Dasan Ahanu – public speaker, organizer, curator, educator, poet, spoken word artist, educator, songwriter, emcee and loyal Hip Hop head – was born and raised in Raleigh, North Carolina.

He is co-founder & managing director of Black Poetry Theatre, a Durham, NC-based theatre company that creates and produces original poetry and spoken word based productions. Dasan has worked with notable festivals, such as the Art of Cool Festival and Beats n Bars Festival, and hosted numerous poetry, jazz, hip hop and cultural arts events. He also has assisted various institutions in presenting art to the community including area museums, art galleries, colleges and universities & performing art centers.

Dasan has competed regionally and nationally as a founding member and coach of Durham, NC’s own Bull City Slam Team. His work has been featured on National Public Radio (NPR) where he has been noted for his appearances on News and Notes with Ed Gordon and State of Things with Frank Stacio. He is featured on the third season of Lexus Verses and Flow (TV One) and the documentary “Poet Son” that aired on WUNC-TV as a part of the North Carolina Visions film series.

Dasan has released three full-length books of poetry: The Innovator; Freedom Papers; and Everything Worth Fighting For: An Exploration of Being Black in America. His most notable spoken word albums are: The Darkest Eye; and Catharsis. In 2007 he signed with NC independent record label Amp Truth Records and teamed with up and coming music producer Picasso to form The Jim Crow Jackson Experiment. Their self-titled debut album was an amazing blend of spoken word, rap, soul, reggae & blues.

Currently, Dasan is a visiting professor at UNC-Chapel Hill in Chapel Hill and a consultant working with organizations on art-based strategies. Dasan is an alumni Nasir Jones Fellowship with the Hip Hop Archive at Harvard University’s Hutchins Center for African & African American Research. His scholarly work is focused on art interventions, creative expression, Hip Hop and popular culture. While an assistant professor of English at Saint Augustine’s University in Raleigh, NC, Dasan edited the campus literary magazine, Inside Out, developed curriculum, workshops, coordinated arts programming & advised Falcon Poetry Club, the campus creative writing organization.

In 2004 he was awarded an Indy Arts Award by Indy Week (formerly Independent Weekly) for his work in arts and activism. Then in 2015 he was awarded the honor again, the first time in the award's history that happened.

Hosted by @dasanahanu | dasanahanu.com
Run time: 30 min