2022 Keynote Speaker

Judy Halebsky is the author of three poetry collections—Sky=Empty, Tree Line, and Spring and a Thousand Years (Unabridged)—and the chapbook Space/Gap/Interval/Distance. Originally from Halifax, Nova Scotia, she graduated from Mount Allison University in New Brunswick, Canada. She holds an M.F.A. in English & Creative Writing from Mills College and a Ph.D. in Performance Studies from the University of California, Davis. On fellowships from the Japanese Ministry of Culture, she spent five years living in Japan, where she trained in Butoh dance and Noh theatre. Her research explores cultural translation, haiku, and storytelling. Currently, she is co-translating a volume of post-Fukushima ecopoetry by Wago Ryoichi. Her essay “Translations and Migrations of the Poetic Diary” will be included in the forthcoming Global Haiku Reader from Routledge. Her honors include fellowships from MacDowell, Millay, the Vermont Studio Center as well as the New Issues Poetry Prize and a Graves Award for Outstanding Teaching in the Humanities. This spring, she will be the poetry judge for the Marin Poetry Center’s high school poetry contest. At Dominican, she teaches creative writing, live storytelling, literature and effective communication.