2021 Senior Reading

Marcelene "Marci" Delcampo is a Cuban-American poet earning a B.A. in Writing & Linguistics and Spanish. She developed a knack for writing poetry in seventh grade thanks to her English/Language Arts teacher, who she credits for many of her accomplishments, such as being announced the winner of the 2020 Brittany "Ally" Harbuck Award. While at GS, Marci was also an assistant poetry editor for the campus literary magazine, Miscellany: Magazine of the Arts and a co-emcee for the department's monthly Burning Swamp readings. You can often find Marci dreaming or frequently tweeting about pugs and other fun things at @marci_delcampo.

Artist's Statement: I'm usually the person that writes way more than they should, so I'll (attempt to) make this short 'n sweet. :-)

It's crazy to think that my four years in undergrad are basically over. I honestly can't even begin to thank the W&L department enough for the extraordinary opportunities, kindness, and support it has given me. As cliché as it is to say, it's through this department that I found who I am and who I was meant to be as a writer. I will forever be grateful for not only the department, but also each and every one of the professors and staff members who helped me on this journey.

I want to give a quick shout-out to Professor Christina Olson and Professor Amanda Hedrick for mentoring me and helping me stay on track to complete my chapbook/Honor Thesis. You rock, and I'm going to miss you both so much.

In no particular order, I'd also like to thank Professors Joanna Schreiber, Ben Drevlow, Christopher Garland, Russell Willerton, Jared Yates Sexton, Carol Jamison, Michael Pemberton, and Lisa Costello, as well as my incredible advisor, Megan Bowen. Each of you has had an impact on my life in one way or another, and I am so very thankful for each of you wonderful, amazing, and caring humans.

To my peers and fellow writers in the program (you know who you are), I love each of you dearly, and I owe you all so much thanks and gratitude for your time, discussion, workshopping, and encouragement these last four years. I wish you all the best on your future endeavors.

Thank you for everything; I wouldn't be here without you.

Destiny Geddis is a twenty-two year old writer originally from Brooklet with a love of mystery and urban fantasy. In the future Destiny plans to take a break from being a student, get some life experience, work on a novel, before eventually returning to that academic grind. Mostly, Destiny just wants to take a long, long nap.

Artist Statement: It’s been such a wild time during my four… five years at Georgia Southern? I remember starting it convinced I was going to be an English major, and yet here I am, swayed to the dark side by the many amazing Writing Professors who took the time to help me out. Thank you to Professor Sexton as well as Professor Williams for both leading me towards my decision to take this major. It’s a choice I don’t regret.

Carley is a first generation college graduate in her family. This past year she was nominated for two submissions in the AWP Intro Journals, and she was a finalist for the Brittany "Ally" Harbuck Award. After graduating, she plans to take a year off from school to work and comb through her writing samples before sending them off to graduate programs, where she plans to work towards her MFA in Creative Nonfiction. After that, she wants to teach writing at a university, preferably somewhere that has four distinct seasons.

Artistic Statement: I think my writing actually started as a way for me to escape reality. I would write these crazy and wild works of fiction, things that could never actually happen or be real (like time traveling pink elephants). But at some point it transitioned into me learning ways to learn about what it was that I was trying so hard to escape from, and to heal from them. I would say writers like Patricia Lockwood and Laurie Halse Anderson showed me that as writers we have a responsibility to tell the hard stories. Not necessarily our own (as Anderson’s work Speak is technically fiction), but a responsibility to put words to things that other people can’t.

Sedona Benjamin is a senior Writing and Linguistics Student at Georgia Southern University. Her work focuses on Technical and Professional Writing, but she also studies rhetorical theories and writes creatively in her spare time. After she graduates in December, she hopes to either begin her career as a Technical Writer or further her education by studying Civil Rights Law.

Artist Statement: It has been an incredible privilege to be a Writing and Linguistics Student here at Georgia Southern. I was blessed to have taken courses with some of the most intelligent, wonderful professors in the world. A few professors that I would like to specially thank are Dr. Joanna Schreiber, Dr. Lisa Costello, and Professor Christina Olson. Each of these professors has helped me to shape my goals for the future, and have pushed me to look deep inside my work to find what it truly means. Art is meant to be interpreted, either by the artist or other people. Pieces of writing that manifest discussion are how lives change. Writing screams expressions that cannot be produced in other ways.