Kweli’s mission is to nurture emerging writers of color and writers identifying as women by creating opportunities for their voices to be recognized and valued. Founding editor Laura Pegram has guided Kweli since 2009, publishing a triannual online journal and investing in writers’ growth through workshops, fellowships, readings, an annual conference, and an international festival. Kweli, which means “truth” in Swahili, celebrates cultural kinship and the role of the literary imagination to envision a world where the narratives we tell reflect the full truth of history and blaze a path of new possibilities for the future.
Reading this journal is a revelation. Here are stories of deep, lived-in materiality. The abundant respect animating its editorial process means its writers, many of them women of color, do not have to justify their concerns and can simply dive into the pleasures of form and narrative. With its vibrant internationalism and the career- and craft-building opportunities it offers its writers, Kweli strives to publish a more generous, humane world into existence.