Pamela Sneed

Pamela Sneed is a poet, writer, visual artist, and performer. She is the author of Funeral Diva (2020), Imagine Being More Afraid of Freedom than Slavery (1998), and Kong and Other Works (2009), as well as the chapbooks Lincoln (2014), Gift (2015), and Sweet Dreams (2018). Her poetry has appeared in 100 Best African American Poems (edited by Nikki Giovanni, 2010), Best Monologues from Best American Short Plays (edited by William Demastes, 2013), and Zoe Leonard’s Transcript of a Rally (2016). Sneed’s writing has appeared widely in magazines such as Art Forum, Hyperallergic, and the New York Times Magazine. She has performed and curated performances in venues from the Brooklyn Museum to Central Park SummerStage, Joe’s Pub, the Public Theater, and Lincoln Center Out of Doors.

Sneed earned her BA from Eugene Lang College and MFA from Long Island University. Sneed has taught solo performance and writing for solo performance at Sarah Lawrence College and was the 2017 visiting critic at Yale and at Columbia University. She teaches online for the low-residency MFA program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and is a visiting artist in the summer MFA program. She is an adjunct assistant professor at the Columbia University School of the Arts.