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This is (Not) What I Expected: Difference and Dignity Through Literature and the Arts

A series of events centered around and inspired by 'Citizen' by Claudia Rankine

Claudia Rankine's book Citizen: An American Lyric, serves as a source of healing, or what UGA College of Education professor Melisa Cahnmann-Taylor refers to as "literary and artistic micro-validation": the ways in which books of fiction, literary non-fiction, poetry, film, and visual art can provide small, often intended images and words that nurture feelings of inclusion and validation for diverse experiences and perspectives.

This series of events includes numerous events that shift expectations of micro-aggression toward validation through deep attention to the past, present, and possible futures at UGA and in our larger Athens community.

Download Book Resources

Learn more about the author

Claudia Rankine is a poet illuminating the emotional and psychic tensions that mark the experiences of many living in 21st-century America. Watch a video from Claudia Rankine's 2016 MacArthur Fellow award.

Upcoming Dates

Attend an event and receive a copy of 'Citizen'

A select number of books will be available to attendees of the March 22-23 dramatic readings and the March 25 book discussions (one per household until supplies run out).

Explore more of Claudia Rankine's work

Raknine's Racial Imaginary Institute in Brooklyn offers more ways for us to explore race and culture through an interdisciplinary cultural laboratory.

Visit the Website

  *Events in this series have been generously supported by funds from the UGA Willson Center for the Humanities and Arts, the Leighton M. Ballew Lecture Series in English, Verse Magazine, and the Georgia Humanities, in partnership with the Georgia Department of Economic Development, through funding from the Georgia General Assembly.*

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