Fowziyah AbuKhalid

Fowziyah AbuKhalid is a Saudi Arabian poet, writer, academic and researcher into social and political issues. She is regarded as an innovative voice in Saudi Arabia and the pioneer of the prose poem, and has published papers on literary and academic subjects and human rights. She obtained her doctorate in political sociology and sociology of knowledge from Salford University, UK, in 2000. She taught in the Social Studies department in the College of Arts, King Saud University and in 2009, at the University of Portland, USA. She is an advisor to the United Nations and founder member of a number of cultural periodicals and women’s civil associations. She published her first poetry collection, Until When Will They Kidnap You on the Wedding Night, in 1975, but her poetry and her writing as a political critique was extremely controversial. In 2014, she published the first volume of all her 9 books of prose poetry under the title, Water of the Mirage. Her poetry has been translated into English, French, German and Italian. In 2007, she was awarded the Saudi Arabia Ministry of Culture and Media Prize, and in 2010 she was also honored by the Young People’s Poetry Association and the Arab Writers Union.