Meet Sheri Hall! For Sheri, poetry and purpose go hand in hand. Empowering low-income areas through the power of the written word is close to her heart. Not only is she an esteemed author, she also is a motivational speaker, consultant, radio personality, facilitator and peer support specialist, to name just a few of her titles. Community connections are important to her, and we are so thrilled that she will be connecting with Writers Conference attendees this year.
A lot of Sheri’s work focuses on the healing and regenerative process of writing. She has written four books, ranging from a collection of poetry and essays (Black Girl Shattered), two poetry chapbooks (“Mélange du Femme Noir” and “Chosen for Both”), as well as a workbook for writers (“Writing Wrongs: Writing to Heal”).
In addition to having four published works of poetry, Sheri Hall has a lengthy list of awards and accolades to her name, including receiving the 2019 Charlotte Street Generative Performing Artist Award, as well as being a 2019 Art in the Loop grant recipient and 2019 and 2017 Arts KC Inspiration Grant recipient. She won the Poet and Activist award at the Music and More Foundation Poetry Awards two years in a row and was nominated for best spoken-word artist in the KC People's Choice awards, Pitch Best KC and the National Spoken Word Awards
Founder of the community writing organization Arsyn Spit Fire, East of Red ArtHouse, and PenFire Publishing, she is also the interim CEO for Poetry for Personal Power, which works to fight the stigma of mental health treatment and empower those experiencing mental health issues through art and education. She also works as a consultant for many other non-profit, community-based, and arts organizations.
Sheri will join us for both days of the Writers Conference this year for several sessions. She is offering a creative writing workshop (“Renaming This One Universe”); a class on creating your elevator pitch (“Building Your Author One Sheet”), and a class on writing your author bio. She will also be a panelist on the topic of revision. We are ecstatic that she will be sharing her expertise with us, and we look forward to you meeting her.
If you’d like to keep up with Sheri, you can find her at spokenpurpose.com or under the name spokenpurpose on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
-- written by Jesseca Bear, adult services information specialist