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I'm honored today to
introduce Niki Herd.

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Herd's poetry is simultaneously
soft and loud, personal

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and public.

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With her crisp, curated
prose, she not only reproduces

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but exposes the complexities
of the American society

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in which we are all implicated.

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Her poems cause us to
confront the assumptions

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we make about gendered
and racial identity,

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not through force, but
through an understated,

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roiling energy that often
struggles to remain contained.

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In addition to being
the featured poet

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in the current issue
of Feminist Formations,

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Herd has been nominated
twice for the Pushcart Prize.

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And her work has been supported
by the Estrella Foundation

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and the Virginia Center
for the Creative Arts,

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among many other organizations.

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She is the author of the
Language of Shedding Skin,

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and the editor of the
forthcoming anthology, Canon

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and Chorus, Black
Poets and Prose.

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She has been widely
published, and her poems

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can be found in many notable
journals and anthologies,

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such as Title Basin Review,
and The Ringing Ear:

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Black Poets Lean South.

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Herd attended our own University
of Arizona and Antioch

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in Los Angeles, where
she earned her MFA.

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She currently lives
in Washington DC.

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After the panel, please
feel free to check out

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her books, which are on
sale here at the symposium.

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Again, we are so thankful to
have such a wonderful poet

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with us here today.

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Please join me in
welcoming Niki Herd.

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[APPLAUSE]

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