Young Chicago Authors/Louder Than A Bomb

In 2001, poet and YCA Artistic Director Kevin Coval had a vision to give Chicago youth a platform to share their stories across the city. During that time, Chicago enforced an anti-gang loitering law that gave police powers to arbitrarily select people for arrest and punishment, resulting in innocent youth across Chicagoland being denied their right to peacefully assemble. The Twin Towers had also recently fallen and people of color were being discriminated against across the globe. Louder Than A Bomb (LTAB) was co-founded with educator, PhD Fellow and former YCA Program Director Anna West as a way to celebrate the identity of all people in a new and radically diverse public cultural space. It has become the world’s largest youth poetry festival.