Writers' Program Progress Party Reading

Join us for readings from works-in-progress by Writers' Program instructor Sehba Sarwar and students Damien Belliveau, Anaquad Cobe, and James Warren.

2 pm Reading begins

3 pm Reception begins

Sehba Sarwar creates essays, stories, poems, and art that tackle displacement, migration, and women’s issues. Her writings have appeared in publications including New York Times Sunday Magazine, Creative Time Reports, Asia: Magazine of Asian Literature and elsewhere. Her short stories have been anthologized by Feminist Press, Akashic Books, and Harper Collins India, while the second edition of her novel, Black Wings, was released in 2019 (Veliz Books). Her papers are archived at the University of Houston’s library; she served as artist-in-residence at the university’s Mitchell Center for Arts for several years. While based in Houston, Sarwar also founded and ran a social justice arts organization (2000-2017) that was the recipient of many NEA awards. Through the organization, Sarwar initiated long-term projects and publications. Born and raised in Karachi, Pakistan in a home filled with artists and activists, Sarwar resides in Los Angeles where she writes, teaches, and creates art.

Damien Belliveau is a native of the San Francisco Bay Area and has spent over a decade telling stories in the world of reality television as an editor and director at Bunim-Murray Productions. The founder of The PartBlack Project, a Q&A photography series documenting ethnically-mixed people like himself, Damien is working on his first memoir, tentatively entitled HELLA. He is a 2020 PEN America Emerging Voices Fellow, and currently taking his first poetry class through UCLA Extension.

Anaquad Cobe is an Ojibwe Indian. His reservation is Lac Du Flambeau Indian Reservation in Wisconsin. He grew up in Chicago, Illinois and went to college at the University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, where he majored in Anthropology and Indian Studies. He has lived and traveled to many parts of the world for his business. From 1990-1993 Anaquad shot on the Pro Tour for Professional Billiards. He was trained as an actor and completed Howard Fines curriculum at Howard Fine School of Acting in Hollywood. Anaquad is an Activist for his people. He has helped lobby bills through Congress, and has been instrumental in repatriating lands taken from Indigenous peoples and tribes. Currently he has an office on Wilshire in Westwood and is an active Private Investigator and Process Server.

James Warren is an aspiring novelist and screenwriter. He has completed and greatly enjoyed UCLA extension classes for both. Last year, in Novel I, he began writing Dustman (a working title), about a mohawked, time-traveling, mercenary who wants nothing more than a particular Motörhead b-side. James lives and works in Los Angeles with his wife Samantha. Neither has, to date, time-traveled.