Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the poetry collection Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry. Cannibal was selected as one of ...Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the poetry collection Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry. ...It’s not unusual for an autobiography to chart a person’s passage from rags to riches, ignorance to enlightenment, or bondage to freedom. It is unusual to find one as powerful and disturbing as Safiya Sinclair’s debut memoir, “How to Say Babylon,” which has already drawn comparisons to Tara Westover’s “Educated” and Mary Karr’s “The Liars’ Club.”© Safiya Sinclair 2023• Illustration: Rex Bonomelli •Site design: Ilsa BrinkBut, for Safiya Sinclair, who grew up in a strict Rastafari home, it means something very different. Sinclair is a professor of English and creative writing at Arizona State University and, her new memoir, "How to Say Babylon," documents her childhood as a Rastafari girl and why she left it behind as a teenager. It’s been met with critical ...Doubt is a storming bull, crashing through. Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. Her first full-length collection, Cannibal (University of Nebraska Press, 2016), won a Whiting Writers’ Award, the Addison M. Metcalf Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, the...Safiya Sinclair. Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the poetry collection Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers' Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters' Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry.Cannibal was selected as one of the American Library … Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the poetry collection Cannibal , winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry. Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the poetry collection Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry. ...by Safiya Sinclair “Mermaid” Caribbean thyme is ten times stronger than the English variety—just ask Miss Queenie and her royal navy, who couldn’t yank a Jamaican weed from her rose-garden that didn’t grow back thick, tenfold, and blackened with the furor of a violated man.SAFIYA SINCLAIR was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the memoir How to Say Babylon, forthcoming from Simon & Schuster in October 2023. She is also the author of the poetry collection Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award, the OCM …Books. Myriam Gurba took down ‘American Dirt.’. It might be the least interesting thing about her. Aug. 28, 2023. But for all her father’s righteous …Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the poetry collection Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry. Cannibal was selected as one of ... Janet Silver. Aevitas Creative Management. 545 Boylston Street, 11th Floor. Boston, MA 02116. www.aevitascreative.com. 617-262-2400. For all queries related to the translation and media/film rights for How to Say Babylo n and Cannibal, please contact Janet Silver at www.aevitascreative.com. Safiya Sinclair is a Jamaican poet and associate professor of creative writing at Arizona State University. Her debut collection, Cannibal, won several prizes and was a finalist for the PEN Open Book …Oct 18, 2023 · Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the memoir How to Say Babylon, out from Simon & Schuster in October 2023. Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the memoir How to Say Babylon, forthcoming from Simon & Schuster/37 Ink in October 2023.Her debut poetry collection, Cannibal, was the winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas …Safiya Sinclair. Safiya Sinclair’s first collection, Cannibal, won the 2015 Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry and a 2016 Whiting Award. Her poems have appeared in Poetry, the Kenyon Review, the Nation and elsewhere. She is currently a PhD candidate in literature and creative writing at the University of Southern California.Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the memoir How to Say Babylon, forthcoming from Simon & Schuster. She is al...By Safiya Sinclair. Doubt is a storming bull, crashing through. the blue-wide windows of myself. Here in the heart. of my heart where it never stops raining, I am an outsider looking in. But in ...Oct 12, 2023 · How to Say Babylon: A Jamaican Memoir by Safiya Sinclair is published by 4th Estate (£16.99). To support the Guardian and Observer order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply. October 3, 2023 at 10:30 a.m. EDT. Author Safiya Sinclair. (Beowulf Sheehan) 7 min. Born in a seaside Jamaican village near Montego Bay, Safiya Sinclair grew up in a strict Rastafarian family on ...Aug 28, 2023 · How to Say Babylon: A Memoir. By Safiya Sinclair. 37 Ink: 352 pages, $29. If you buy books linked on our site, The Times may earn a commission from Bookshop.org, whose fees support independent ... Personal History. Revisiting My Rastafari Childhood. Babylon was everything forbidden, and looming all around us—and my father tried to protect us …Doubt is a storming bull, crashing through. Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. Her first full-length collection, Cannibal (University of Nebraska Press, 2016), won a Whiting Writers’ Award, the Addison M. Metcalf Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, the...The rhythms of the Caribbean are never far off, nor are her sweltering motherland’s abundant flora, fauna and ghosts. Born in Montego Bay, Jamaica, and raised in a strict Rastafarian family, she started to write poetry as a survival strategy; any writer who does not bear a deep wound or hurt would be better off in another profession, she asserts.Poetry by Safiya Sinclair: “Nameless, I haunt for god and love / in extinct places, curve myself inside desire’s eye and drink.”A courageous memoir of breaking free from a father’s oppression – and how poetry can be a salve against chaosSafiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, tthe OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry.Cannibal was a finalist for the PEN Center USA Literary Award, as well as being longlisted for the PEN Open Book Award and the …Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the recipient of a Whiting Writers' Award, the Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation, and a Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center Fellowship.Safiya Sinclair’s mother and father grew up as lost souls in Jamaica, dealing with mistreatment, abuse and abandonment – then they found Rastafarianism and each other. This could have been a ...Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry. Cannibal was selected as one of the American Library ...Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry.. Sinclair’s other honors include a Pushcart Prize and Fellowships from the Poetry …Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. Her first full-length collection, Cannibal (University of Nebraska Press, 2016), won a Whiting Writers’ Award, the Addison M. Metcalf Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, the...Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica.She is the author of Cannibal (University of Nebraska Press, 2016), winner of the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry, the Addison M. Metcalf Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature in Poetry, and selected as an American Library Association Notable …Oct 3, 2023 · Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the memoir, How to Say Babylon, forthcoming in October 2023 from Simon and Schuster. She is also the author of Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for ... Oct 4, 2023 · Poet Safiya Sinclair reflects on her Rastafari roots and how she cut herself free Sinclair grew up in a devout Rasta family in Jamaica where women were subservient. When she cut her dreadlocks at ... Poet Safiya Sinclair reflects on her Rastafari roots and how she cut herself free Sinclair grew up in a devout Rasta family in Jamaica where women were subservient. When she cut her dreadlocks at ...By Safiya Sinclair. Doubt is a storming bull, crashing through. the blue-wide windows of myself. Here in the heart. of my heart where it never stops raining, I am an outsider looking in. But in ...Safiya Sinclair is an award winning poet, a woman who has lived many lives but who was forged first and foremost in her native Jamaica as the oldest child in a Rastafarian family. I admit to ignorance of this culture, of the extreme patriarchy at its heart, explicitly espousing the double standard. Sinclair credits …Jun 21, 2021 · Safiya Sinclair, associate professor Sinclair joins ASU from Brown University’s Department of Literary Arts, where she served as a postdoctoral research associate. She was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica, and is the author of “ Cannibal ,” a collection of poems that explore her Jamaican childhood and history, race relations in ... Oct 7, 2023 · A ward-winning poet Safiya Sinclair, 39, teaches creative writing at Arizona State University, but she was raised in a strict Rastafari home in Jamaica, where her reggae musician father used faith ... Oct 3, 2017 · The PEN Ten with Safiya Sinclair. October 3, 2017. Photo by Willy Somma. The PEN Ten is PEN America’s weekly interview series. This week, we interviewed Jamaican poet Safiya Sinclair, author of Cannibal, which won the 2015 Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry and a 2016 Whiting Writers’ Award. 1. Safiya Sinclair; Search All Winners; Keynotes Adam Johnson; Alfred Kazin; Andrew Solomon; Barry Lopez 2008; Derek Walcott 1991; Edna O'Brien 2004; Elizabeth Alexander 2016; Elizabeth Hardwick 1989; Eudora Welty; Frances FitzGerald 1995; Frank Conroy; Frederick Buechner; Galway Kinnell; Grace Paley 2005; John …Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the poetry collection Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry.Cannibal was selected as one of the American Library …Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the recipient of a Whiting Writers' Award, the Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation, and a Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center Fellowship.Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the poetry collection Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry. ...Safiya Sinclair stopped by the Today show to discuss her memoir, How To Say Babylon. Sinclair’s book, published earlier this month by Simon & Schuster, tells the story of her experience growing up in Jamaica as the daughter of a strict Rastafarian father. The book was a finalist for the 2023 Kirkus Prize, with a …Growing up in a strict Rastafari household, Jamaican poet and writer Safiya Sinclair’s dad imposed strict rules on her and her siblings. They were forced to wear their hair in dreadlocks, follow ...as my hair; that stranger we’ve. long stopped searching for. But if somehow our half-sunken. hearts could answer, I would cup. my mouth in warm bowls. over the earth, and kiss the wet dirt. of home, taste Bogue-mud. and one long orange …Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of Cannibal, winner of the 2015 Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry (University of Nebraska Press, 2016), and the chapbook Catacombs (Argos Books, 2011). She is the recipient of a 2016 Whiting Writers’ Award, a Ruth Lilly and …Update, March 22, 2024: “How to Say Babylon” by Associate Professor of English Safiya Sinclair has won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Autobiography. The awards are, according to the New York Times, “among the most prestigious literary prizes in the United States. Unlike other major awards, the recipients are chosen by book …over the earth, and kiss the wet dirt. of home, taste Bogue-mud. and one long orange peel for skin. I’d open my ear for sugar cane. and long stalks of gungo peas. to climb in. I’d swim the sea. still lapsing in a soldered frame, the sea that again and again.Nov 2, 2020 · Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the forthcoming memoir How to Say Babylon.She is also the author of the poetry collection Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, the Phillis Wheatley Book Award, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry. Safiya Sinclair’s mother and father grew up as lost souls in Jamaica, dealing with mistreatment, abuse and abandonment – then they found Rastafarianism and each other. This could have been a ...Safiya Sinclair is the author of the critically acclaimed memoir, How to Say Babylon (Simon & Schuster, 2023), which the New York Times Book Review, in a front page review, called “scorching,” and Publisher’s Weekly, in a starred review, called a “tour de force.” The memoir is also a Jenna Today Show Book Club Pick.Poet Safiya Sinclair reflects on her Rastafari roots and how she cut herself free Sinclair grew up in a devout Rasta family in Jamaica where women were subservient. When she cut her dreadlocks at ...How to Say Babylon: A Jamaican Memoir by Safiya Sinclair is published by 4th Estate (£16.99). To support the Guardian and Observer order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.By Safiya Sinclair. November 2, 2023 7:00 AM EDT. Sinclair is the author of How To Say Babylon: A Memoir. R ecently, while shuffling through a …Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the recipient of a Whiting Writers' Award, the Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation, and a Provincetown Fine …Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the recipient of a Whiting Writers' Award, the Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation, and a Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center Fellowship.May 17, 2017 · Whiting Award winning poet Safiya Sinclair reads from and talks about her collection CANNIBAL.For more about the Whiting Awards, visit www.whiting.org/awards Safiya Sinclair’s How to Say Babylon is a memoir that has been called “lushly observed and keenly reflective” by the Washington Post and very warmly reviewed elsewhere. It tracks the author ...December 1, 2023 11:40 AM. Poet Safiya Sinclair reflects on her strict Rastafari upbringing and how she eventually broke free in her new memoir, "How to Say Babylon." To the strict Rastafari ... Selected Online Publications. “ Gospel of the Misunderstood ,” at The New Yorker. “ Hymen Elegy ,” at Granta. “ In Memoriam ,” 92Y New Colossus Project. “ A Bell, Still Unrung ,” at The Academy of American Poets, Poem-a-Day. “ One Hundred Amazing Facts About the Negro, with Complete Proof, II ” at the Kenyon Review. Safiya Sinclair is an award winning poet, a woman who has lived many lives but who was forged first and foremost in her native Jamaica as the oldest child in a Rastafarian family. I admit to ignorance of this culture, of the extreme patriarchy at its heart, explicitly espousing the double standard. Sinclair credits her father's artistic side ...Sep 28, 2023 · By Safiya Sinclair. (Simon & Schuster; 352 pages; $28.99) Yet, despite the near-constant threat of her father’s fury and his telling her she was “worthless,” Sinclair found a source of strength that would soon become her path to freedom: words: “In the chaos of our rented house, under a borrowed moon, I discovered that a poem was order. Oct 7, 2023 · A ward-winning poet Safiya Sinclair, 39, teaches creative writing at Arizona State University, but she was raised in a strict Rastafari home in Jamaica, where her reggae musician father used faith ... Safiya Sinclair is an award winning poet, a woman who has lived many lives but who was forged first and foremost in her native Jamaica as the oldest child in a Rastafarian family. I admit to ignorance of this culture, of the extreme patriarchy at its heart, explicitly espousing the double standard. Sinclair credits her father's artistic side ...Oct 12, 2023 · How to Say Babylon: A Jamaican Memoir by Safiya Sinclair is published by 4th Estate (£16.99). To support the Guardian and Observer order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply. Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the memoir, How to Say Babylon, forthcoming in October 2023 from Simon and Schuster. She is also the author of Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, …Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the poetry collection Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, and the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry.Cannibal was selected as one of the American Library …Safiya Sinclair has published poems in the Caribbean publications The Jamaica Observer Literary Arts Magazine, Bearing Witness 2003: A Collection of the Year’s Best Fiction and Poetry and the international anthology Kunapipi: A Journal of Post-Colonial Literature. Sinclair, a graduate of Bennington College, …Provoking and thrilling, Safiya Sinclair’s debut collection heralds the arrival of a vital lyrical voice. The poems in Cannibal beautifully evoke Safiya’s childhood in Jamaica while exploring themes of history, race relations, womanhood and otherness. Here Safiya speaks to The Bookseller’s Caroline Sanderson about her experience of growing up as a …Whiting Award winning poet Safiya Sinclair reads from and talks about her collection CANNIBAL.For more about the Whiting Awards, visit www.whiting.org/awardsSafiya Sinclair. September 2023 ‘My father believed the sanctity of my soul was at stake’: Safiya Sinclair on leaving her Rastafari childhood behind.Throughout her childhood, Safiya Sinclair’s father, a volatile reggae musician and militant adherent to a strict sect of Rastafari, became obsessed with her purity, in particular, with the threat of what Rastas call Babylon, the immoral and corrupting influences of the Western world outside their home. He worried that womanhood would make ...In this personal essay, Safiya Sinclair explores how she let go of her Rastafarian roots and found herself. November 2, 2023. Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the memoir How to Say Babylon , forthcoming from Simon & Schuster/37 Ink in October 2023. Her debut poetry collection, Cannibal , was the winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, the OCM Bocas ... Safiya Sinclair is a Jamaican poet and memoirist who has won several awards and honors for her work. Learn more about her life, books, and achievements on her …Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of Cannibal (University of Nebraska Press, 2016), winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the Addison M. Metcalf Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Poetry, the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in …How to Say Babylon: A Jamaican Memoir by Safiya Sinclair is published by 4th Estate (£16.99). To support the Guardian and Observer order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.It’s not unusual for an autobiography to chart a person’s passage from rags to riches, ignorance to enlightenment, or bondage to freedom. It is unusual to find one as powerful and disturbing as Safiya Sinclair’s debut memoir, “How to Say Babylon,” which has already drawn comparisons to Tara Westover’s “Educated” and Mary Karr’s “The Liars’ Club.”Audio. Safiya Sinclair vs. The Sea. November 7, 2023. 00:00. 00:00. In today’s episode, Brittany and Ajanae have the pleasure of interviewing Safiya Sinclair. Join them as they discuss the craft of switching to memoir, maintaining self-confidence while navigating academia, what their teenage selves would think of them, and the influence ...Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the memoir, How to Say Babylon, forthcoming in October 2023 from Simon and Schuster. She is also the author of Cannibal, winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Metcalf Award in Literature, …'Safiya Sinclair bursts onto the shelves with this richly powerful debut collection' – Scotsman Colliding with and confronting Shakespeare's The Tempest and postcolonial identity, the poems in Safiya Sinclair's Cannibal beautifully evoke the poet's Jamaican childhood and reach beyond to explore history, race relations in America, …
as my hair; that stranger we’ve. long stopped searching for. But if somehow our half-sunken. hearts could answer, I would cup. my mouth in warm bowls. over the earth, and kiss the wet dirt. of home, taste Bogue-mud. and one long orange peel for skin. I’d open my ear for sugar cane. . Air force lacrosse
Safiya Sinclair is a Jamaican poet and memoirist who has won several awards and honors for her work. Learn more about her life, books, and achievements on her …BENNINGTON — Poet and memoirist Safiya Sinclair ’10 will address the class of 2024 at Commencement at Bennington College on June 1. “Returning to Bennington as this year’s commencement speaker truly ranks as one of my proudest moments yet,” said Sinclair in a press release. “It’s no exaggeration to say that Bennington College ...Safiya Sinclair knows just how to make a reader feel the intensity of every word on the page. Her debut poetry collection and winner of the 2016 Whiting Award and OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, Cannibal , was vicious in its exploration of the origins of the word “cannibal” and the realities of living in a …Review by Rachel Hoge. Safiya Sinclair's memoir should be savored like the final sip of an expensive wine—with deference, realizing that a story of this magnitude comes along all too infrequently. With unparalleled lyricism and a command of language only a poet could possess, How to Say Babylon: A Memoir recounts Safiya Sinclair’s life as a ...Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. She is the author of the memoir How to Say Babylon , winner of the National Book Critics Circle … Safiya Sinclair was born and raised in Montego Bay, Jamaica. Her first full-length collection, Cannibal (University of Nebraska Press, 2016), won a Whiting Writers’ Award, the Addison M. Metcalf Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, the... Book Reviews. 'How to Say Babylon' centers on resisting patriarchy and colonialization. October 11, 20232:08 PM ET. By. Keishel Williams. 37 Ink. As …Join Aspen Words at TACAW for Winter Words with memoirist and award-winning poet Safiya Sinclair, as she discusses her new book, “How to Say Babylon.” This Read with Jenna TODAY show book club pick examines the author’s rigid Rastafarian upbringing and her efforts to break free from the patriarchal structure which defined her youth ...How does Safiya Sinclair's writing style and voice evolve throughout the memoir? 3. What are some of the challenges and obstacles that Safiya faces as she tries to break free from her father's repressive control? 4. What was your understanding of Rastafarian culture and religion before reading HOW TO SAY BABYLON? After?Safiya Sinclair is an award winning poet, a woman who has lived many lives but who was forged first and foremost in her native Jamaica as the oldest child in a Rastafarian family. I admit to ignorance of this culture, of the extreme patriarchy at its heart, explicitly espousing the double standard. Sinclair credits her father's artistic side ... Safiya writes about the importance of Lucille Clifton’s self-affirming poem “won’t you celebrate with me” for the Academy of American Poets’ February feature, “12 Poems to Read for Black History Month.”. A profile and interview with Safiya in Poets & Writers, as one of the top ten debut poets of 2016. Safiya Sinclair is an associate professor at Arizona State University. Poet Safiya Sinclair grew up in Montego Bay, Jamaica, in a devout Rastafari family. Her father, a reggae singer, ruled the ....