Shayne Langford, Ibe Liebenberg, and Pam Houston

On the 6/7/23 edition of Dr. Andy’s Poetry and Technology Hour:

We’re joined by the three poets being featured at this upcoming Poetry Night! Writer and teacher Shayne Langford shares thoughts about academia, including the difference between writing in academic and independent settings, as well as the authors he returns to for inspiration. Next is poet Ibe Liebenberg, who discusses the poetic influence of his job as a firefighter, his academic journey pursuing two MFAs, and his process reading and writing fiction and poetry. Rounding out the hour, writer and professor Pam Houston tells us about working at the Institute of American Indian Arts, writing her memoir Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country, and mobilizing people to shift the political landscape.

Shayne Langford is a writer from rural Northern California. He worked as a fly fishing guide in Southwestern Colorado while earning an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of California, Davis, where he now teaches in the English Department.

Ibe Liebenberg is a citizen of the Chickasaw Nation. He lives in Chico, California, and works as a firefighter, and a lecturer at Chico State University. He is currently enrolled in the MFA program at the Institute of American Indian Arts. He has been published in POETRY Magazine, The ThreePenny Review, Ecotone, North American Review, Beloit Poetry Journal, Sugar House Review, American Journal of Poetry, Salamander Magazine, and Verse Daily.

Pam Houston is the author of the memoir, Deep Creek: Finding Hope In The High Country, which won the 2019 Colorado Book Award, the High Plains Book Award and the Reading The West Advocacy Award, and more recently, Air Mail: Letters of Politics Pandemics and Place coauthored with Amy Irvine.  She is also the author of Cowboys Are My Weakness, Contents May Have Shifted, and four other books of fiction and nonfiction, all published by W.W. Norton. She lives at 9,000 feet above sea level on a 120-acre homestead near the headwaters of the Rio Grande and teaches creative writing at UC Davis and at the Institute of American Indian Arts. She is cofounder and creative director of the literary nonprofit Writing by Writers and fiction editor at the Environmental Arts Journal Terrain.org. She raises Icelandic sheep and Irish wolfhounds and is a fierce advocate for the Earth. 

Pam Houston, Shayne Langford, and Ibe Liebenberg will read at the Poetry Night Reading Series on June 8th, 2023.

Find out more about Dr. Andy's Poetry Night Reading Series in Davis, California by visiting http://www.poetryindavis.com. Invite your friends to sign up for the mailing list. To learn more about Dr. Andy’s tiny media fiefdom, subscribe to his weekly newsletter at https://andyjones.substack.com.