Nikky Finney

Nikky Finney in 2012. Photo by Soppakanuuna. Licensed under Creative Commons, courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Nikky Finney (born August 26, 1957) is an award-winning African-American poet and academic.

Life

Family

Finney was born Lynn Carol Finney, 1 of 3 children, and the only daughter, of Ernest A. Finney, Jr., a civiil rights lawyer and retired Chief Justice of the state of South Carolina, and Frances (Davenport), an elementary school teacher. Finney’s father began his career as a civil rights attorney, and in 1961, served as Head Legal Counsel for the Friendship 9, black junior college students arrested and charged when trying to desegregate McCrory’s lunch counter in Rock Hill, South Carolina. In 1994, Ernest Finney, Jr., was appointed by the State Legislature as the 1st African-American Chief Justice of South Carolina since Reconstruction. Both of Finney’s brothers are attorneys in South Carolina: her older brother, Ernest “Chip” Finney, III, was elected Solicitor of the Fifth Circuit, and her younger brother, Jerry Leo Finney, is in private practice in Columbia, SC.

Both Finney’s parents were raised on the family-owned land: Justice Finney on a farm in Virginia, and Frances Davenport Finney on a farm in Newberry, SC. Themes of the African-American relationship to the land surface throughout Finney’s work.

Youth and education

Educated in Catholic grade school, and then in South Carolina public schools during the riotous struggle over racial integration, Finney was anchored in her youth by her maternal grandmother, Beulah Lenorah Butler Davenport, and by the inimitable constancy of the nearby South Carolina sea. A bookworm in childhood, she composed poetry and acquired the nickname "Nikky", likely in reference to poet Nikki Giovanni, who would later become a friend and mentor. Graduated from Sumter High School in 1975, Finney matriculated at Talladega College, an HBCU in Alabama, where she was mentored by poet and essayist Gloria Wade Gayles, studyied with Dr. Howard Zehr, and graduated in 1979.

Career

Finney began her artistic career as a photographer. Finney committed to documenting the trajectory of African American contributions to American creativity and culture. In Alabama, Finney continued to advance as an autodidactic poet and creative artist.

Finney matriculated at Atlanta University, working in the African-American Studies department, under African American historians Dr. Richard Long and Dr. David Dorsey. While in Atlanta, Finney joined the Pamoja Writing Collective, the community writing workshop led by Toni Cade Bambara. Finney also immersed herself in study of the poetry and visual arts of the Black Arts Movement. Ultimately, limited potential for creative work in academic programs caused Finney to abandon the constraints of graduate study and return to Talladega to work as a photographer. Hired as photographer and reporter by Byllye Y. Avery, for the newly organized, Atlanta-based, National Black Women's Health Project, Finney traveled to Nairobi, Kenya for the End of the Decade of Women Conference in 1985, and covered the historic UN conference for the National Black Women’s Health Project.

On Wings Made of Gauze, her 1st book of poems, was completed in Atlanta. The book was read and ushered to the late Eunice Riedel by Nikki Giovanni. Riedel acquired and edited On Wings Made of Gauze, which was published by William Morrow, in 1985.

After publication of her 1st book of poems, Finney relocated to the Bay Area, where she involved herself with progressive causes, and continued independent work as a poet. Finney was recruited to a position as Visiting Writer in the English department at the University of Kentucky (1989–90), by South Carolina-born novelist and poet, Percival Everett. In 1993, Finney was offered a post on the permanent faculty.

Finney is the Provost’s Distinguished Service Professor of English at the University of Kentucky (UK). She lives in Lexington with her partner, novelist A.J. Verdelle, and her daughter.

Finney’s 2nd book of poetry, Rice, completed in Lexington, was published in 1995 by SisterVisions, a Canadian press. In 1997, Rice received a PEN American Open Book Award. Rice stands as the book that brought Finney her many grass-roots followers. Finney’s story cycle, Heartwood, designed for literacy students, was published in 1998, by the University Press of Kentucky.

Finney took a leave from UK in 1999 to hold the Goode Chair in the Humanities at Berea College (founded in 1855), the first interracial and coeducational college in the South. In 2005, she became a full professor in UK's English department. In 2006, she was appointed Interim Director of the African American Studies and Research Program at UK.

Finney’s 3rd book of poetry, The World is Round, was published by Inner Light Publishing in 2003. After its publication, Finney was invited to Smith College, in Northampton, Massachusetts, where she served for 2years as the Grace Hazard Conkling Writer-in-Residence, from 2007 to 2009.

Finney edited and wrote the introduction to The Ringing Ear: Black Poets Lean South, which was published by the University of Georgia Press in 2007, under the auspices of Cave Canem, an organization that works to increase opportunities for African-American poets. The Ringing Ear, with entries selected and edited by Finney, showcased the work of 100 African American poets who are southern or who wrote on southern subjects.

Finney’s 4th book of poems, Head Off & Split, was published by Northwestern University Press in 2011. On October 12, 2011, Head Off & Split was announced as a finalist for the 2011 National Book Awards, with Finney honored as the 2011 winner of the National Book Award for Poetry on November 16, 2011. Awards ceremony host John Lithgow judged her acceptance speech, touching on race, reading and writing, to be "the best acceptance speech for anything that I've ever heard in my life".

Finney is a founding member of the Affrilachian Poets, a writing collective based in Lexington, Kentucky. Finney has served on the faculty and Board of the Cave Canem Foundation where she shepherds younger poets in the spirit of her mentorship experience.

Writing

Finney’s commitment to social justice and cultural preservation is revealed through the themes of her work.

Recognition

• 2011 National Book Award for Poetry, Head Off & Split
• 2004 Benjamin Franklin Awards (Independent Booksellers Association), First Place for Poetry, The World Is Round
• 2002 Honorary Doctorate of Humanities, Claflin University
• 2002 Hall of Fame for Writers of African Descent, Chicago, Illinois
• 1999 PEN Beyond Margins Award, Rice, New York City
• 1999 Kentucky Foundation for Women, Artist Fellowship Award
• 1999 Kentucky Arts Council, Al Smith Fellowship
• 1995 Kentucky Foundation for Women, Artist Fellowship Award
• 1994 Kentucky Arts Council, Artist’s Fellowship Award

Publications

Poetry

• On Wings Made of Gauze. New York: Morrow, 1985. ISBN 978-0-688-04796-2
• Rice. Toronto: Sister Vision, 1995. ISBN 978-0-920813-21-8
  • also published as Rice: Poems (with foreword by Kwame Dawes). Evanston, IL: TriQuarterly Books / Northwestern University Press, 2013.
• Heartwood. Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1997. ISBN 978-0-8131-0910-7
• The World is Round. Atlanta, GA: InnerLight, 2003. ISBN 978-0-9714890-4-2
  • also published as *The World is Round: Poems (with foreword by Kevin Everod Quashie). Evanston, IL: TriQuarterly Books / Northwestern University Press, 2013.
• The Poet's House: A poem. Monterey KY: Larkspur Press, 2006.
• Head Off & Split: Poems. Evanston, IL: TriQuarterly Books / Northwestern University Press, 2011. ISBN 978-0-8101-5216-8

Edited

• The Ringing Ear: Black poets lean south. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2007. ISBN 978-0-8203-2926-0

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.

Audio / video

Nikky Finney reads "Left"

• Nikky Finney (cassette). Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 1997.
• Visting Writers' Series: Nikky Finney (CD). Portland, OR: Reed College, 2012.

Except where noted, discographical information courtesy WorldCat.

See also

• List of U.S. poets

External links

Poems

• Nikky Finney b. 1957 at the Poetry Foundation.

Audio / video

• Nikky Finney at YouTube
• Finney's 2011 National Book Awards acceptance speech, November 17, 2011

Books

• Nikky Finney at Amazon.com

About

• Nikky Finney at African American Literature
• Nikky Finney at 'Poets & Writers
• "Finney at Smith College"
• Nikky Finney Official website.
• African American Studies Department UK
• "Interview with: Nikky Finney", The Oxford American, April 6, 2011
• Interview with Finney on "New Books in African American Studies"