El

Jones

El Jones is a spoken word poet, professor, radio host, and community activist living in Halifax, where she served as Municipal Poet Laureate from 2013–2015. Her first book of poetry, Live from the Afrikan Resistance!, was published in 2014. Jones has taught at Dalhousie University, Acadia University, Nova Scotia Community College, and Saint Mary’s University, and she was recently named the Nancy’s Chair of Women’s Studies at Mount Saint Vincent University. She was selected as a Writers' Trust Rising Star by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson.

Writers & Books

Program History

2019 - Rising Star

Rising Stars

Selected by

Leanne Betasamosake Simpson

Citation

"El Jones is a gifted orator with a gorgeous and moving command of the essentially Afrikan art form of spoken word, using it as a moving tool to affirm, critique, and burst open liberatory sound and space. In Live From the Afrikan Resistance!, she demonstrates that the power and energy of her spoken word also exists in print form as readers witness Jones lifting up and celebrating Black brilliance and resistance. Her political interventions and essays on topics such as abolition, police violence, and gender justice offer thoughtful, incisive, and world-building alternatives to make our shared worlds more just, and more kind. El Jones’ orature, poetry, political and personal essays and scholarship are gifts and should be on the reading lists and in the classrooms of every Canadian." —2019 Rising Stars selector Leanne Betasamosake Simpson