Editors

Ellen van Neerven 

Ellen van Neerven is an award-winning author, editor and educator of Mununjali (Yugambeh language group) and Dutch heritage. They write fiction, poetry, and non-fiction on unceded Turrbal and Yuggera land. van Neerven’s first book, Heat and Light (UQP, 2014), a novel-in-stories, was the recipient of the David Unaipon Award, the Dobbie Literary Award and the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards Indigenous Writers Prize.  van Neerven’s poetry collection Comfort Food (UQP, 2016) won the Tina Kane Emergent Award and was shortlisted for the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards Kenneth Slessor Prize. Throat (UQP, 2020) was the recipient of Book of the Year, the Kenneth Slessor Prize and the Multicultural Award at 2021 NSW Literary Awards and the inaugural Quentin Bryce Award. 

Ellen was the recipient of an inaugural black&write! kuril dhagun Indigenous editing mentorship in 2011 and worked as Managing Editor until 2016. 

Linda McBride-Yuke 

Linda McBride-Yuke (1958-2019), was a Bundjalung and Butchulla woman who grew up in the suburb of Zillmere, Brisbane. 

Both of Linda's parents were activists involved in the Queensland Council for Advancement of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders (QCAATSI). Her father, as President, and mother, as Secretary, drove across Queensland registering Indigenous people for the electoral rolls.  

Linda was the first Aboriginal student to complete grade 12 at Sandgate District State High School and graduated from University of Queensland with a BA in Political Science (International and Australian Politics). In the early 1980s Linda married at Schofield Barracks Army base in Hawaii. She then went to live at Fort Stewart, Georgia, another US Army base. 

Linda McBride-Yuke worked in the public sector for 25 years, both Federal and State. She was the recipient of an inaugural black&write! kuril dhagun Indigenous editing mentorship in 2011. 

Yasmin Smith

Yasmin Smith is an emerging poet of South Sea Islander, Gubbi Gubbi, and English heritage. She has advocated for First Nations literature as a black&write! editor. She is interested in works that explore inter-generational loss and healing. She currently works at University of Queensland Press on Turrbal and Jagera Country. 

Yasmin was the recipient of a black&write! Editing Internship in 2015-16. 
 

Grace Lucas-Pennington

Grace is a Bundjalung/European person living on Yuggera land. She grew up mostly between Bundjalung country on the NSW north coast and the greater Logan/Brisbane area. Grace works as an editor, mentor, publishing consultant and is a Board member of Byron Bay Writers Festival. She was awarded the 2020 Nakata Brophy prize for poetry.  

Grace was the recipient of a black&write! Editing Internship in 2015 and was appointed as Senior Editor in 2017. 
 

Jasmin McGaughey

Jasmin McGaughey is a Torres Strait Islander and African American writer and editor. In 2019 she was awarded a Wheeler Centre Next Chapter Fellowship. Jasmin has written for Overland, Kill Your Darlings, SBS Voices and Griffith Review. 

Jasmin was the recipient of a black&write! Editing Internship in 2019, and was appointed as Junior Editor 2020-21.
 

Allanah Hunt

Allanah Hunt is a Barkindji writer, a 2020 Next Chapter fellow, and winner of the inaugural Boundless Indigenous Writer's Mentorship. Allanah was awarded her PhD in Creative Writing at Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge, UK, and won the 2019 Nakata Brophy Prize for her short story, Running to home. Allanah has published several short stories, and was also awarded a Queensland Premier’s Young Publishers and Writers Award in 2020.

Allanah was the recipient of a black&write! Editing Internship in 2019, and was appointed as Junior Editor 2020-21.

Nadia Johansen

Nadia is a Gungarri woman from south-west Queensland, living and working in Brisbane. She is currently studying a Bachelor of Fine Arts in creative writing at QUT and has a background working in Indigenous community organisations. She was runner-up in the inaugural SBS Emerging Writers competition. Nadia edits and writes because she believes Indigenous storytelling gives power, richness and truth-telling to Australian literature.  

Nadia was the recipient of a black&write! Editing Internship in 2021. 
 

Bianca Valentino

Bianca is a Blak editor, award-winning writer, artist and musician living on Yugambeh Country. She is the first Indigenous publisher/editor of a music publication - Gimmie zine - in Australia. Her work has appeared in Rookie, Rolling Stone, No Cure and more. She is passionate about First Nations stories, supporting storytellers and community. 

Bianca was the recipient of a black&write! Editing Internship in 2021.