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Long Bio
Adriana E. Ramírez is a Mexican-Colombian writer, critic, and poet based in Pittsburgh.
She’s the winner of the 2015 PEN/Fusion Emerging Writer’s Prize, which is given to recognize a promising writer under age 35 for an unpublished work of nonfiction that addresses a global or multicultural issue, for her nonfiction novella, Dead Boys (Little A, 2016).
From 2016-2020, she served as “Critic At Large” for the Los Angeles Times‘ Book Section, where she wrote book reviews and essays on all things literary.
Her writing has appeared in The Atlantic, the Boston Globe, ESPN’s The Undefeated (now Andscape), People Magazine, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Literary Hub, Guernica/PENAmerica, Convolution, HEArt, Apogee, Nerve, and elsewhere.
Ramírez is a columnist, editor of InReview, and member of the editorial board of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
Ramírez’s column, editorial writing, and arts criticism work at the Post-Gazette has won prizes and recognition from the Society for Features Journalism, the Society for Professional Journalists Keystone Chapter, and the Press Club of Western Pennsylvania.
She is the author of two small-press poetry chapbooks—The Swallows (self-published in 2012—reissued by Blue Sketch Press in 2016) and Trusting in Imaginary Spaces (Tired Hearts Press, 2010). She served as the nonfiction editor of DISMANTLE (Thread Makes Blanket Press, 2014), an anthology celebrating the VONA/Voices workshop. With Jesse Welch, she co-edited In the Shadow of the Mic: Three Decades of Slam Poetry in Pittsburgh (Bridge & Tunnel Books, 2020).
Ramírez co-founded Aster(ix) Journal in 2013 with novelist Angie Cruz. Aster(ix) is a literary arts journal dedicated to social justice, as well as giving voice to the censored and the marginalized. In 2020, she founded the podcast Charla Cultural with Karla Lamb, produced by City of Asylum and Aster(ix) Journal.
Once a nationally ranked slam poet and poetry slam tournament director, she co-founded the Pittsburgh Poetry Collective (home of the Steel City Slam). After leaving the PPC in 2016, she founded the infamous Nasty Slam. Ramírez continues to perform on stages around the country. She was featured in the 2014 Legends of Poetry Slam Showcase and TEDxHouston, as well as the 2016 Three Rivers Arts Festival. In 2017, she performed as a featured storyteller for the Moth’s Mainstage show in Pittsburgh.
In 2017, she received the City of Asylum Pittsburgh Prize/PASSA PORTA Residency in Brussels, Belgium. In 2019, she was awarded the Carol R. Brown Creative Achievement Award for an Established Artist by the Pittsburgh Foundation and the Heinz Endowments. Two of her essays have been selected as “Notable” in the Best American Essays series.
Born in Mexico City, Ramírez grew up in McAllen, TX and is a graduate of both Rice University (B.A. English) and the University of Pittsburgh (MFA in Nonfiction Writing). She went on to teach at the University of Pittsburgh as a lecturer and visiting lecturer in the writing program for almost a decade. Ramírez has taught in the MFA low-residency programs at Carlow University and Chatham University.
She is VONA and National Hispanic Institute alum, a perpetually-disappointed fan of Mexican soccer, and a lover of large bodies of water. She once appeared on Jeopardy!
She lives in Pittsburgh with her husband, two children, and two adorable dogs that are probably fighting each other right now. She’s currently into vegetable gardening, planning bike rides that never happen, and collecting Funko Pop figurines. She’ll rarely say no to a taco. Or a margarita.
Her debut full-length nonfiction book, The Violence, is forthcoming from Scribner.
Short Bio
Adriana E. Ramírez is a Mexican-Colombian writer, critic, and performance poet based in Pittsburgh. She won the inaugural PEN/Fusion Emerging Writers Prize in 2015 for her novella-length work of nonfiction, Dead Boys (Little A, 2016). Her reviews, essays, and poems have also appeared in The Atlantic, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, ESPN’s The Undefeated, Los Angeles Review of Books, Guernica/PEN America, and Literary Hub among others. She occasionally reviews books for People Magazine. Once a nationally ranked slam poet, she founded the infamous Nasty Slam in Pittsburgh and continues to perform on stages around the country. She and novelist Angie Cruz founded Aster(ix) Journal, a literary journal giving voice to the censored and the marginalized. Her debut full-length work of nonfiction, The Violence, is forthcoming from Scribner.
Shorter Bio
Adriana E. Ramírez is an award-winning nonfiction writer, storyteller, critic, and performance poet based in Pittsburgh. More information on her can be found at aeramirez.com.
Shortest Bio
Adriana E. Ramírez is an award-winning writer based in Pittsburgh.
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