Deidra White, an MFA graduate student in the College of Arts and Sciences, wrote and performed a piece to help the University of Kentucky celebrate the completion of the Kentucky Can fundraising campaign. 

Please watch this video of her performance of the piece she wrote, with the support of her creative writing faculty in the College of Arts and Sciences, called “Here in Kentucky.” 

Her piece, together with footage edited by the UK video team, tells the story of what this university, including UK’s Markey Cancer Center, means to her, her family and her community. 

Deidra is a Lexington, Ky. native, a University of Kentucky MFA Candidate, and an aspiring Affrilachian Poet. She received the 2022 Farquhar Award for Poetry “Meihua,” the Patricia and William Stacy Endowed Fellowship for Distinguished Honors in English, the William Hugh Jansen Fiction Award in the Art of Storytelling/Folklore “Woodstock,” and the 2023 winner of the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Nonfiction Award for her contemporary piece “DUCK.” Her work engages the tradition of Affrilachian writing and explores the intricate dynamics of Black womanhood with an eye to connections of the past to present.