Jessica’s upcoming and past events include readings, workshops, lectures, and more. Contact Jessica today for interview requests or other queries.
Upcoming Events
Find Jessica at AWP 2023 on Friday, March 10 at 8pm at Hugo House where she is co-hosting a literary event featuring former Hugo House fellows.
She will also be reading her own work on Saturday, March 11 at the “NW Modern” reading held at Pine Box on Melrose at 8pm.
Join Jessica and three other Native artists for a talk at Ucross Gallery on May 5.
Past Events
February 2023: Jessica and Lani Asunción gave an artist talk at Kala Art Gallery on Tuesday, February 22. More information here.
January 2023: Jessica and Dr. Rebecca Whittington talked about translation and text at the Chennai Book Festival.
January 2023: Loyola College in Chennai, India welcomed Jessica on a lecture about Indigeneity and poetics.
July 2022: Jessica gave a talk at the British Library Eccles Centre as part of the Summer Knowledge Series July 15 about her archival research on Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Christina Rossetti. She was joined by former BBC journalist Doreen Cunningham.
May 2022: Jessica lectured on the decolonization of poetics at Stella Maris College (Chennai, India).
April 2022: Jessica performed alongside guitarist Teiorhathe Esquivel at the Hugo House Literary Series on April 1.
March 2022: Jessica discussed public art during the Clark County [Nevada] Parks and Recreation Full Scope Series where the focus was “Women in Public Art.”
March 2022: Jessica was the featured poet at the March 9, 2022 Milwaukie [Oregon] poetry series.
March 2022: Jessica was at the HOCUS Neverland event.
February 2022: The “Me too: Voices of Survivors” virtual reading series included Jessica who shared work-in-progress from her manuscript sp[RED].
November 2021: Jessica read (virtually) as part of the Josephine County Library Author Talks series.
September 2021: Jessica presented at LitFUSE along with Airlie Press virtually. Check out the full schedule.
Jessica’s book The Last Exotic Petting Zoo was featured in the film Queen Bees. See how many times you can spot Ellen Burstyn with it … in the trailer, too!
August 2021: Jessica was in St. Petersburg, Florida as the poet in residence for Keep St. Pete Lit and read at the local opera house during her tenure.
April 2021: Jessica shared her research on the “wise Indian” trope via SEO analysis at the 48th Annual Symposium on the American Indian April 14.
April 2021: Jessica shared her doctoral research on March 4 at the virtual Louisiana State University CLPT-French Conference in a lecture “Eating Disorders in Early – Mid Twentieth Century Poetry.”
March 2021: Jessica and Airlie Press were featured at the (virtual!) AWP conference in March talking about the collective press model
January 2021: Jessica and her Benson High School students shared what the class has been working on during Jessica’s WITS (Writers in the Schools) Literary Arts residency.
January 2021: Jessica is part of the Fertile Ground Festival and you can catch her exhibit online on January 31
August 2020: Jessica was the (now virtual) artist-in-residence at Crazy Horse Memorial for August 2020 and led artist talks on Zoom every Wednesday during her term.
July 2020: Jessica was featured on July 19 at Poets in Pajamas.
June 2020: Jessica will read at the Women’s International Study Center (WISC) Acequia Madre House in Santa Fe on June 17 at 5:30 in Santa Fe, New Mexico. More details coming soon. Canceled due to coronavirus.
June 2020: Jessica’s work will be featured at the Currents Festival on June 18 from 6 – 8 p.m. The event will be held at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, NM. More information coming soon. Canceled due to coronavirus.
May 2020: Jessica was part of the virtual Diverse Careers Panel, part of PSU’s Career Skills Weekend.
April 2020: Jessica was slated to speak at the BAAS (British Association of American Studies) on SEO and the “wise Indian trope” in Liverpool. Find the full schedule here. Canceled due to coronavirus.
April 2020: Jessica was slated to be at the Terroir Creative Writing Festival on April 18, held at the Yamhill Valley campus of Chemeketa Community College in McMinnville leading a craft workshop, reading from her latest collections, and signing books. Canceled due to coronavirus.
March 2020: Jessica had her exhibition opening for “emBODY poetry” at Open Signal in Portland, Oregon on March 10 from 6 – 8 p.m., located at 2766 NE Martin Luther King Jr Blvd, Portland, OR 97212.
March 2020: Jessica will be reading at The Voice of Empathy salon, located at the Tiny Theatre PDX, on March 1 at 4 p.m.
February 2020: Jessica and Lex Runciman read at the Silverton Poetry Festival Poet’s Talk on Saturday, February 22.
February 2020: Jessica’s work was featured at the Portland Winter Lights Festival “Perceptions” exhibition on February 8 from 6 – 8 p.m. at Open Signal in Portland, Oregon.
February 2020: Jessica was the featured reader at McMinnville Public Library’s Poetry Night on February 6 at 6 p.m. where her books and Airlie Press backtitles were available.
January 2020: Jessica was on the Write 2 Publish panel “Finding Funding for Writing Projects” on January 11. The conference is held at Portland State University in Smith Memorial Union.
January 2020: Jessica read at Incite: Queer Writers Read on January 8 at 7 p.m. at Literary Arts in downtown Portland.
December 2019: Jessica chaired the panel “Technology and America” at the British Association of American Studies (BAAS) annual Postgraduate Conference. The panel was held on Saturday, December 7 at 10:45 am in The British Library in London.
December 2019: Jessica was at the Walters Artisan Pop-Up Shop on December 3 from 5 – 8 p.m. located at the Walters Cultural Center in Hillsboro, Oregon.
November 2019: Jessica read at the Lilla Literary Series at Leach Botanical Gardens in Portland on November 17 at 4 p.m.
November 2019: Jessica read with Lilla Lit as part of the annual LitCrawl. Play Lit Crawl Literary Bingo on November 8 at 7 p.m. at CENTRL Office in downtown Portland.
November 2019: Jessica read with fellow Airlie poet Gary Lark at Tsunami Books November 1 at 7 p.m., located at 2585 Willamette St, Eugene, OR 97405.
October 2019: Jessica was featured alongside poets Gwendolyn Morgan and Armin Tolentino at Another Read Through in Portland at 7 p.m. on October 24.
October 2019: The Art Center East in La Grande, Oregon featured Airlie poets including Jessica, Gary Lark, and Amelia Ettinger on October 16 at 7 p.m. located at 1006 Penn Ave, La Grande, OR 97850.
October 2019: Jessica read with Airlie Press at Annie Blooms in Portland, Oregon October 1 for the launch of Savagery and all Airlie autumn 2019 titles.
September 2019: Jessica read with poet Doug Stone at the White Dog Literary Salon on September 29 from 3 – 5 pm.
August 2019: Jessica’s “Red/Act” was on a year-long display as part of the yəhaw̓ exhibit in Seattle (through August 4 2019).
August 2019: An alternate version of Jessica’s “Red/Act” was featured at the summer 2019 exhibition Umbra: New Prints for a Dark Age at the International Print Center New York City, located in Manhattan.
August 2019: Jessica featured her poetry at the North Street Collective on August 18 in Willits, California from 5 – 7 pm at 350 North Street.
June 2019: Jessica led a poetry workshop and VR experience at By the People on June 23 at 11:45 in The Smithsonian’s AIB in Washington DC.
June 2019: As a faculty member for Tualatin Valley Creates arts incubator, Jessica showcased her poetic VR installation at the kickoff event on June 13 from 6 – 9 at Walters Cultural Center in Hillsboro.
May 2019: Jessica read her work while in conversation with Kate Gray at The Book Bin on May 31 at 7pm, located at 450 Court St NE, Salem, OR 97301.
May 2019: Jessica’s novel The Wrong Kind of Indian won gold at the IPPYs. She accepted the award at The Copacabana in New York on May 28.
May 2019: As the visiting poet at Chemeketa Community College in 2018-19, Jessica was at the college May 21 for a reading at noon and led a workshop at 6 p.m.
May 2019: Jessica’s poem “Place Settings” was one of the winning entries for the Literary Arts Writers of Color showcase. A free reading featuring all winning writers took place at Literary Arts in Portland on May 22 at 7.
May 2019: Jessica was featured at the Halcyon Arts Lab Open Studio in Georgetown on May 18 from 11 – 2 where she hosted a reading series and performing a live-body poetry painting.
April 2019: Jessica was on the Conscious Writing and Editing panel at the Write2Publish Conference at Portland State University in Oregon on April 27.
April 2019: Jessica read at the US Department of State’s Library in Washington DC on April 22 at noon for their National Poetry Month: A Conversation with Women event.
April 2019: Jessica had a piece, “Red/Act,” on display at IA&A at Hillyer (Washington DC), which debuted at their First Friday Gallery Opening on April 5.
March 2019: Jessica read at the Airlie Press off-site event at Devil’s Den Wine Bar for AWP’s 2019 conference in Portland, Oregon on March 29.
March 2019: Unsolicited Press was at AWP 2019 in Portland, Oregon. Jessica was available for a book signing at the UP table on Thursday, March 28 from 11-12.
March 2019: Jessica was featured in an off-site reading at AWP with the Submission Reading Series on Thursday, March 28 from 8-10 pm at Yale Union in Portland.
March 2019: Jessica talked about her latest poetic projects at the Mt. Hood Cherokees meeting on Saturday, March 9.
February 2019: Jessica read at Reston Readings on Sunday, February 24.
February 2019: Osiyo Television filmed a docu-series on Jessica and her work in Hillsboro, Oregon, which included a reading at Perks of Art.
February 2019: Jessica was at Halcyon Art’s Lab Open Studios on Saturday, February 23, in Washington DC.
January 2019: Jessica spoke at the La Maison Française (Embassy of France) for Washington DC’s “Night of Ideas” on Red/Act: The State of Incarcerated Indigenous Women and Poetry.
December 2018: The PDX Winter Poetry Festival featured Jessica and more poets reading and performing on Saturday, December 22.
November 2018: Jessica read her poetry and introduced the Antipode online tool at Halcyon Arts Lab Open Studios in Washington, DC.
July 2018: Jessica was part of the Poetry Incubator co-hort at The Poetry Foundation in Chicago. She’ll be at the annual Chicago Poetry Block Party July 28, 2018.
On July 20, 2018, Jessica led a Talking Circle lecture at Crazy Horse Memorial in South Dakota.
Jessica was at Mother Foucault’s Bookshop in Portland, Oregon for a reading with Pointed Circle.
Jessica was featured on KBOO’s “Poetry and Everything” available to stream anywhere.
Were you at the 2018 AWP Conference? Check out the panel Jessica was on by Submittable.
During her residency at the Hosking Houses Trust with an appointment at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust in Stratford-Upon-Avon, England, Jessica was featured at a reading during the Crossing Borders International Poetry Festival.
Jessica’s residency at the Women’s International Study Center (WISC) Acequia Madre House in Santa FE, NM, culminated in a reading open to the community. Check out the Santa Fe New Mexican feature.
Jessica read from her latest work at the Rhubarb Reading Series in Portland, Oregon at Jade Lounge.
Yellow Dog Bookstore in Columbia, Missouri blended a reading with an interview by the local Mizzou student newspaper.
The Many Voices of Women’s Fiction Book Club welcomed Jessica for an online Q&A session after her book was selected for their monthly read.
LitCrawl, part of the Wordstock weekend, included Night Circus with readings by poets and writers including Jessica.
The Transmit Culture monthly speakers series featured Jessica discussing Native Americans in publishing.
The Metro Regional Government organization in Portland, Oregon featured Jessica during a “Lunch and Learn” session that combined a reading with a lecture.
In Las Vegas, BooksOrBooks Reading bookstore hosted an evening poetry reading with Jessica.
Jessica read at Berl’s Bookstore in Brooklyn, a shop dedicated exclusively to poetry.
Jessica was the first writer to be featured on the Submittable site. The podcast is available for streaming.
PSA: Providing Service Through Art at the Ford Gallery in Portland, Oregon featured Jessica and more poets.
During the 2017 Ooligan Press Write to Publish Conference, Jessica was on a panel addressing diversity in publishing.
The National Center for American Indian Enterprise’s (NCAIED) 40 Under 40 awardees honored 2017 recipients, including Jessica, at their annual gathering.
The International Women’s Writing Guild hosts a summer workshop every July in Allentown, PA. Jessica taught a three-day writing workshop on crafting a writing career.
The Wrong Kind of Indian enjoyed a debut reading at Another Read Through in Portland, Oregon.
Jessica was one of five writers who partnered with Portland Story Theatre for a performance at The Fremont Theatre. The video of the performance, which received a Top 10 Pick for 2017, is available to stream.
Performing under the stage name “Savage,” Jessica has performed with the International Poetry Brothel series at Dante’s in Portland, Oregon.
Jessica is featured on the JenningsWire podcast talking about making money as a writer. Listen here.
Unchaste Series featured Jessica twice during their series at Literary Arts in Portland, Oregon. She is also included in their second anthology.
Jessica kicked off the Multicultural Literary Arts Days, a two-day festival, at Wilson High School and sponsored by the Oregon Literary Arts Council (OLAC). Check out the OLAC blog about her talk.
Portland State University’s MFA in Poetry Spring Colloquium featured Jessica in an intimate discussion with students about living as a writer with an advanced degree.
The Hillsboro Writers Fair included a number of authors including Jessica.
Jessica read at Wordstock’s pop-up events in 2016 and 2017, sponsored by the Oregon Literary Arts Council.
At the Mt. Hood Cherokee Summit, Jessica was a keynote speaker discussing what it means to be a Native American writer in contemporary society.
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Jessica Mehta 