Reading and panel discussion with IAIA MFA in Creative Writing (MFACW) Director Deborah Jackson Taffa (Quechan [Yuma] Nation and Laguna Pueblo), Jamie Figueroa (Boricua) ’12 and ’15, James Thomas Stevens (Akwesasne Mohawk) ’90, Ramona Emerson (Diné) ’15, Layli Long Soldier (Oglala Lakota) ’09, and Douglas Bootes (Saponi Descendant) ’17 and ’19.

MFA in Creative Writing

The Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing is designed as a two-year program with two intensive week-long residencies per year (summer and winter) at IAIA. Students and faculty mentors gather for a week of workshops, lectures, and readings. At the end of the residency week, each student is matched with a faculty mentor, who then works one-on-one with the student for the semester. IAIA’s program is unique in that we emphasize the importance of Indigenous writers speaking to the Indigenous experience. The literature we read carries a distinct Native American and First Nations emphasis. The MAFCW offers four areas of emphasis: poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, and screenwriting.