Fulbright Foreign Student Program

Grant

MFA Creative Writing

Host Institution

University of Miami

Sigrid Marianne Gayangos was born and raised in Zamboanga City. She is the author of Laut: Stories (University of the Philippines Press), a National Book Award finalist, and Lola Maria's Candles (Aklat Alamid), a forthcoming bilingual children's book. In 2021, she received the National Commission for Culture and the Arts Writers' Prize for Fiction, which supported the completion of her second short story collection in Chavacano. She is currently self-translating this collection, El Vida Encantao (The Enchanted Life), into English. In 2023, she was awarded first prize in the Gawad Bienvenido Lumbera National Literary Contest for her Chavacano poetry collection, Descarga. As an incoming MFA student at the University of Miami, she is excited to complete a historical novel set in Zamboanga City, with glistening turquoise waters and soft sandy beaches nearby.