Please join us for a virtual event Bearing Witness and the Endurance of Voice presented by Shanta Lee Gander.

Lucy Terry Prince was born in Africa, where she was kidnapped by slave traders and transported to Rhode Island. While still enslaved in 1746, she wrote “Bars Fight,” the oldest known poem in the United States written by an African American. Prince later regained her freedom and moved to Vermont with her husband, Abijah Prince, and fought for her family’s land rights all the way to the highest court in Vermont. In this presentation, Shanta Lee Gander illustrates Prince’s importance as a poet and orator, and as one unafraid to fight for her rights within the landscape of early Vermont, New England, and America. Gander will also perform Lucy’s only surviving poem, “Bars Fight.”

Shanta Lee's work reaches from her art to her multi-faceted professional life which encompasses leadership, community engagement, PR/marketing, and translating vision into reality.

Her creative life includes writing prose, poetry, investigative journalism, and photography. Shanta Lee is the co-author with her husband MacLean C. Gander of Ghosts of Cuba: An Interracial Couple’s Exploration of Cuba in the Age of Trump—Told in Images & Words (in manuscript).

Shanta Lee has an MBA from the University of Hartford and an undergraduate degree in Women, Gender and Sexuality from Trinity College.  She  gives lectures on the life of Lucy Terry Prince as a member of the Vermont Humanities Council Speakers Bureau.  Shanta Lee is currently completing her MFA in Creative Non-Fiction and Poetry at the Vermont College of Fine Arts.

She has brought her passions together as a collaborator and creative engine for projects such as the CreateVT Action Plan for the creative sector throughout Vermont, the implementation of the city-wide Visioning a Healthier New Haven campaign which included a digital storytelling component and data collection; curation of small -large scale events incorporating the Giving Women Power Over AIDS traveling exhibition; launching a creativity forums series, Healing with Art and Nourishing the Inner Artist: Conversations about Art, Creativity, and Imagination; and co-curator for the "I AM..." exhibition in collaboration with the Vermont Arts Council; and as a PR consultant with several individual artists.

Shanta Lee enjoys collaborating with her husband, finding new abandoned places to explore, and her taste in books is as broad as her musical appreciation. Anything from Gregorian chants or Vivaldi to Queen, Led Zeppelin, and A$AP Rocky can be found on her playlist.

Event sponsored by the NH Humanities.

Lane Memorial Library is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82885320748?pwd=emVuZDRvVXl6SS8ySmIxOVFJbkhJQT09

Meeting ID: 828 8532 0748

Passcode: 584933