Clinnesha Sibley is an award-winning writer, published author, community advocate, and educator. A native of McComb, Mississippi, she has taught Playwriting and African-American theatre courses for the University of Arkansas and the College of Charleston.
After teaching at the university level for seven years as an Assistant Professor, she moved into secondary education. A writer of plays, blogs, poetry, prose, essays and creative non-fiction, Clinnesha’s work has been featured in countless literary journals.
She is a recipient of the Holland New Voices Award, the Arkansas Arts Council Individual Artist Fellowship, Mississippi Theatre Association Adult Playwriting Award, A.I.M. Award for Creative Writing, a 2021 Vance Fellowship from the Natchez Literary and Cinema Celebration, 2020-2021 Teacher of the Year at Mississippi School of the Arts, 2022 STAR Student-Teacher Achievement Recognition Program, and Claes Nobel Educator of Distinction by the National Society of High School Scholars.
Clinnesha’s writing, often influenced by the Civil Rights Movement, contributes authentic narratives about Mississippians, Southerners, and Black women to the contemporary literary canon. Her plays have been recognized by many reputable companies and organizations including Penumbra Theatre, Athena Project, Blackboard Reading Series, New Circle Theatre, The Union For Contemporary Art, and Destination Freedom Black Radio Days.
Clinnesha contributed to Howlround Theatre Commons (“How to Survive Predominantly White Academic Theatre…”), Black Acting Methods Critical Approaches (“Remembering, Rewriting, and Reimagining: Afrocentric Approaches to Directing New Work for the Stage”), and 2020: The Year that Changed American Anthology (“I Am Speaking”: Why Black and Brown Voices Matter”).
She was selected as one of twenty-four change-makers from across the U.S. for the 2017-2018 National Arts Strategies Creative Communities Fellow Program. This program was her springboard into the non-profit sector and social entrepreneurship, which grounded her in the role of Executive-Artistic Director for the Southwest Mississippi Multiplex for Early Innovative Intervention Studies.
