May 20, 2020

FELLOWSHIP OPPORTUNITY

by Lana Barkawi | in Literary

POETRY COALITION FELLOWSHIP–
APPLICATIONS ACCEPTED UNTIL JULY 15, 2020.

Mizna, a founding member of the Poetry Coalition, is accepting applications for a paid Poetry Coalition Fellowship position. This position is 20 hours per week from September 15, 2020 to June 30, 2021. The stipend is $18,720 plus a $1,000 stipend toward health care. 

Mizna is a critical platform for contemporary literature, art, film, and cultural programming centering the work of Southwest Asian and North African (SWANA) artists. For more than twenty years, we have sought to reflect the depth and multiplicity of our community and have been committed to being a space for Arab, Muslim, and other artists from the region to reclaim our narratives and engage audiences in meaningful and artistically excellent art. As part of our commitment to the fullness of our community, we especially work to create spaces that are reflective of those who are marginalized within our communities, including Afro Arabs, queer and trans Arabs, and those from Arabic-speaking countries who do not identify as Arab.

POSITION OVERVIEW: This Poetry Coalition Fellowship will have a focus on our literary programs. We seek a candidate who can help think strategically about Mizna’s literary programming, which focuses on the publication and distribution of Mizna: Prose, Poetry, and Art Exploring Arab America and includes literary readings and nurturing the writing craft in our community. The Fellow will lead the effort to help plan for a more resourced future, taking in to account our program’s potential impact and its true program costs. The ideal candidate will have experience in literature and nonprofit management, and will be steeped in Arab/SWANA–American literature and culture.

FELLOWSHIP LOCALE: Given the current COVID19 pandemic, the Mizna team are working remotely for the foreseeable future, and the new Fellow will do the same. Therefore, people based outside of the Minneapolis/St. Paul metro area will be considered for this position. However, we will prioritize local people in case we are eventually able to hold in-person events during the timeframe of the fellowship.

FELLOW RESPONSIBILITIES 

• • Committing to 20 hours per week for the entire ten-month fellowship
• • Adhering to rules and policies of Mizna as appropriate 
• • Assisting with some or all of the following:
  • • Strategic planning for Mizna’s literary programming
  • • Journal production
  • • Community outreach
  • • Marketing and promotion, including materials development
  • • Grant writing and/or fundraising
  • • Content production for websites or social media
  • • Programming and curating live events, such as poetry readings and workshops
  • • General administration
• • Assisting with the host organization’s Poetry Coalition joint programming in March
• • Attending and participating in meetings
• • Attending and participating in monthly Zooms with other Poetry Coalition fellows and Academy staff to foster community, professional development, and create a peer learning group to learn about the following:
  • • Community outreach
  • • Marketing and promotion, including materials development
  • • Grant writing and/or fundraising
  • • Content production for websites or social media
  • • Programming and curating live events, such as poetry readings and workshops
  • • General administration
• • Participating in the Poetry Coalition’s fall convening and professional development trainings
• • Completing evaluations at the end of the fellowship year

FELLOW QUALIFICATIONS:

• • Passion for poetry and literature and familiarity with and/or knowledge of contemporary poets and writers
• • Deep familiarity with the current landscape of Arab/SWANA–American literature
• • Interest in literary arts programming, administration, and management 
• • Demonstrated experience in the areas listed above

TO APPLY: Please submit a cover letter, resume, and 2–3 references via web form. No calls please. Mizna is an Equal Opportunity Employer. Download a .pdf version of the job description here.

NO LONGER ACCEPTING APPLICATIONS.

MORE ABOUT THE POETRY COALITION AND THE FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM

The Poetry Coalition is a national alliance of more than 25 organizations dedicated to working together to promote the value poets bring to our culture and the important contribution poetry makes in the lives of people of all ages and backgrounds. Members are nonprofit organizations whose primary mission is to promote poets and poetry, and/or multi-genre literary organizations that serve poets in the disability community and of specific racial, ethnic, or gender identities, backgrounds, or communities. All members present poets at live events. Each March, members present programming across the country on a theme of social importance. The Poetry Coalition is coordinated by the Academy of American Poets, and we are grateful to the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for its support of this work.

The Poetry Coalition Fellowship Program is a three-year pilot program, and Mizna will host a Fellow for the 2020–2021 year only. The goals of this are to help:

• • diversify the leadership of the nonprofit literary field by encouraging more inclusion of individuals from under-represented communities;
• • develop future literary leaders regardless of educational background; 
• • introduce individuals who are interested to nonprofit literary arts management, fundraising, programming, and editorial work, providing experiences that will be useful as they seek jobs and inspiring them to consider working in the literary field; and increase the capacity of our individual organizations by having additional assistance. 

Paid fellowships will not “level the playing field.” Opportunity in our country is not equally distributed across ability, class, ethnic, gender, and racial lines. And we alone cannot erase and undo the biases, barriers, discrimination, and prejudice that exist in our country. But we hope poetry organizations can be out front in building equity and inclusivity in literary arts organizations and spaces.