Ilavenil Meena Kandasamy

Ilavenil Meena Kandasamy is an Indian poet, fiction writer, translator and activist. She was born in 1984 to Tamil parents, both of them are university professors. She was named as Illavenil by her parents, she developed an early interest in poetry, and later adopted the name Meena. She completed a Doctorate of Philosophy in Socio-linguistics from Anna University, Chennai. Meena wrote her first poetry at the age of 17 and also started translating books by Dalit writers and leaders into English at that age. Her work has appeared in eighteen languages. Although Meena writes in English, she has translated prose and poetry from Tamil. Currently, she lives in East London.

Her Works: 

# In 2003, Translations: The writings & speeches of Dalit leader Thol. Thirumavalavan # In 2005, The Eighth day of creation # In 2006, Touch # In 2006, Translations:  Why Were Women Enslaved, (the works of Dravidian ideologue Periyar) # In 2010, Ms Militancy # in 2012, Sparsham, Translated into Malayalam by VS Bindu # In 2014, Gypsy Goddess # In 2014, Fraulein Militanz, Translated into German by Raphel Urweider #In 2015, This Poem Will Provoke You & Other Poems # in 2017, When-i-hit-you

Fellowships/ Residencies: 

# International Writing Program, University of Iowa (USA), Aug-Dec 2009 # UGC Visiting Fellow, School of Languages, Jawaharlal Nehru University (New Delhi, India), March 2010 # British Council- Charles Wallace India Trust Fellow, University of Kent, Canterbury (UK), Jan – April 2011 # Visiting Fellow, University of Newcastle (UK), May 2011 # UGC Visiting Fellow, School of English, University of Hyderabad (India), March 2012 # Writer-in-Residence, International Writers’ Workshop, Hong Kong Baptist University, Oct 2012 # Institute of Advanced Studies, Visiting Fellow, University of Warwick (UK), May 2015 # Writer-in-Residence, Literarisches Colloquium Berlin, May 2016 # Hope Street Writer-in-Residence, hosted by The White Review, and University of Liverpool (UK), May 2018 # City of Stories Writer-in-Residence, Spread the Word and Association of London Chief Librarians, 2018 # NYU Gallatin Global Faculty in Residence, New York University, Fall 2018