Quraysh Ali Lansana, MFA

About

Quraysh Ali Lansana is author of 20 books in poetry, nonfiction and children’s literature. Lansana is currently a Tulsa Artist Fellow and a visiting associate professor of English and creative writing at The University of Tulsa. He was formerly a lecturer in Africana studies at Oklahoma State University-Tulsa, where he also served as director of the Center for Truth, Racial Healing & Transformation. Lansana is executive producer of KOSU/NPR’s “Focus: Black Oklahoma” monthly radio program, which is a recipient of a 2022 duPont-Columbia Award, a 2022 NAACP Image Award, a 2022 Oklahoma Society of Professional Journalists Award and was a Peabody Award nominee. Lansana is also the recipient of a 2022 Emmy Award, a 2022 Oklahoma Association of Broadcasters Award and a 2022 National Educational Telecommunications Association Public Media Award for his roles as host and consultant for the OETA (PBS) documentary film “Tulsa Race Massacre: 100 Years Later.” Lansana is a three-time International Regional Magazine Award-winning Contributing Editor for Oklahoma Today magazine. A former faculty member of both the writing program of the School of
 the Art Institute of Chicago
 and the drama division of 
The Juilliard School, Lansana served as director of the Gwendolyn Brooks Center 
for Black Literature and
 Creative Writing at Chicago State University from 2002-12, and was associate professor of English and creative writing there until 2014.

Lansana’s most recent books include “Opal’s Greenwood Oasis,” “the skin of dreams: new and collected poems, 1995-2018,” “The Whiskey of Our Discontent: Gwendolyn Brooks as Conscious and Change Agent,” and “The BreakBeat Poets: New American Poetry in the Age of Hip Hop.” Forthcoming titles include “Killing the Negative: A Conversation in Art & Verse,” with Joel Daniel Phillips, a children’s biography of Ralph Ellison, and a series of books on the Black Rodeo. Lansana’s work appears in “Best American Poetry 2019.” He is a founding member of Tri-City Collective and serves on the board of directors of the Philbrook Museum of Art and Oklahoma Humanities, is a curatorial scholar for The Thomas Gilcrease Institute of American History and Art, and a curatorial board co-chair for the Ragdale Foundation. He is a Cave Canem Fellow and a member of the first cohort of the Culture of Health Leadership for Racial Healing Fellowship.

Awards and Honors

In 2024 Lansana received the Faculty DEI Champion Award. Lansana is executive producer of KOSU/NPR’s “Focus: Black Oklahoma” monthly radio program, which is a recipient of a 2022 duPont-Columbia Award, a 2022 NAACP Image Award, a 2022 Oklahoma Society of Professional Journalists Award and was a Peabody Award nominee. Lansana is also the recipient of a 2022 Emmy Award, a 2022 Oklahoma Association of Broadcasters Award and a 2022 National Educational Telecommunications Association Public Media Award for his roles as host and consultant for the OETA (PBS) documentary film “Tulsa Race Massacre: 100 Years Later.” Lansana is a three-time International Regional Magazine Award-winning Contributing Editor for Oklahoma Today magazine.