Nicole Najmah Abraham is a Brooklyn native, mother, spoken word artist, and fashion photographer. She is also project manager for Green Earth Poets Café; workshop facilitator for New York State Senator Jesse Hamilton’s The Campus, a technology and wellness hub in Brooklyn; project contractor for the Center for Community Alternatives, which promotes community-based alternatives to incarceration; and visual marketer, producer, and social media manager for Halalywood Entertainment, an international halal production company. Abraham is a resident speaker and guest lecturer at the Fresno Kremen School of Education and Human Development, where she teaches master’s students. She additionally teaches hip-hop, poetry, and fashion design to youth within the juvenile detention system, as well as prisons in and around New York. Abraham has worked in the New York City fashion industry for almost 15 years, having designed for Walmart, Ecko, Rocawear, U.S. Polo Association, Jordache Jeans, Children’s Apparel Network, and House of Deréon (Beyonce’s fashion line). Abraham founded a forum and storytelling project known as “I Am More Than a Scarf,” featuring Muslim women. “People believe Muslims don’t connect to everyday issues,” she says. But as a human being living every day in America, these are our issues too. So, don’t call me to be your token and give a statement about terrorism. If my son walks out the door, is he going to come back home, because he may get shot and killed, being a Black teenager walking around in a hoodie? Or gentrification that’s changing my neighborhood that I’ve lived in for over ten years in Brooklyn. These issues directly affect me. I’ve realized the power of the arts and using my platform and spotlight.”
