Online Archive

With the guidance of Dr. Joanne V. Gabbin, students and faculty from 5 different disciplines came together at the JMU X-Labs, took the material from the Furious Flower 1994 conference, digitized by JMU Special Collections, and transformed it into a user friendly, online archive. Explore the history of America's first Black poetry center and check out the product of this awesome collaboration: furiousflower.org

Special Collections 

JMU’s Carrier Library Special Collections serves as the repository for the records of the Furious Flower Poetry Center. In addition to materials that document the origin and development of the center on JMU’s campus, the collection includes manuscripts, correspondence, photographs, and a rich audio visual archive of recordings of past conferences, poetry readings, and other Furious Flower events. 

Review the finding aid for the Furious Flower Poetry Center Records for a more complete description of the collection and its contents. Researchers may access the collection by visiting Special Collections on the second floor of Carrier Library. Contact Special Collections archivists and collection stewards at library-special@jmu.edu with questions.

The Library at Furious Flower Poetry Center

At Cardinal House, we collect books and media related to Black poetry, the arts, history, and culture. For a full listing of our holdings, visit ffpc.libib.com.

The Fight & The Fiddle

The Fight & The Fiddle was originally conceived as an online literary magazine by Elizabeth Hoover, the Assistant Director of the Furious Flower Poetry Center from 2014 to 2016. Under her direction, the publication featured interviews with Reginald Dwayne Betts, Ross Gay, Yona Harvey, Dawn Lundy Martin, Nadine Pinede, and Karenne Wood. It included a special series on Amiri Baraka and Jayne Cortez as architects of the Black Arts Movement. Access these early entries here.

Recent issues of The Fight & The Fiddle are available here.