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    • Nikki Giovanni

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    American poet, writer and activist

    Yolande Cornelia “Nikki” Giovanni Jr.is an American poet, writer, commentator, activist, and educator.

    Table of Contents

    Occupation

    poet

    teacher

    writer

    About the Nikki Giovanni

    Yolande Cornelia “Nikki” Giovanni Jr.is an American poet, writer, commentator, activist, and educator. One of the world’s most well-known African-American poets, her work includes poetry anthologies, poetry recordings, and nonfiction essays, and covers topics ranging from race and social issues to children’s literature. She has won numerous awards, including the Langston Hughes Medal and the NAACP Image Award. She has been nominated for a Grammy Award for her poetry album, The Nikki Giovanni Poetry Collection. Additionally, she was named as one of Oprah Winfrey’s 25 “Living Legends”. Giovanni is a member of The Wintergreen Women Writers Collective

    Giovanni gained initial fame in the late 1960s as one of the foremost authors of the Black Arts Movement. Influenced by the Civil Rights Movement and Black Power Movement of the period, her early work provides a strong, militant African-American perspective, leading one writer to dub her the “Poet of the Black Revolution”. During the 1970s, she began writing children’s literature, and co-founded a publishing company, NikTom Ltd, to provide an outlet for other African-American women writers. Over subsequent decades, her works discussed social issues, human relationships, and hip hop. Poems such as “Knoxville, Tennessee” and “Nikki-Rosa” have been frequently re-published in anthologies and other collections.

    Giovanni has received numerous awards and holds 27 honorary degrees from various colleges and universities. She has also been given the key to over two dozen cities. Giovanni has been honored with the NAACP Image Award seven times. One of her more unique honors was having a South America bat species, Micronycteris giovanniae, named after her in 2007.

    Giovanni is proud of her Appalachian roots and works to change the way the world views Appalachians and Affrilachians.

    Giovanni has taught at Queens College, Rutgers, and Ohio State, and was a University Distinguished Professor at Virginia Tech until September 1, 2022. After the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007, she delivered a chant-poem at a memorial for the shooting victims.

    18 Quotes by Nikki Giovanni

    1. 1.

      Some say we are responsible for those we love. Others know we are responsible for those who love us.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    2. 2.

      You must invent your own games and teach us old ones how to play.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    3. 3.

      We love because it’s the only true adventure.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    4. 4.

      I think one of the nicest things that we created as a generation was just the fact that we could say, ‘Hey, I don’t like white people.’

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    5. 5.

      When you are skinning your customers, you should leave some skin on to grow again so that you can skin them again.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    6. 6.

      We write because we believe the human spirit cannot be tamed and should not be trained.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    7. 7.

      There’re two people in the world that are not likeable: a master and a slave.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    8. 8.

      White people really deal more with God and black people with Jesus.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    9. 9.

      If now isn’t a good time for the truth I don’t see when we’ll get to it.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    10. 10.

      If I could come back as anything – I’d be a bird, first, but definitely the command key is my second choice.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    11. 11.

      I really don’t think life is about the I-could-have-beens. Life is only about the I-tried-to-do. I don’t mind the failure but I can’t imagine that I’d forgive myself if I didn’t try.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    12. 12.

      Mistakes are a fact of life. It is the response to the error that counts.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    13. 13.

      Everything will change. The only question is growing up or decaying.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    14. 14.

      If you don’t understand yourself you don’t understand anybody else.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    15. 15.

      A lot of people refuse to do things because they don’t want to go naked, don’t want to go without guarantee. But that’s what’s got to happen. You go naked until you die.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    16. 16.

      We eat up artists like there’s going to be a famine at the end.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    17. 17.

      Sacred cows make very poor gladiators.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist

    18. 18.

      Art is not for the cultivated taste. It is to cultivate taste.

      Nikki Giovanni

      American poet, writer and activist