Penda Smith

Penda Smith is a creative writer, educator, and thinker living and breathing in New Orleans. Her work focuses on mother-and-daughter relationships, coming-of-age narratives, African diaspora studies, and slavery. Inspired by her Senegalese heritage, she raises questions about belonging, identity, consent, and pleasure within the afterlife of slavery. She has received support from the Cave Canem Foundation, Hedgebrook Writing Residency, Hurston/Wright Writers workshop, and you can find her work at Muzzle Magazine, Root Work Journal, and Obsidian Journal.  Aside from writing, she loves hot yoga, roller skating, and twerking her trauma out. She teaches at Loyola University and loves her cat, Prudence.