Presented by Black Writers Pride and Charm City Books
You’ve heard of James Baldwin, Nikki Giovanni, and Audre Lorde, but who is running with the baton now? Join this collective of contemporary writers who have published award-winning and highly acclaimed literature based on the reality of Black Queer life. This genre bending conversation will have literary perspectives that cover fiction, non-fiction, YA, sci-fi, journalism, poetry, publishing and more!
Moderated by Brandon Rashad Butts (@blackwriterspride)
K. Ancrum is an author of speculative contemporary Young Adult Fiction. She is best known for the LAMBDA award winning ICARUS and the National Book Award nominated THE CORRUPTION OF HOLLIS BROWN. K. is a Chicago native who is passionate about reflective representation in young adult fiction, and exploring the edges of what is possible within her chosen genre. She currently writes most of her work in the lush gardens of the Chicago Art Institute.
Alexis Pauline Gumbs is a poet, scholar, educator, and community builder. Her books include Survival Is a Promise: The Eternal Life of Audre Lorde and Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals. She has received the Whiting Award in Nonfiction and the Windham-Campbell Literature Prize for Poetry. Gumbs lives in Durham, NC.
Jenn M. Jackson (they/them) (@jennmjackson) is a queer androgynous Black woman, an abolitionist, and a lover of all Black people. They are the author of the PEN America Open Book Finalist nonfiction book BLACK WOMEN TAUGHT US (2024) from Penguin Random House and the book POLICING BLACKNESS forthcoming from Cornell University Press in 2027. Jackson was a long-time columnist at Teen Vogue, penning articles on Blackness, intersectionality, racism, politics and culture in the United States. They were also a columnist at Yes! Magazine focusing on gender and sexuality, Black Feminism, and politics. Jackson has been published at Al Jazeera, Washington Post, Marie Claire, Ebony Magazine, The Root, among many others. Jackson was the editor-in-chief of Black Youth Project’s digital magazine from 2015 to 2017 and is now the interim EIC at the same publication. In 2021, Jackson participated in the Hurston-Wright Writer’s Weekend for nonfiction writers with Imani Perry where they worked on their forthcoming memoir.
Academically, Jackson’s research is in Black Politics with a focus on racial threat and trauma, gender and sexuality, Black Politics and Feminisms, and social movements. Jackson received their doctoral degree in Political Science at the University of Chicago in 2019. They are a native of Oakland, CA and will always represent their city.
Rasheed Newson is the author of the national bestseller My Government Means to Kill Me. The novel was a Lambda Literary finalist for Gay Fiction and was named one of the “The 100 Notable Books of 2022” by The New York Times. His latest novel, There’s Only One Sin in Hollywood, came on June 2 of this year. The Los Angeles Times hailed it for “smoothly merging the true and the invented stories and characters of 1950s Hollywood” and described the novel as “imaginatively crafted, stunningly tense, [and] historically significant.” Rasheed is also a television drama writer, producer, and showrunner. Along with his screenplay writing partner, T.J. Brady, he co-developed and was an executive producer of Bel-Air. Rasheed currently lives with his husband and their two children in Pasadena.
Phill Branch is an Emmy Award-winning documentary filmmaker, author, live performance storyteller, and educator. A graduate of the American Film Institute (Screenwriting, MFA) and Hampton University, he is the founder of Baltimore Story Fest and a GrandSLAM champion for The Moth. He received a Maryland State Arts Council’s Creativity Grant in 2025 and was a 2014 Lambda Literary Nonfiction Emerging Voices Fellow. His memoir, The Double Dutch Fuss, was named one of five notable 2026 debut nonfiction titles in Poets & Writers’ annual “New Nonfiction” feature. He is currently a Resident Artist at the Howard County Center for the Arts in Maryland. His documentary work includes Hampton University: One of the Wonders of the World and Searching for Shaniqua, both of which aired on PBS.
Instagram: @phillbranch
Brandon Rashad Butts (He/Him) is a cultural curator, writer, and producer based in Baltimore. He’s published in 3 Element Literary Review, DGX Magazine, and contributed to Huffington Post Black Voices. As a moderator, he’s led conversations with Deesha Philyaw, Bob the Drag Queen, Kosoko Jackson, S.A. Cosby, and more. He is founder of Black Writer’s Pride, an initiative geared toward hosting literary events that center the works of people who live at the intersection Black and Queer life. He’s also curator of Homeboy Dinner Party, a substack that hosts his food writing and pop up food service. He believes Toni Morrison, James Baldwin, June Jordan, and Jesmyn Ward are require reading. @b_rad.books.
