Jamila Woods is a poet, singer, and teaching artist from Chicago, IL. She is the Associate Artistic Director of Young Chicago Authors and a founding member of YCA’s Teaching Artist Corps. A Pushcart Prize winner, her poetry has been published by Poetry Magazine, Haymarket Books, and Third World Press. Jamila was a 2015 recipient of the Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship awarded by the Poetry Foundation. She is also a member of the Dark Noise Collective of poets & educators of color. Jamila recently released her debut solo album HEAVN to rave reviews by Pitchfork and the Chicago Tribune.
Jamila supported her younger siblings, Kamaria (Kami) and Jelani Woods, while they were youth leaders at ICAH and participated in ICAH's cultural work that used art as a method to start conversations about sex and sexuality. She has since become a huge ICAH ally by bringing ICAH's Education Department to her young people and adult staff at Young Chicago Authors. Jamila is committed to utilizing art as a way to express oneself and evoke critical conversations.
“Her music is inspiring to me as it is rooted in being unapologetically black, which is something that is often seen as a threat in this world. I have admired her commitment to racial, youth, and gender justice, and I believe she uses an incredible intersectional lens when approaching the ways young people (and people) show up in this world.”