Emerging Voices is a literary fellowship program that aims to provide new writers, who lack access, with the tools they will need to launch a professional writing career. Over the course of the year, each Emerging Voices fellow participates in: a professional mentorship; hosted Q & A evenings with prominent local authors; a series of Master classes focused on genre; and two public readings. The fellowship includes a $1,000 stipend.
The Mentorship Project grew out of PEN USA’s forum “Writing the Immigrant Experience,” held at the Los Angeles Central Library in March 1994, which explored the issues, problems and challenges faced by first and second generation immigrant writers. It was evident from the forum that many of the culturally diverse communities of writers in Southern California have special needs and are often isolated from the literary establishment. In the fall of 1995, PEN USA initiated Emerging Voices as a literary mentorship designed to launch potential professional writers from minority, immigrant and other underserved communities.
For 2011, writers selected for the fellowship are Eric Layer, Lauren Marks, Jamie Schaffner, Azarin Sadegh, and Hafeez Lakhani.
Hadeez Lakhani was born in India and grew up in South Florida. A graduate of Yale University, he has worked as a non-profit field worker, commodities trader, and high school teacher. He has studies at the Gotham Writers Workshop and is near-completion of his memoir, The New American Dream, a story of acculturation - growing up Muslim in suburban America and stumbling onto Wall Street. Twenty-eightt years old, he lives in New York City.
Azarin Sadegh, a 2010 UCLA Kirkwood Award nominee, was born in Shahi. During the war in Iraq, she left Iran, studied Computer Science in France and took her first Creative Writing class in Los Angeles. Since 2007, he work has appeared in print and online, including in the Chicago Sun Times, Iranian.com and Common Boundary: Stories of Immigration. Currently, she lives in Los Angeles and is working on her second novel, The Suicide Note.
More information here.
The Mentorship Project grew out of PEN USA’s forum “Writing the Immigrant Experience,” held at the Los Angeles Central Library in March 1994, which explored the issues, problems and challenges faced by first and second generation immigrant writers. It was evident from the forum that many of the culturally diverse communities of writers in Southern California have special needs and are often isolated from the literary establishment. In the fall of 1995, PEN USA initiated Emerging Voices as a literary mentorship designed to launch potential professional writers from minority, immigrant and other underserved communities.
For 2011, writers selected for the fellowship are Eric Layer, Lauren Marks, Jamie Schaffner, Azarin Sadegh, and Hafeez Lakhani.
Hadeez Lakhani was born in India and grew up in South Florida. A graduate of Yale University, he has worked as a non-profit field worker, commodities trader, and high school teacher. He has studies at the Gotham Writers Workshop and is near-completion of his memoir, The New American Dream, a story of acculturation - growing up Muslim in suburban America and stumbling onto Wall Street. Twenty-eightt years old, he lives in New York City.
Azarin Sadegh, a 2010 UCLA Kirkwood Award nominee, was born in Shahi. During the war in Iraq, she left Iran, studied Computer Science in France and took her first Creative Writing class in Los Angeles. Since 2007, he work has appeared in print and online, including in the Chicago Sun Times, Iranian.com and Common Boundary: Stories of Immigration. Currently, she lives in Los Angeles and is working on her second novel, The Suicide Note.
More information here.
