About

This research explores how a poetics of ‘black interiority’ can be seen to inhabit the work of contemporary poets including Kayo Chingonyi, Jay Bernard and Harmony Holiday. The critical component examines what shapes and defines black interiority or, what Kevin Quashie describes as poetics of ‘quiet’. Employing a critical race theory framework, this work examines the role of an interior poetic praxis through each poet’s use of form and composition, as well as their attention to subject matters such as the body and gender, race, representation and identity, and the wider cultural landscape within the poets’ speakers reside. 

​To be presented in tandem with the critical component is a body of creative work – a collection of poems which present a practice-based exploration of a poetics of black interiority.