{"id":59615,"date":"2025-09-15T07:55:00","date_gmt":"2025-09-15T11:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/?p=59615"},"modified":"2025-09-04T10:53:34","modified_gmt":"2025-09-04T14:53:34","slug":"alumni-awards-collaborative-worldbuilder-fabrice-guerrier-ma-15-named-alum-of-the-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2025\/alumni-awards-collaborative-worldbuilder-fabrice-guerrier-ma-15-named-alum-of-the-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Alumni Awards: Collaborative worldbuilder Fabrice Guerrier MA &#8217;15\u00a0named Alum of the Year\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><em>This is the first of three profiles about the recipients of EMU&#8217;s 2025 Alumni Awards. For more information about the annual awards and a full list of past winners, visit <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/alumni\/awards\">emu.edu\/alumni\/awards<\/a><\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:10px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>LOS ANGELES VISIONARY ARTIST AND FUTURIST FABRICE GUERRIER MA &#8217;15 (CONFLICT TRANSFORMATION) <\/strong>has been selected by Eastern Mennonite University\u2019s Alumni Association and its Awards and Nomination Committee as the 2025 Alum of the Year for his work as founder and CEO of <a href=\"https:\/\/syllble.com\/\">Syllble Studios<\/a> (pronounced Syll-a-ble), the first collaborative worldbuilding production house for science fiction and fantasy storytelling.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cBeing selected for this award feels quite unbelievable and affirms my work around collaborative worldbuilding,\u201d said Guerrier, who defines worldbuilding on his website (<a href=\"https:\/\/fabriceguerrier.com\/\">fabriceguerrier.com<\/a>) as \u201cthe creation of intricate, plausible fictional universes often found in sci-fi, fantasy, and video games.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In collaborative worldbuilding, underrepresented creators from diverse cultures come together to imagine and publish their shared stories.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">A refuge of books<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Born and raised in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Guerrier immigrated with his family to Coral Springs, Florida, when he was 13. Already fluent in French and Haitian Creole, Guerrier learned English as his third language.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s kind of magic\u2026 being Haitian from an Afrocentric world\u2026 being from an island\u2026 being able to speak multiple languages,\u201d said Guerrier.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Nevertheless, Guerrier was an exile in a foreign country, forced to flee the 2004 Haitian coup d\u2019\u00e9tat. He says while he \u201cwanted to be an American,\u201d the more he tried to fit in, the more he felt like he was destroying a precious part of himself.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Guerrier found refuge at Northwest Regional Library, where he worked as a page, volunteered, helped with community programming, and explored everything from manga and comics to encyclopedias and films to nonfiction and sci-fi books. His curiosity sparked Syllble, an idea that was furthered while reading \u201cBlindness,\u201d an essay in Jorge Luis Borges\u2019 \u201cSeven Nights\u201d collection, as a sophomore at Florida State University.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI resonated with how Borges described being in a library as the closest thing to heaven, and how his blindness allowed him to see things in different ways. The impact of his words inspired me to become a writer,\u201d said Guerrier.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Healing and growth<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>After graduating from Florida State in 2013 with a bachelor of science degree in international affairs and a leadership studies certificate, Guerrier decided to pursue a master of arts in conflict transformation from EMU\u2019s Center for Justice and Peacebuilding (<a href=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/cjp\/\">CJP<\/a>).\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As a graduate assistant at the Zehr Institute for Restorative Justice, he worked with its then-director and CJP professor, <strong>Carl Stauffer MA &#8217;02 (conflict transformation), <\/strong>and conducted \u201chumbling and eye-opening\u201d field research on the impact of Fambul Tok International in promoting reconciliation in communities after an 11-year civil war in Sierra Leone (West Africa).&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cEMU was a place of healing for me,\u201d Guerrier said. \u201cMy peace studies showed me how personal and interpersonal work affects peace in the world.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Guerrier worked with CJP Professor Emeritus <strong>Barry Hart MDiv &#8217;78 <\/strong>to explore theories and practices of Strategies for Trauma Awareness &amp; Healing (<a href=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/cjp\/star\/\">STAR<\/a>), and in 2014, he started a chapter of Coming To The Table (<a href=\"https:\/\/comingtothetable.org\/\">CTTT<\/a>), a racial healing and reconciliation organization aimed at Taking America Beyond the Legacy of Enslavement\u2014a program that began at CJP. Guerrier later served on CTTT\u2019s board of managers and became its youngest national president.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Looking to the future<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>After graduating from EMU in 2015, Guerrier worked on two novels, revising one to the point of exhaustion.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt was probably one of the most painful and loneliest experiences I\u2019ve ever had,\u201d he said.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Guerrier began researching collaborative writing techniques in Hollywood and beyond, which led him to invite three writers to his home to create a story together. The successful session set Syllble in motion.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Today, Syllble is enabling marginalized voices across the globe to conceive and tell the stories of their shared universes in order to disrupt modern-day inclinations toward disaster and doom.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cImagining radically hopeful futures allows us to replace the realities imposed by capitalism and technology and media with something that\u2019s beautiful, nourishing, warm, and healing,\u201d said Guerrier. \u201cIt is how we reclaim what it means to be human.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:10px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Guerrier will share his story at EMU TenTalks, held on Saturday, Oct. 11, at 1:30 p.m. in Martin Chapel during Homecoming 2025. For a full schedule of Homecoming events and activities, visit <a href=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/homecoming\/\"><strong>emu.edu\/homecoming<\/strong><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This is the first of three profiles about the recipients of EMU&#8217;s 2025 Alumni Awards. For more information about the annual awards and a full list of past winners, visit <a href=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2025\/alumni-awards-collaborative-worldbuilder-fabrice-guerrier-ma-15-named-alum-of-the-year\/\" target=\"_self\" class=\"more-link\">... read more <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">about Alumni Awards: Collaborative worldbuilder Fabrice Guerrier MA &#8217;15\u00a0named Alum of the Year\u00a0<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":302,"featured_media":59619,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[266,12503,17562,264,60,12537],"tags":[5753,18145,17236,17868,17238,13745,15507,18542,14693],"feature":[17427,17426,17241,17422],"class_list":["post-59615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","category-cjp","category-digest","category-graduate-programs","category-homecoming","category-star","tag-alumni","tag-alumni-awards","tag-cjp","tag-cjp-2","tag-coming-to-the-table","tag-conflict-transformation","tag-fabrice-guerrier","tag-strategies-for-trauma-awareness-healing","tag-zehr-institute-for-restorative-justice","feature-emu-home-page-feature","feature-myemu-feature","feature-news-feature","feature-news-landing-page-main-feature"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Alumni Awards: Collaborative worldbuilder Fabrice Guerrier MA &#039;15\u00a0named Alum of the Year\u00a0 - EMU News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2025\/alumni-awards-collaborative-worldbuilder-fabrice-guerrier-ma-15-named-alum-of-the-year\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Alumni Awards: Collaborative worldbuilder Fabrice Guerrier MA &#039;15\u00a0named Alum of the Year\u00a0 - EMU News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This is the first of three profiles about the recipients of EMU&#8217;s 2025 Alumni Awards. For more information about the annual awards and a full list of past winners, visit\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2025\/alumni-awards-collaborative-worldbuilder-fabrice-guerrier-ma-15-named-alum-of-the-year\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"EMU News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/EasternMennonite\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-09-15T11:55:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/emu-wordpress-multisite-instance-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/43\/2025\/09\/03122952\/EMU-74-scaled.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2560\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1707\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ryan Cornell\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@EMU_News\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@EMU_News\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Ryan Cornell\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2025\/alumni-awards-collaborative-worldbuilder-fabrice-guerrier-ma-15-named-alum-of-the-year\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2025\/alumni-awards-collaborative-worldbuilder-fabrice-guerrier-ma-15-named-alum-of-the-year\/\",\"name\":\"Alumni Awards: Collaborative worldbuilder Fabrice Guerrier MA '15\u00a0named Alum of the Year\u00a0 - 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