Scope and Contents Poet and CETA Arts DC participant, Anne Becker reflects on her life and work with some of the most celebrated poets of the later half of the 20th century, including work with June Jordan, Dennis Brutus, Shirley Kaufman and Nobel prize winners Joseph Brodsky and Czeslaw Milosz. She also speaks about her seventeen years at Watershed Foundation, the work site for Anne Becker’s tenure as an Arts DC CETA participant, where she developed develop her own poetry, eventually becoming the poet...

Scope and Contents This collection consists of Beatrice Murphy Campbell’s biographical information; correspondence; photographs; documents related to her community involvement and service with organizations and government agencies; and speeches and testimonies. The collection is divided into eight series: 1. Biographical, 2. Correspondence, 3. Organizations, 4. Speeches and testimony, 5. Clippings and newsletters, 6. Awards, 7. Miscellaneous, and 8. Photographs. Series 3 is divided into four sub-series: 1....

Abstract Leslie Bumstead talks about moving around the world as a child, because of work of her father as a CIA agent. She reflects on finding confessional poetry as an outlet to deal with teenage angst and adolescent issues. She is later introduced to experimental poetry in D.C., building connections and re-imagining what poetry can look like. Leslie spends some time in El Salvador, recording oral histories of women guerilla fighters and doing other NGO work in the region. She meets her husband, a...

Abstract

Butler (she/they) narrates their experiences at Busboys and Poets, first as a child and later as a poet and employee. She explores the cultural role that Busboys has played in DC along with gentrification in the city and how it has impacted arts spaces. Butler describes their understanding of the responsibility that business owners have toward the communities that they serve, in particular DC’s local Black community.

Scope and Contents

ARTS DC: CETA and the Arts in the District of Columbia 1977 – 1982 collection contains five audio interviews of ARTS DC artists. The interviews were conducted by Jonetta Rose Barras in 2017. Transcript and indexes are included for all interviews.