Nikki Giovanni

Notable people · Literature · Poetry

Nikki Giovanni

Black Arts Movement poet of 'Nikki-Rosa' and Black Judgement who grew up in Lincoln Heights outside Cincinnati, organized the city's first Black arts festival, and taught at Ohio State and Mount St. Joseph.

Born June 7, 1943, Knoxville, TN
Died December 9, 2024, Blacksburg, VA

Unknown author / CC BY 2.5 · Wikimedia Commons

At a glance

Born: June 7, 1943, Knoxville, TN source
Died: December 9, 2024, Blacksburg, VA source
Also known as: Nikki Giovanni, Yolanda Cornelia Giovanni, Poet of the Black Revolution
Education: Fisk University, Nashville, TN, 1960-67, history, with honors
: University of Pennsylvania School of Social Work, Philadelphia, PA, brief study
: Columbia University School of the Arts, New York, MFA study
Known as: Literature, Poetry

Life story

Nikki Giovanni was born in Knoxville, Tennessee, in 1943. The family moved to Lincoln Heights, Ohio, near Cincinnati, when she was four.

In 1958 she went back to Knoxville to live with her grandparents. She entered Fisk University in 1960, left for a time, and returned in 1964, graduating with honors in history in 1967.

Her first book, Black Feeling, Black Talk, came out in 1968. She taught at Rutgers' Livingston College from 1969 and at Virginia Tech from 1987 to 2022.

Lincoln Heights has a state historical marker for her. She died in Blacksburg, Virginia, in 2024.

Ohio ties

Lincoln Heights (c. 1947-1958)
childhood home from age four; her parents worked at Glenview School Hamilton County · source
Cincinnati (1967)
organized the city's first Black arts festival Hamilton County · source
Columbus, Ohio State University (1984-1985)
visiting professor of English Franklin County · source
Delhi Township, College of Mount St. Joseph (now Mount St. Joseph University) (1985-1987)
professor of creative writing; honorary doctorate 1985 Hamilton County · source

Timeline

1943 Born Yolande Cornelia Giovanni Jr. in Knoxville, Tennessee, on 7 June. source
1947 Aged four, moved with her family to Ohio, where they settled in the Black community of Lincoln Heights outside Cincinnati. source
1958 Went back to Knoxville to live with her grandparents and attend Austin High School. source
1960 Entered Fisk University in Nashville as an early entrant, without finishing high school, and was soon expelled after a clash with the dean of women. source
1967 Graduated from Fisk with honors in history and organized Cincinnati's first Black arts festival. source
1968 Published Black Feeling Black Talk with borrowed money and used its earnings to self-publish Black Judgement, which includes 'Nikki-Rosa'. source
1970 Founded the publishing company NikTom and edited Night Comes Softly, an anthology of Black women poets. source
1971 Published her first children's book of poems, Spin a Soft Black Song. source
1973 Gemini, her autobiographical prose, was a National Book Award finalist; her 30th-birthday celebration filled a 3,000-seat hall at Lincoln Center. source
1983 Named Woman of the Year by the Cincinnati chapter of the YWCA. source
1984 Became visiting professor of English at Ohio State University for 1984-1985. source
1985 Became professor of creative writing at the College of Mount St. Joseph on the Ohio (to 1987), received its honorary doctorate, and was elected to the Ohio Women's Hall of Fame. source
1987 Joined the faculty of Virginia Tech, where she taught until 2022. source
1988 Received the Ohioana Book Award. source
1999 Voted Ohio's favourite author of poetry in an Ohioana Library Association ballot of Ohioans. source
2007 Closed the Virginia Tech memorial convocation on 17 April with the chant poem 'We are Virginia Tech'. source
2008 Received a certificate of recognition from the Hamilton County committee of the Ohioana Library Association. source
2022 Retired from Virginia Tech and received the Poetry Foundation's Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. source
2023 The documentary Going to Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project won the Grand Jury Prize for documentary at Sundance. source
2024 Died on 9 December in Blacksburg, Virginia, aged 81, of complications of the lung cancer she had written about publicly since the 1990s. source

What Nikki is known for

Ohio Women's Hall of Fame, 1985
Historical marker in Lincoln Heights
Black Feeling, Black Talk (1968)
Love Poems (1997)
Rosa (2005, Caldecott Honor)
Bicycles: Love Poems (2009)

Stories

'Nikki-Rosa'

Giovanni's best-known poem, 'Nikki-Rosa', from Black Judgement (1968), looks back on a childhood in a close Black family in the Cincinnati area. It is both a memory of being poor and a warning to outsiders, including future biographers, not to tell her story for her: the holiday gatherings and the big tub she bathed in mattered more than the poverty. It became her most anthologized work, and her AP obituary writers noted it was aimed at people like them.

Source

Cincinnati's first Black arts festival

In 1967, the year she graduated from Fisk after being expelled and readmitted, Giovanni came back to Cincinnati and organized the city's first Black arts festival. The Voice of Black Cincinnati's 'First 28' series, which honours Black Cincinnatians who were first in their fields, counts her for it. The next year she borrowed money to print Black Feeling Black Talk, sold it well enough to self-publish Black Judgement, and was on her way to The Tonight Show.

Source

Coming home to teach

After 15 years in New York and on the national lecture circuit, Giovanni came back to Ohio in the mid-1980s. She was visiting professor of English at Ohio State in 1984-1985 and then professor of creative writing at the College of Mount St. Joseph on the Ohio, west of Cincinnati, from 1985 to 1987, which gave her an honorary doctorate. In 1985 she was elected to the Ohio Women's Hall of Fame. In 1987 Virginia Tech hired her, and she stayed there for 35 years.

Source

Honors and things named for them

Seven NAACP Image Awards
Langston Hughes Medal (1996)
Oprah Winfrey Living Legend (2005)
27 honorary degrees
Ohio Women's Hall of Fame (1985)
State historical marker, Lincoln Heights, Ohio

Named for Nikki Giovanni

Micronycteris giovanniae, a South American bat species named for her in 2007 source

Family

son: Thomas Watson Giovanni

Sites to know

Homes, graves, markers, museums and monuments; the numbered ones are on the map.

1 Mount St. Joseph University (College of Mount St. Joseph), where she taught 1985-1987
Delhi Township Hamilton County · source

Places in Ohio to see

Nikki Giovanni historical marker (marker)
Lincoln Heights, Hamilton County ZIP 45215 (approximate) · Lincoln Heights · Hamilton County · official page

Ohio places

Where Nikki Giovanni was born, lived, worked and is remembered, with the ZIP code, town and county pages for each.

Lived: Lincoln Heights, Hamilton County ZIP 45215 · Lincoln Heights · Hamilton County
Lived: Wyoming, Hamilton County ZIP 45215 · Wyoming · Hamilton County

Myths and corrections

Things often said about Nikki Giovanni, and what the record shows.

Often said Her younger sister gave her the name 'Nikki' (Ohio Center for the Book).

The record The AP obituary and Wikipedia say it was her older sister, Gary. source

Documents

Primary records: patents, letters, court and government files, nominations and old county histories, each at the archive that holds it.

Nikki Giovanni curriculum vitae, April 2006 (employment, honors, Ohio appearances, bibliography) 2006, nikki-giovanni.com
Nikki Giovanni, Ohio Center for the Book author entry (with awards chronology) 2018, Ohio Center for the Book, Cleveland Public Library
AP obituary as run by WCPO Cincinnati: 'Nikki Giovanni, poet and literary celebrity from Lincoln Heights, has died at 81' 2024, WCPO / Associated Press

Pictures

Free to use with the credit shown. Select a picture for the original and its license.

Public domain
MOUNTAIN HOME AIR FORCE BASE, Idaho -- Nikki Giovanni, world-renowned poet, writer, commentator, activist and ...
Public domain
MOUNTAIN HOME AIR FORCE BASE, Idaho -- Nikki Giovanni, world-renowned poet, writer, commentator, activist and ...
Public domain
I always like summer best you can eat fresh corn rrom daddy's garden and okra and greens and cabbage and lots ...
takomabibelot / CC BY 2.0
Nikki Giovanni after a show with Javon Jackson at the Hyde Park Union Church during the 2023 Hyde Park Jazz Fe...
Goose Green Photography / CC BY 4.0
Nikki Giovanni. Pictures from the Arkansas Literacy Festival's Martini Reception with the Authors. The event w...
David Quinn / CC BY 2.0
Governor Moore and First Lady Dawn Moore Celebrate the Renaming of The Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum by Pat ...
Maryland GovPics / CC BY 2.0
Governor Moore and First Lady Dawn Moore Celebrate the Renaming of The Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum by Pat ...
Maryland GovPics / CC BY 2.0
Governor Moore and First Lady Dawn Moore Celebrate the Renaming of The Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum by Pat ...
Maryland GovPics / CC BY 2.0
Governor Moore and First Lady Dawn Moore Celebrate the Renaming of The Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum by Pat ...
Maryland GovPics / CC BY 2.0
Governor Moore and First Lady Dawn Moore Celebrate the Renaming of The Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum by Pat ...
Maryland GovPics / CC BY 2.0
Governor Moore and First Lady Dawn Moore Celebrate the Renaming of The Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum by Pat ...
Maryland GovPics / CC BY 2.0