Sheniz Janmohamed: University of Toronto Scarborough’s Writer-in-Residence

By Megan Easton

Sheniz Janmohamed was a fourth-year English student at St. Michael’s College [Toronto, Canada] when the prestigious Hart House Review published her poetry. It was a moment of excitement and pride – the same emotions she felt 15 years later on hearing about her appointment as U of T Scarborough’s 2022 writer-in-residence.

Janmohamed (BA 2006 St. Michael’s) was prolific during her undergraduate years, publishing magazine features and book reviews in addition to poetry and testing out her new poems at local open mic nights. “Somebody gave me the wise advice to use my time as a student to get my work out there as much as possible, and I definitely did,” she says.

Since then, the poet, spoken word artist and educator has performed nationally and internationally and published in journals including Arc Poetry Magazine, Descant and Quill & Quire.

Janmohamed has been writing for as long as she can remember. Her parents still tease her about not being able to pronounce “poem” as a young child. “I called them ‘polems,’ and I recently found a box full of them, going right up into high school,” she says. “It was interesting to see that I’m still exploring some of the themes I was writing about back then in a much less sophisticated way, like what it means to belong and the search for our common humanity.”

Launched in 2013, the Writer-in-Residence program creates opportunities for students to interact with accomplished writers through in-class workshops, creative writing groups and regular office hours.

Read full article at U of T Scarborough News