UCR Emeritus Professor and U.S. Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera selected Allison Adelle Hedge Coke as the 2016 Library of Congress Witter Bynner Fellow. In his selection, Herrera said he sought to honor Hedge Coke "for her precision of Earth, of suffering in and out of the Rez, of the workers unnamed, open roads knitted with tin shacks, Case '45 tractors, ancestor dust and the spirit tuned to caribou, America and song. For her translation projects of First Peoples across the entire hemisphere. For her unceasing teaching, humility, courage, and pioneering--for these offerings to the small miracles of all our voices and the galaxies they aim to call out and admire." Burn is a lyric testament to that legacy.
Author Biography:
Allison Adelle Hedge Coke's books include Streaming, Blood Run, Off-Season City Pipe, Dog Road Woman, Sing: Poetry from the Indigenous Americas, Effigies, Effigies II, and Rock, Ghost, Willow, Deer. Awards include an American Book Award, King*Chavez*Parks Award, Lifetime Achievement Award Native Writers Circle of the Americas, Wordcrafter of the Year Award, Pen Southwest Book Award, and the 2016 Library of Congress Witter Bynner Fellowship. She is founding faculty for the VCFA MFA in Writing & Publishing program, and a Distinguished Professor of Creative Writing at the University of California Riverside. Hedge Coke is mixed heritage, raised in North Carolina, Canada, and on the Great Plains. Dustin Illetewahke Mater, Chickasaw, is an award-winning multimedia artist and designer. He was the first southeastern tribal member to be a part of Pendleton Blankets Legendary Collection, and has a shell gorget housed in the permanent collection at the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) in Washington, D.C., with additional artistic works shown in Paris, Edinburgh, the National Parks Service, and multiple reputable galleries. Mater has won numerous awards, including first place in sculpture at Santa Fe Indian Market. Mater previously illustrated Spider Brings Fire by Linda Hogan.
