VOCAB

We're back next week and since every month is National Poetry Month for us, we gone stick to the script. Joining us this month will be !!!

Manòn Voice is a poet, storyteller, filmmaker, educator, and cultural worker whose work lives at the intersection of art and social change. Rooted in Hip Hop and spoken word, her practice explores identity, justice, and collective memory, creating spaces where storytelling becomes a vehicle for dialogue and transformation. A native of Indianapolis, she has performed on stages across the country and facilitated workshops with diverse communities. She is a Professor of Hip-Hop Music, History, and Culture at Butler University and the director of the IT WAS ALL A DREAM Hip Hop Ensemble, where she engages Hip Hop as a living tool for education, resilience, and cultural expression.

Through her creative practice, Manòn considers herself a poetic documentarian, attuned to the narratives that shape our social landscape. Her poetry has appeared in The Flying Island, The Indianapolis Review, The House Life Project: People + Property Series, Sidepiece Magazine, The World We Live(d) In anthology, Questions for a Resilient Future Series, Kinship: Belonging in a World of Relations, and Aesthetic Ethics: Towards a Moral Imagination, and more.

Her work engages urgent issues such as housing insecurity, environmental justice, food access, and systemic inequality, while also holding space for beauty, healing, and possibility. Alongside her artistic practice, she is committed to land stewardship and Afro-Indigenous approaches to farming, exploring the relationship between cultivation, culture, and community healing. Her documentary ROOT BLACK, centered on Afro-Diasporic agrarian heritage and Black farming in the United States, premiered at the Indy International Film Festival. She is also the 2025 PitchDox Award winner for her upcoming documentary, Barbara Boyd: On Top of the World, which chronicles the life and legacy of Indiana’s first African Amer


Hosted by: &
DJs: &
April 8th | 8pm | $10
Community Partners:

We're back next week with an old friend!

Sylvia Thomas is an internationally renowned musician and poet creating unique experiences for audiences to engage in storytelling and soundscapes.

For the last 10 years, she’s performed across the United States, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Mexico, for the United Nations, and all over her hometown of Indianapolis. Sylvia is also part of the long-term artist residencies with Big Car Collaborative.

She’s excited to come back to where her career began at VOCAB!

The White Rabbit Cabaret
Hosted by the VOCAB team
June 11th | 8pm | $10
Community Partners:

Indianapolis Liberation Center