Black American Writers Series

The Bert C. Bach Written Word Initiative

Black American Writers Series

Mark your calendars for our upcoming fall installment of the series: Gregory Pardlo on October 22, 2025

Our most recent visitor: Crystal Wilkinson

We were honored to have two sessions with Crystal Wilkinson. First, an afternoon coversation between her, Jesse Graves, and Thomas Alan Holmes in the Reece Museum. Then, an evening reading from her collection, Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts, followed by a conversation between her and Fred Sauceman.

These events are sponsored by the Black American Studies Program, the Bert C. Bach Written Word Initative, and the Center of Excellence for Appalachian Studies and Services.

Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts: Stories and Recipes from Five Generations of Black Country Cooks

A lyrical culinary journey that explores the hidden legacy of Black Appalachians, through powerful storytelling alongside nearly forty comforting recipes, from the former poet laureate of Kentucky.

Crystal Wilkinson a recent fellowship recipient of the Academy of American Poets, is the award-winning author of Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts, a culinary memoir, Perfect Black, a collection of poems, and three works of fiction—The Birds of Opulence, Water Street and Blackberries, Blackberries. She is the recipient of an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Poetry, an O. Henry Prize, a USA Artists Fellowship, and an Ernest J. Gaines Prize for Literary Excellence. Named Kentucky’s Poet Laureate from 2021 to 2023, she has received recognition from the Yaddo Foundation, Hedgebrook, The Vermont Studio Center for the Arts, The Hermitage Foundation and others. Her short stories, poems and essays have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies including most recently in The Atlantic, The Kenyon Review, STORY, Agni Literary Journal, Emergence, Oxford American and Southern Cultures. She currently teaches at the University of Kentucky where she is Bush-Holbrook Professor in Creative Writing.

Crystal Wilkinson The Black American Writers Series is a partnership between Black American Studies, The Bert C. Bach Written Word Initiative, and the Department of Literature & Language. The interdisciplinary series is set in the heart of Black American Studies, a major interdisciplinary program in the College of Arts & Sciences. This series brings noteworthy essayists, poets, writers, journalists, historians, and others to the campus of East Tennessee State University to highlight and spotlight the contributions of Black American Writers.

Natasha Trethewey reads from her work.
Major Jackson discusses writing craft with students.
Sherée Renee Thomas presenting on speculative fiction for students at the Reece Museum.
Major Jackson in a roundtable discussion with Dr. Jesse Graves and Valencia Robin.
Sherée Renee Thomas' presentation on speculative fiction.
Dr. Daryl Carter introduces Natasha Trethewey before her evening reading.
Dr. Jesse Graves, Natasha Trethewey, Dr. Daryl Carter, and Dr. Amy Wright
Dr. Jesse Graves and Dr. Amy Wright in a roundtable discussion with Natasha Trethewey.

The Black American Studies program and Art & Design’s Slocumb Galleries were proud to present internationally recognized poet Nikki Giovanni to speak at East Tennessee State University on September 20, 2022.

Nikki Giovanni is a poet, professor, author, and internationally recognized for her distinguished contributions to the field. Her works, such as Black Feeling, Black Talk, Bicycles: Love Poems, and Those Who Ride the Night Winds, have made her one of America’s most important voices on the Black experience since the late 1960s. She is also a professor at Virginia Tech University, where she was a powerful voice in the aftermath of the mass shooting there in 2007, representing a campus devastated by the loss of so many lives. Her marks went viral, thus reflecting this simple fact: it is the humanities which explains our world, bringing us together, and supplies the healing balm when tragedy strikes.