Graham Akhurst is an Aboriginal writer and academic hailing from the Kokomini of Northern Queensland. His research sits in the discipline of Creative Writing, Australian Literature, and Australian Publishing Studies. Graham is currently the Director of Indigenous Studies and a Senior Lecturer of Indigenous Australian Studies and Creative Writing in the Faculty of Design and Society. Graham was a finalist in the 2024 NAIDOC Awards in the catagory of Creative of the Year. His debut novel Borderland was published in October 2023 by The University of Western Australia Press and recieved the following accolades:

2025 Finalist NSW Literary Awards. Glenda Adams Award for New Writing for Borderland. 

2024 Finalist for Work of State Significance QLD Literary Awards for Borderland.

2024 Finalist for Young Adult Book of the Year QLD Literary Awards for Borderland.

2024 Finalist for Best Horror Book of the Year Aurealis Awards for Borderland.

2024 Finalist Best YA Book of the Year Aurealis Awards for Borderland.

2024 Finalist Adaptable Program Queensland Writers Centre.

2024 Children’s Book Council of Australia ‘Notable’ book for Borderland. 

Graham's research has been published as a book chapter in Indigenous Postgraduate Education: Intercultural Perspectives, and has articles in The Australian Journal of Indigenous Education, and Artlines. He is a contributing editor at Kweli Journal, New York City. He is a board member of The Sydney Review of Books and Varuna. He has published creatively in Kweli and J Journal for fiction, Mascara Literary Review and Westerly for creative non-fiction, and the Australian Book Review, Cordite, VerityLa, Off the Coast (Maine America), Red Ink (Arizona State University Press), Australian Poetry Journal, Artlines, Meanjin, and Island Magazine for poetry. His short story ‘Staffy’ was nominated for the 2022 PEN Dau Award, Best American Short Stories, O. Henry Prize, and Pushcart Prize. He was the poet of the week for the Australian Book Review in early April 2016. Graham has been a featured reader at the Queensland Poetry Festival, Clancestry, Woodford Folk Festival, UQ Art Museum, Queensland Art Gallery, Ruckus Slam, Dark Mofo, Sydney Writers Festival, Perth Writers Festival, Byron Writers Festival, Scribblers Festival, Brisbane Writers Festival, Singapore Writers Festival and Dhaka Literary Festival and the American Australian Association Arts Gala (2019) amoung many others. He was a participant of the Australia Council for the Arts Future Leaders Program in 2018. Graham was a participant on the Aurora International Study Tour in 2015. He was valedictorian of his graduating year at The University of Queensland (2014) and completed his writing honours with a first-class result at UQ (2015). He has an MPhil in Creative Writing from UQ funded by an APA scholarship (2019), and is a current PhD candidate at The University of Sydney. Graham has previously been a faculty member at The University of Queensland, teaching Indigenous Studies. He was named the first Indigenous recipient of the Fulbright W.G Walker Award as the highest-ranked postgraduate Australian applicant. The Fulbright Award funded his studies at Hunter College, CUNY, where he was awarded an MFA in Fiction (2021). He also received the Nomad Two Worlds Foundation Indigenous Arts Scholarship from the American Australian Association and a second Australia Council of the Arts Grant for Professional Development. He is also the recipient of a Roberta Sykes Scholarship, the Ian Potter Cultural Foundation Scholarship, and a Creative Writing Scholarship from Hunter College.