Bartell Boykin, along with Yomi Sode as headliner.  Time-permitting, there will be a Q and A.

Awarded the National Medal in 2017 by the Institute of Museum and Library Services, Richland Library is a vibrant, contemporary organization that provides resources and information that advance the Midlands. Learn more: https://www.richlandlibrary.com/about-us.

The mission of SC Humanities is to enrich the cultural and intellectual lives of all South Carolinians. Established in 1973, this 501(c) 3 organization is governed by a volunteer 20-member Board of Directors comprised of community leaders from throughout the state. It presents and/or supports literary initiatives, lectures, exhibits, festivals, publications, oral history projects, videos and other humanities-based experiences that directly or indirectly reach more than 250,000 citizens annually. South Carolina Humanities receives funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities as well as corporate, foundation and individual donors. The National Endowment for the Humanities: Democracy demands wisdom.