Using Poetry to Teach Black Queer History

In this two-hour workshop, participants will explore ways of engaging with poetry as historical text and history as poetic text. The workshop will offer ideas on how to work with students on close reading, listening, and research using poetry and oral history as primary texts. Teachers will leave with a set of sources and activities as well as ideas on how to incorporate poetry and oral history into their curriculum.

Facilitator:
Naomi Extra is a poet, writer, and scholar. She received her PhD in American Studies from Rutgers University, Newark. In both her creative and scholarly work, she explores the themes of agency and pleasure in the lives of black women and girls. She has received fellowships from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Cave Canem, Jack Jones Literary Arts, American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS), and the African American Intellectual History Society. Her work has appeared in Boston Review, The New Yorker, Lit Hub, Washington Post’s The Lily, and elsewhere. Her poetry chapbook, Ratchet Supreme, was selected by Tiana Clark as the winner of the 2019 BOAAT Chapbook Prize. Currently, she is a Lecturer of Jazz and Poetry at Rutgers University, Newark.