SpokenHeard with Hodari B. Davis and Susan Dobbe Chase

Hodari Bayano Davis is the National Program Director of “Youth Speaks Inc.”(youthspeaks.org), Executive Producer of “Brave New Voices International Youth Poetry Slam Festival" (bravenewvoices.org) twice featured on HBO, and Program Architect and Producer of the “Life is Living” Campaign (lifeisliving.org), a traveling Eco Hip Hop Festival rooted in the principle of "Life as Primary Text".  Davis currently serves as a Senior Producer on a partnership blending youth spoken word and Investigative Journalism called the Off Page Project. Davis is also the Creative Director of The Bigger Picture Project (thebiggerpicture.org) aimed at using poetry and testimony to raise awareness about the institutional and environmental factors contributing to Type II Diabetes. As an urban educator and activist for more than 20 years, he began his career as a teacher in the country’s first high school African American Studies department at Berkeley High School.  He holds advanced degrees from UC Berkeley and San Francisco State University.  As an artist and poet, he currently serves as the Artistic Director of “Young Gifted And Black” (YouTube.com/tvygb), a youth arts company that performs historic and contemporary African American poetry and rap internationally and throughout the Bay Area.