Martin Luther King, Jr. Writing Awards

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Jim Daniels, Director of the Creative Writing Program, established the Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Writing Awards in 1999. The program builds on Daniels’ commitment to writing about race (he edited Letters to America: Contemporary American Poetry on Race. In 2001, the event expanded to include a separate category for Carnegie Mellon students, working on the premise that the voices of college students, and their varying experiences, could and should interact with the young voices from the Pittsburgh community The contest guidelines specifically request personal narratives on race. We believe that if we learn each other’s stories, the barriers begin to break down. We begin to see each other as individual human beings, struggling the way we all must, to live good lives and treat each other decently. We are all parts of different communities, and we reach out and cross over in strange, often surprising ways. The King Writing Awards provides a common ground for all these communities. As part of the University’s day-long schedule of panel discussions and performing arts presentations, the winners of this contest read in the University Center’s main lecture hall to an audience of hundreds. 

The submission deadline for this year’s King Writing Awards is Monday, December 17, 2007. For more information on this year’s Martin Luther King Jr. Awards, please see the current poster.  Teachers and students may view some creative writing exercises for brainstorming ideas.  As always, contestants are free to create works related to King’s legacy without the use of these writing prompts.

In addition, each year, a book of award winners’ work is published and distributed at the event. This archive of those books is meant to keep the discussion going by making this writing accessible to an even larger audience. Past winners and their work are listed in the award booklets below, starting with the current year. Please click on the program from the year you which to see to download the booklet in PDF format.