about
Mubanga Kalimamukwento, 2023, Minnesota
Mubanga was born in Lusaka, Zambia. Her creative work has appeared or is forthcoming in adda, Aster(ix), Contemporary Verse 2, Kweli, Overland, The Ex-Puritan, Menelique, on Netflix, and elsewhere, and her editorial work can be found or is forthcoming in Shenandoah, the Water~Stone Review, Doek! Literary Magazine and Safundi. She founded Ubwali Literary Magazine and co-founded the Idembeka Creative Writing Workshop. When she’s not writing or editing, Mubanga serves as a Mentor at the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop. She is a PhD student in the Department of Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies at the University of Minnesota (Twin-Cities), where she is also an Interdisciplinary Center for the Study of Global Change (ICGC) Scholar. Mubanga lives in Minnesota with her husband and their two children.
honors
AWARDS
Won
Dzanc Books Prize for Fiction ~ 2024
The Drue Heinz Literature Prize ~ 2024
The Minnesota Star Tribune's Top Ten Fiction Books from Minnesota (2024)
Brittle Paper's 100 Notable African Books of 2024
The Continent's Top 5 African Books of 2024
The Boston Globe's Top 75 Books of 2024
Debutiful's 10 Best Debut Short Story Collections of 2024
Debutiful's 25 Most Anticipated Books of 2024
Miles Morland Scholarship ~ 2023
Tejumola Olaniyan Creative Writer-in-Residence Fellowship ~ 2023
Mercatus Center Don Lavoie Fellowship ~ 2023/2024
Shenandoah Fellowship for BIPOC Editors ~ 2023/2024
The Tusculum Review Poetry Chapbook Prize ~ 2022
1000 Voices Program, Every Woman Treaty ~ 2022
Jacobson Scholar (Hawkinson Fund for Peace and Justice) ~ 2021/2022
Deborah Keenan Poetry Scholarship (Hamline University) ~ 2021
Writer of Color Merit Scholarship (Hamline University) ~ 2020 - 2023
Kalemba Short Story Prize ~ 2019
Brittle Paper’s Top 15 Debut Books of 2019
Dinaane Debut Fiction Award ~ 2018/2019
Hubert H. Humphrey (Fulbright) Fellowship ~ 2018/2019
Young African Leaders Initiative ~ 2017
Finalist
The African American Poetry and Poetics Book Prize ~ 2023
Raz-Shumaker Prairie Schooner Book Prize Series in Fiction ~ 2022
Minnesota Author Project ~ 2022
Shortlist
Commonwealth Short Story Prize ~ 2022
Miles Morland Scholarship ~ 2022
Miles Morland Scholarship ~ 2021
Nobrow Short Story Prize ~ 2020
Bristol Short Story Prize ~ 2019
Semi-finalist
Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative ~ 2022