Joshua Bennett, “one of the most impressive voices in poetry today” (Dissent), is the author of a major new work, We (The People of The United States) (2026), a book-length poem about America, past, present and future.

​

Bennett addresses an astonishing range of subjects, including The Beach Boys, Gwendolyn Brooks, the invention of the typewriter, Zora Neale Hurston, Sun Ra, life on Mars, Robert Frost, experimental physics, and The Jackson 5.

 

Booklist called it, “An essential addition to the American poetic canon.”

 

Bennett’s previous books of poetry, criticism and narrative nonfiction include Being Property Once Myself (2020), Owed (2020), The Study of Human Life (2022), and Spoken Word: A Cultural History (2023). He serves as professor of literature and Distinguished Chair of the Humanities at MIT.

 

Bennett earned his Ph.D. in English from Princeton University, and an M.A. in Theatre and Performance Studies from the University of Warwick, where he was a Marshall Scholar.

 

He has recited his original works at the Sundance Film Festival, the NAACP Image Awards, and President Obama’s Evening of Poetry and Music at the White House. He has also performed and taught creative writing workshops at hundreds of middle schools, high schools, colleges, and universities across the United States, as well as in the U.K. and South Africa.

​​

Cosponsored by the University at Albany's Great Dane Dialogue series in honor of America's 250th Celebration