Kwame Dawes, professor of English and Glenna Luschei Editor of the Prairie Schooner at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, is co-hosting and participating in a Ford Foundation research conference Aug. 3 in New York City.

The conference, “African Poetry Today: A Celebration and Reading,” is hosted by Dawes and Elizabeth Alexander, director of the Ford Foundation’s Creativity and Free Expression program. It is designed to highlight new developments in contemporary African poetry and is organized by the African Poetry Book Fund, which is sponsored by UNL’s Department of English, Prairie Schooner and the Ford Foundation.

African Poetry Book Fund editors will complete foundational research to start an index of contemporary African poetry. The index will be used in future projects that include a plan to publish the first major anthology of contemporary poetry as well as a digital humanities initiative to further develop the index into an interactive global resource.

A panel including Dawes; Matthew Shenoda, an Egyptian poet, writer and associate professor at Columbia College Chicago; and Chris Abani, a Nigerian and American author; will examine how challenges in international publishing create opportunities for innovation.

For more information on UNL’s African Poetry Book Fund, click here.