Luci Tapahonso

Luci Tapahonso, Navajo poet and short story author


Luci Tapahonso, Navajo, (b. 1953) is originally from Shiprock, NM, where she grew up in a family of 11 children. Navajo was her first language but she learned English at home before starting school at the Navajo Methodist Mission in Farmington, NM. She majored in English at the University of New Mexico, as an undergraduate and graduate student. She stayed on there as an Assistant Professor of English, Women's Studies and American Indian Studies for a few years. She has been an Associate Professor of English at the University of Kansas and is now Professor of English at the University of Arizona in Tucson where she teaches Poetry Writing and American Indian Literature.

Luci serves on the editorial board of wicazo sa review and was on the edtorial boards of Frontiers from 1991-1996 and of Blue Mesa Review from 1988-1992. She has been a juror for the Poetry Society of America, the Associated Writing Program Awards, and the Stan Steiner Writing Awards. She serves on the Advisory Boards of the Telluride Institute Writers Forum and has been a member of the New Mexico Arts Commission Literature Panel and the Kansas Arts Commission.

Luci writes for popular magazines as well as for academic and poetry journals, writing often for New Mexico Magazine. Among the journals where her work has been published are Diné Be Iina, Frontiers, Caliban, Sinister Wisdom, and the Beloit Poetry Journal.

She is also sought after as a speaker and has appeared on many NPR, PBS, CBS, ABC and local programs. Her work has been included in theatre productions and been read by William Shatner at the World of Poetry Convention in Las Vegas. It is also available on recordings.

Luci serves her community at all levels, from her local community and university department to the national level. She has served on numerous English Department committees and reads her poetry in classes. She serves on University-wide committees, boards and task forces; she gives poetry readings in the local community and speaks to local groups. She has served on the board of Habitat for Humanity and the United Way Allocations Panel (both local). On the state level, Luci has served on the state Art Commissions, delivered Commencement Addresses at high schools on the Navajo Reservation and in Santa Fe and judged the Miss Navajo Nation and Miss Indian New Mexico Pageants. On the national level, Luci serves on the Board of Trustees for the National Museum of the American Indian, a branch of the Smithsonian Institution, and has served on the Board of Directors of the American Indian Law Resource Center, as a Review Consultant for the Cultural Diversity Development Division of American College Testing and reviews manuscripts for the University of Oklahoma Press, the University of Arizona Press, the University of Nebraska Press, and Cornell University Press. She is also a consultant to American Playhouse for the movie The Lady Chieftans. She was on the Planning Committee for the Returning the Gift Writers Festival from 1989-1992, worked in collaboration with David Noble, Rich Rollins and Krista Elrick on the Phoenix Art Commission Project Hohokamki: The Pueblo Grande Project from 1990-1992 and was a éé College) in Tsaile, AZ in 1995..

Luci began to write poetry at the age of 8 or 9. She is now the author of five books of poetry and stories and one children's book. Luci is the mother of five children.