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The Rockbridge Regional Library in Lexington will host a panel discussion on Wednesday, March 12, from noon to 1 p.m. to explore history and future of imagining a better America, featuring Black feminist scholar and Washington and Lee University history professor Dr. Nneka Dennie, MidMountain Fellows Paul Park, Soleil Ouimet, xocean alexandre and Harli Saxon, as well as MidMountain co-curator Andy “River” Peterson.
Dennie’s first book, “Mary Ann Shadd Cary: Essential Writings of a Nineteenth-Century Black Radical Feminist,” is a primary source collection of work by and about Shadd Cary — an abolitionist, suffragist, and one of the first Black women newspaper editors in North America — that won the 14th MLA Prize for Bibliographical or Archival Scholarship. In 2018, Dennie co-founded the Black Women’s Studies Association. She is also a 2024 recipient of the Mellon Emerging Faculty Leaders Award from the Institute of Citizens and Scholars.
Soleil Ouimet, xocean alexandre and Harli Saxon are among the contemporary intersectional creatives from across the region coming together for Mid-Mountain’s March fellowship cohort to work on projects related to imagining better Appalachian futures. Paul Park, also joining the cohort, has published 12 novels and three books of short stories in a variety of genres. Until his recent retirement he taught writing and literature at Williams College in Massachusetts. Park was also a longtime friend of Terry Bisson, the regional science fiction author, and participated in MidMountain’s audio documentary series about him in the first season of “Our Connected Culture.”
Andy “River” Peterson (they/them) is a multimedia artist who explores the intersection of people, policy, and place. They were a staff writer covering innovation at the Washington Post for years and also have been published with Slate, Politico, Ars Technica and other outlets. Since 2021, they have curated residencies at MidMountain — sharing time and space with dozens of creatives to explore the art of storytelling across mediums. In May 2025, they will debut a new musical called “Save From Oblivion” about history in popular memory and the lives (and afterlives) of Mary Ann Shad Cary and Osborne Perry Anderson, the sole Black survivor of the Harpers Ferry raiding party.
