workerspoetry
Worker Poetry Seminar
On July 26, a poetry seminar was held at Nan Feng Library to celebrate worker voices through poetry, organized with the Worker Poetry Society.
Worker Poetry Seminar
On July 26, at Nan Feng Library in Guangzhou, I hosted a poetry seminar dedicated to worker poets and the lives they write about. The event, co-organized with the Worker Poetry Society, brought together around thirty poets, workers from different industries, and university students to share poems, stories, and conversations about work, life, and creativity.
At this gathering, poet Ran Qiaofeng read Record of Drifting · The Plug-in Line Girl Worker in his Chongqing dialect, capturing the quiet traces workers leave behind—scribbled lines on scraps of paper, fragments of thought that say, “I was here.” Luo Deyuan shared Forty Years of Selected Worker Poetry (1983–2023), telling the history of worker poetry and offering advice to new writers. We also celebrated the launch of Selected Works of Worker Poetry, marking the 15th anniversary of the Worker Poetry Society founded by Ran fifteen years ago in a Guangzhou electronics factory.
This event is reported in the Nanfang Gongbao (Southern Workers' Post) by reporter Yang Xuan.
I first learned about worker poetry while researching labor issues. Books and policies gave me information, but it wasn’t until I encountered the words of these poets that I truly felt the heartbeat behind the statistics. Their poems—raw, direct, and deeply human—moved me to join the society and spend time at the Kangle Village textile job recruitment square, listening to workers’ experiences firsthand.
