‘I discovered my why.’ And the governor has honored this Columbus resident because of it
A Columbus resident is among the 10 recipients of the 2023 Governor’s Awards for the Arts and Humanities.
Jonathan Perkins, the founder and director of the Fountain City Poetry Slam, is a teaching artist, spoken-word comedian, actor and playwright. According to the news release from the Georgia Council for the Arts and the Georgia Humanities, he teaches children “how to use creativity as a means for emotional health, personal growth and professional prosperity.”
Perkins, 42, is a 1999 graduate of Shaw High School in Muscogee County. He earned a bachelor’s degree in communication arts from Georgia Southern University in 2004.
He received the 2022 Leadership Award from the Georgia After School & Youth Development Conference for “exemplifying excellence in the field of expanded learning,” the news release says, “and has developed and facilitates lessons for students at Aaron Cohn Regional Youth Detention Center, Muscogee County Department of Juvenile Justice and Anne Elizabeth Shepherd Home for Girls.”
The recipients of this award are the 12th annual cohort. The award honors people and organizations making significant contributions to Georgia in the arts and humanities. The other 2023 recipients are:
- Altama Museum, Toombs County
- Atlanta Dogwood Festival, Fulton County
- Ballethnic Dance Company, Fulton County
- Harold Rittenberry, Clarke County
- Historic Rural Churches of Georgia, statewide
- Dr. Karan Berryman Pittman, Randolph County
- Mack Scogin and Merrill Elam, Fulton County
- Morris Robinson, Fayette County
- Otis Redding Foundation, Bibb County.
Perkins, a published poet, was a 2018 runner-up in the Missouri Review’s Miller Audio Prize for Humor. That year, he also was selected for Columbus & the Valley Magazine’s “Five Under 40” list. In 2020, he was selected for Georgia Trend’s “40 Under 40” list.
The Legendary Apollo Theatre in New York selected Perkins as a 2022 Apollo Stories Fellow.
What this award means to him
Perkins called receiving this award “affirming” for his career choice.
“We have this thing as people that we question whether we are doing the right thing, did we take the right steps,” he told the Ledger-Enquirer. “Then something like this comes along and lets you know you are doing the right thing. I’m on the right path.”
When he was exposed to poetry slams and spoken-word events in college, Perkins became determined to produce opportunities for teens back home in Columbus — opportunities he didn’t have at that age.
“I discovered my why,” he said. “… As young people, we often have this weird view of poetry from the way we were taught it in school, that it has to be one way or rhyme or you have to be Edgar Allan Poe. But I learned I can just be myself and tell my story, and nobody can tell my story better than I can, and I’ve got to tell it because someone can learn and grow from it.”
Learning is a mutual process, Perkins noted.
“I’m very appreciative of the young people I’ve been able to work with over the last 15 or 16 years,” he said. “Every last one of them has had an impact on my work. I’ve learned from them as much as they’ve learned from me, if not more.”
Who nominated him and why?
Crystal Pendleton Shahid, market president for Truist Bank in Columbus, nominated Perkins.
“Jonathan does so much in our community with young people,” she told the Ledger-Enquirer. “… He’s so talented. He’s such a servant leader. … Every organization he touches is blessed to have him.”
Shahid described the positive influence she has seen Perkins make.
“He gives kids in the community a creative outlet they might not get,” she said. “That is a gift.”
This story was originally published December 14, 2023 at 9:44 AM.
