About
“As a storyteller, my vision is to create work that centres and speaks to Brown, Black, Muslim and ethnically diverse women, femmes, non-binary people and beyond with writings that include cultural references without this necessarily needing to be the focus. When you read or listen to my work, my hope is that you’re transported to a place of magical, hopeful, loving, honest, and ultimately healing stories that don’t shy from reality.”
Brwn Girl in the Ring™ is a storyteller, facilitator and historian through poetry, spoken word, fiction writing and theatre, based in the West Midlands.
Influenced by her experience as a British Muslim of Malawian Indian heritage, her community began migrating from India to Malawi in the 1890s, eventually settling in the UK in the early 70s.
Her love for writing and playful wordplay includes themes of anti-colonial healing, history, living with anxiety, spirituality, female pleasure, nature, love and mysticism. More recently, she’s been exploring mixing her poetry with beats and soundscapes.
She’s performed locally, nationally and internationally, collaborated with a variety of artists of various art forms and continues to deliver poetry workshops.
Find out more about where she’s been featured.
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As a Creative
After receiving mentoring support from JJ Bola, Bridget Hart and Shagufta K Iqbal, she’s currently editing her debut poetry collection. She's also been awarded Arts Council England Project Grant funding for her children’s storytelling EP and printed book.
She was previously awarded Arts Council England Developing your Creative Practice Funding. Using this support, she travelled to Malawi to explore her family history, alongside testing and exploring audio-recording chapters of her children’s book with hip hop beats and nature sounds and took time to R&D the script for her first theatre production. As a creative collaborator, she regularly works with artists of different genres.
Follow her creative journey on Instagram.
As an Enabler
In addition to her creative practice, Brwn Girl in the Ring™ has worked and volunteered in the arts, culture and tourism sector since the early 2000s - she’s a programme enabler and facilitator and deeply believes in cultivating compassion leadership, work focussed on driving equitable change and making space for people to be their authentic selves.
She’s part of the team behind the More than a Moment pledge; is an alumni of Dr Rosales Meza’s Decolonial healing collective and graduate of the Village Auntie’s Foundational Womanhood rites of passage programme. She’s formerly board member for the Crown Prosecution Service scrutiny panel (East Midlands) for hate crime and violence against women and girls and Projects Director for Transforming Narratives, an four year programme connecting artists and organisations between Birmingham, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
She recently facilitated a South Asian creative workforce Radical Listening session, covering the Britain’s colonial history in India and current context for the South Asian creative workforce in the West Midlands and discussed tangible action on driving equitable change. Watch the discussion.
She loves travel and has a background in martial arts, having trained in Taekwondo and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and spent 2 months in a martial arts school in China. Getting lost in music, sketching, nature and burning agar bati are her favourite magical spaces.
Developing your Creative Practice funding supported by Arts Council England
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