December 6th marked the start of the Winter/Spring 2019 residency for Antioch University Los Angeles MFA students. The MFA in Creative Writing program hosts a ten-day residency each semester filled with seminars and lectures focusing on different elements of craft; along with readings by guest speakers and current students. Students are encouraged to design their residency experience based on their interests and needs. There’s always a wide selection of different lecture topics to choose from, ranging from navigating the world of professional writers to using your creative voice for social justice.
This term, the program welcomed the new Akohekohe cohort as well as the following guest speakers: Ada Limón (poet, author of Bright Dead Things), Beth Minh Nguyen (fiction, author of Pioneer Girl: a novel), Lilliam Rivera (writing for young people, author of The Education of Margot Sanchez), Ashaki Jackson (poetry, author of Surveillance and co-founder of “Women Who Submit”), Isaac Fitzgerald (Buzzfeed, co-author of Pen & Ink: Tattoos and the Stories Behind Them), Hilary Teeman (of Crown Publishing), Christopher Castellani (fiction, author of The Art of Perspective: Who Tells the Story), and David Ulin (writer/critic, author of The Lost Art of Reading: Books and Resistance in a Troubled Time).