British Black and Asian Poetry : Race, Aesthetics and Politics 1970-2023 - Omaar Hena

This book examines a wide sweep of prominent Black and Asian British poets, from Linton Kwesi Johnson and Jean 'Binta' Breeze through�David Dabydeen, Bernardine Evaristo, and Jason Allen-Paisant. Throughout, Omaar Hena demonstrates how�these poets engage with urgent crises surrounding race and social inequality�over the past fifty years, spanning policing and racial violence in the 1970s and 1980s, through poetry's cultural�recognition in the 1990s and 2000s by museums, the 2012 London Olympics, the publishing scene, and awards�and prizes, as well as continuing social realities of riots and uprisings. In dub poetry, dramatic monologues, ekphrasis, and�lyric, Hena argues that British Black and Asian poets perform racial politics in conditions of spiraling crisis. Engaged and insightful, this book argues that poetry�remains a vital art form in twenty-first-century global Britain.�This title is also available as open access on Cambridge Core.