Walidah Imarisha is an educator, writer, public scholar and spoken word artist.

She has co-edited two anthologies including Octavia’s Brood: Science Fiction Stories From Social Justice Movements. Imarisha’s nonfiction book Angels with Dirty Faces: Three Stories of Crime, Prison, and Redemption won a 2017 Oregon Book Award. She is also the author of the poetry collection Scars/Stars, and is currently working on an Oregon Black history book, forthcoming from AK Press.

For six years, she presented statewide as a public scholar with Oregon Humanities’ Conversation Project on topics such as Oregon Black history, alternatives to incarceration, and the history of hip hop. Imarisha has taught in Stanford University’s Program of Writing and Rhetoric, Portland State University’s Black Studies Department, Oregon State University’s Women Gender Sexuality Studies Department, and Southern New Hampshire University’s English Department.

Imarisha’s website is www.walidah.com

This event is co-sponsored by Ethics and the Common Good Project, New Student Experience, Civil Liberties and Public Policy Program, Culture, Brain and Development Program, Critical Studies in Childhood, Youth and Learning Program, Community Partnerships for Social Change, and the Hampshire Art Gallery.