No Surprises, a Reading with Joshua Nguyen & Monica Davidson

This event is promoting our upcoming workshop:

Workshop Title: No Surprise In The Writer, No Surprise In The Reader

Workshop Description: In this generative workshop, participants will ruminate on what surprises them in writing (others' and their own). It will be a workshop on what to do when confronted with a poem that has grown stale, what to do when a collection of poems doesn't excite the writer anymore, and how to create turns that turn heads (including your own head).

Joshua Nguyen is a bisexual Vietnamese-American writer, a collegiate national poetry slam champion (CUPSI), and a native Houstonian. He is the author of the chapbook, "American Lục Bát for My Mother" (forthcoming, 2021), published by Bull City Press, and has received fellowships from Kundiman, Tin House, Sundress Academy For The Arts, and the Vermont Studio Center. He has been published in The Offing, Wildness, American Poetry Review, Defunkt, The Texas Review, PANK, Auburn Avenue, Crab Orchard Review, and Gulf Coast Mag. He has also been featured on both the "VS" podcast and Tracy K. Smith's, "The Slowdown". He is a bubble tea connoisseur and works in a kitchen. He is a PhD student at The University of Mississippi, where he also received his MFA.

Bio: Monica Davidson is a youth activist, social justice change agent, spoken word poet, facilitator and educator from Madison, WI. Monica is a three-time member of Houston VIP Slam team, ranked 5th in the Nation. She served as the Education and Community Outreach Coordinator for Generation Spoken and has helped facilitate and develop spoken word and writing curriculum for countless high school, grade school, professional and community programs. She has worked collaboratively with Writers in the Schools (Houston,TX) and Youth Speaks/Brave New Voices (San Francisco, CA). Monica has a passion for working with young people and believes every young mind has a great talent waiting to be discovered.