Darrell Stover, Interdisciplinary Studies/Africana Studies/Science, Technology, and Society at North Carolina State University
Darrell Stover is a poet, naturalist, cultural historian, avid birdwatcher, and science communicator committed to sustaining our planet and its biodiversity for future generations. He has raised money and protested for environmental causes. He has lent his performance skills and poetry to the same. One of his signature poems, “Mad Baby,” which celebrates science and kids, has taken on a life of its own. While it presents a microorganism’s discovery and connection to environmental health, it has resulted in his serving on the board at Haw River Assembly, played a role in the success of a Durham art and science camp at the Hayti Heritage Center, was a major part of the kick-off of the March for Science in downtown Raleigh, and became a key element in the Science Impactor presentation and science storytelling workshop that Stover developed for the Morehead Planetarium and Science Center.
His career life has always been an intersection of science and art sifted through history with an emphasis on community and individual empowerment through the same. He is Head of the North Carolina Science Museum Grant Program at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences which funds over 50 science museums across the state of North Carolina. He is also on the faculty at NC State University where he teaches “Black Popular Culture: From the Blues to Afrofuturism” and “Introduction to Science, Technology, and Society.” What most don’t know is he studied microbiology and American Studies at the University of Maryland at College Park and acquired his Master of Arts degree in Science Writing from Johns Hopkins University. While in the Washington, DC area he worked at the National Cancer Institute as research assistant in support of the examination of retroviruses via molecular biology, monoclonal antibodies, and electron microscopy. He moved into the private sector to Cambridge Scientific Abstracts as Senior Microbiology Editor developing content, coverage, and codification of published research for online databases in microbiology and biotechnology. Upon arrival in the Triangle he originally worked as science writer at the Burroughs Wellcome Fund and was Science Writing Fellow at Virginia Tech University. He served as program director at the Hayti Heritage Center and the North Carolina Humanities Council. He found and directed the Spoken Word Performance Poetry Ensemble in Washington, DC. He has been published in the Washington Post, the Independent Weekly, the Hip Hop Tree and in several poetry anthologies. His latest book of poetry is Somewhere Deep Down When. His more recent public programs have been the performance/lecture “The Natural History of Afrofuturia” and the curation of a series on the cultural significance of the “Black Panther” film featuring a panel discussion on the science and technology represented on screen. The presentation of “Dream STEAM: Afrofuturist Dances with the Sciences” at the “Afrofuturism and Indigenous Futurities” conference held at UNC-Chapel Hill expounds on the use of biological science in African diasporic speculative fiction.