Professor Nicole Smith Futrell, an Associate Professor and Co-Director of our Defenders Clinic, has been awarded a 2022 Writing as Activism Fellowship by the NYC Literary Action Coalition in partnership with PEN America.
Designed to uplift New Yorkers producing literary work that centers activism on community and social justice issues, the Fellowship is awarded to six New York City-based “writer-activists committed to uplifting the voices of those most marginalized in the city through writing, including those who identify as LGBTQIA+, Black, Latinx, Asian American, Indigenous, disabled, low-income, and at any intersection of these and other experiences.” This year’s Fellows include educators, poets, writers, and artists whose activism centers creative engagement with social justice issues impacting New York City communities.
In the Defenders Clinic, Professor Smith Futrell and her students represent incarcerated and formerly incarcerated New Yorkers in parole, clemency, wrongful conviction, and reentry cases. The Clinic also collaborates with local organizations, such as WITNESS, Release Aging People in Prison (RAPP), Parole Preparation Project, and the Legal Aid Society to advocate for individuals and communities that have been impacted by mass incarceration.
In her work, Professor Smith Futrell aims to advance the experiences and demands of communities of color that have been marginalized by the criminal legal system. She uses her teaching, writing, and practice to expand the field’s understanding of, and approach to, advocacy for decarceration. Of her plans for her Fellowship, she shares:
Telling stories through writing is such an important skill in social justice lawyering. Well-crafted writing can enhance a person’s capacity for seeing and responding to the complexities of trauma, systemic inequity, and redemption that incarcerated people experience. This Fellowship will allow me to expand the scope and reach of my writing beyond the academic and legal advocacy spaces that I am used to. It will be an opportunity for me to collaborate with amazing New York City writer-activists and engage with literary writing to share some of the insights I have gained about criminalization, intergenerational trauma, transformation and forgiveness while doing this work.
You can stay connected to Professor Smith Futrell’s work by following her on Twitter @nicoles_nyc and watching the Defenders Clinic spaces on Twitter @cunycrimclinic and our website.