Art in Dialogue: World Building: Re/Imagining Sites of Belonging, Staceyann Chin

Staceyann Chin in conversation with Professor Simone J. Alexander

What does it mean to create a place where we belong? And how can art, storytelling, and collective action help us imagine and build those places?

Join multidisciplinary artist, poet, and activist Staceyann Chin in conversation with Professor Simone J. Alexander about land, home, identity, and belonging. Drawing from her decades-long artistic practice and her work as a land steward and founder of MendDiCap, Chin will explore how personal stories can become sites of connection, resistance, and world-building. Her work asks us to consider who gets to feel at home, whose stories shape our understanding of place, and how we might create more expansive spaces of belonging.

Presented in partnership with Africana Studies and the Lehigh University Art Galleries (LUAG) as part of LUAG’s Art in Dialogue series and in conjunction with the exhibition This Land: Reimagining the United States of America on its 250th Anniversary. Attendees are encouraged to view the exhibition prior to the event at 4 pm. 

Space is limited; please register in advance.

If you require assistance filling out this form or prefer to share your registration information via email or phone, please email Elise at ejs421@lehigh.edu call 610-758-6882. Questions, concerns, and any accessibility needs can also be directed to Elise at ejs421@lehigh.edu or call 610-758-6882.

Staceyann Chin unapologetically identifies as Caribbean, Black, Asian, lesbian, feminist, pro-choice mother, farmer, and land steward to Kindred on the Rock in Point Hill, Jamaica, a MendDiGap Connection Hub. Chin's Brooklyn home, The Blackyard, is a safe harbor for many who might need it in the harsh isolation of the New York metropolis and is used to gather, to rest, to rejuvenate, to find security, and as a site for strategization for marginalized folk mobilizing for liberation.

Original co-writer/performer in the Tony Award-winning Def Poetry Jam on Broadway, Staceyann began her career reading poetry at the Nu-yo-rican Poets' Café, then quickly moved on to one-woman shows Off-Broadway, writing workshops, and performances in Sweden, South Africa, Australia, and Jamaica.

Chin is the author of the memoir The Other Side of Paradise and the poetry collection Crossfire, and her writing has appeared in The New York Times, academic journals, and other publications. Her one-woman show Motherstruck explored her experience as a Black queer woman consciously choosing motherhood and was adapted into an award-winning film.

In recent years, Chin has expanded her work to consider questions of land, home, stewardship, and the boundaries of belonging. She is the founder of MendDiCap Inc., an organization focused on fostering belonging for Black and Brown people in the African diaspora and bridging displacement with land stewardship. Through Kindred on the Rock, a MendDiCap Connection Hub in Point Hill, Jamaica, she works to connect people with the social, agricultural, cultural, and historical heritage of Jamaica and the African diaspora.

Chin also serves as a board member of Women's Empowerment for Change (WeChange) in Jamaica and as Global Land Program Director for the Kindred Sister Site at Restore Forward in Ava, New York.