Craig Santos Perez is an Indigenous Chamoru (Chamorro) from Guam who is an associate professor of the University of Hawai’i, Mānoa’s English department. He teaches eco-poetry — poetry that addresses environmental disaster — and creative writing and Pacific literature. 

The body of his poetry and scholarship seeks to explore the environmental urgency of our time and the impacts of human activity and global capitalism on ecology. He has recorded two spoken-word poetry albums, co-edited five anthologies and written five books of poetry. His most recent book, Habitat Threshold, was a Gold Medalist Nautilus Book Award Winner and longlisted for a PEN America Literary Award. He’s received numerous other awards, including the 2011 PEN Center USA Literary Award for Poetry, the American Book Award and the Hawai’i Literary Arts Council Elliot Cades Literary Award. 

Perez is also the co-founder of Ala Press, a publisher committed to Pacific literature. He serves on the editorial boards of the University of Arizona Press’s indigenous series, Sun Tracks, and the University of Hawai’i Press’s The New Oceana Literary Series and academic journal The Contemporary Pacific. He’s been a faculty member of Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation (VONA), and the Kundiman and Mokulēʻia writer’s retreats.

He has a B.A. in creative writing and literature from the University of Redlands, an MFA in creative writing from the University of San Francisco, and a master’s and Ph.D. in comparative ethnic studies from University of California, Berkeley. 

Perez has been featured in The New York Times, BBC Cultural Frontline, CNBC, The Atlantic and The Guardian.

Courtesy of Craig Santos Perez

Pronouns: He/him

Expertise: Eco-poetry, climate change, poetry, Pacific literature

Location: Honolulu, Hawaii

Email: csperez@hawaii.edu

Phone: (808) 291-3564

Twitter: @craigsperez

Heard on BBC’s The Cultural Frontline: “Art from the Anthropocene”