2008 Scholarship recipients:
Leo Love Merit Scholarship in Fiction - Heather Swartz
Leo Love Merit Scholarship in Poetry - Marco Dominguez
D.H. Lawrence Fellowship - Nancy Pagh
Hispanic Writer Award - Benjamin Garcia
Native Writer Award - Oscar Hokeah
Taos Resident Award - Jessica Wilbanks
Leo Love Merit Scholarship in Fiction - Heather Swartz
Heather Swartz
In the long ago, Heather Swartz received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in English at the University of Kansas. More recently, she completed her PharmD at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and is currently working as a senior medical writer in the pharmaceutical industry. After hours, she enjoys writing (without footnotes and references) in the Advanced Fiction Workshop based in Evanston, Illinois. Heather’s short fiction was included in the critically acclaimed 2007 anthology Further Persons Imperfect. She lives in Evanston and plans a September 2008 wedding to fellow author Paul McComas (Planet of the Dates).
Hispanic Writer Award - Benjamín García
Benjamín García
Benjamín García is an English major at the University of New Mexico entering his senior year. He is a first generation immigrant born in Albuquerque but raised in Houston. His work appears in the current issue of Conceptions Southwest. He is deciding between pursuing an MFA, a PhD, or joining Teach for America after graduating.
D.H. Lawrence Fellowship - Nancy Pagh
Nancy Pagh photo credit: Anita K. Boyle, Egress Studio
Nancy Pagh was born on Fidalgo Island in Washington State. After college, she worked in the Scientific Publications Unit of the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration in Seattle. She earned Master’s degrees in literature and writing at the University of New Hampshire, and completed a Ph.D. in Interdisciplinary Studies at the University of British Columbia. Her first book of poems, No Sweeter Fat, won the Autumn House Press book prize and was published in 2007. Her poems appear or are forthcoming in Prairie Schooner, Rattle, The Fourth River, Bellingham Review, Poetry Northwest, Crab Creek Review, and other journals. Nancy’s first book, At Home Afloat (2001), is a critical study of the language women use at sea. Her chapbook, After, won the Floating Bridge Press competition and is forthcoming in September 2008. She has been a featured reader in Pittsburgh’s Gist Street Master’s Series and at the Skagit River Poetry Festival. She lives in Bellingham, WA.
Native Writer Award - Oscar Hokeah
Oscar Hokeah
Oscar Hokeah is Kiowa/Cherokee originally from Oklahoma. Currently he is enrolled in the BFA program at the Institute of American Indian Arts. He has been published in Yellow Medicine Review and Red Ink Magazine. He is the 2008/09 recipient of the Truman Capote Scholarship Award. If you would like to find out more about Oscar Hokeah, please visit his MySpace page here.
Taos Resident Award - Jessica Wilbanks
Jessica Wilbanks
Jessica Wilbanks lives in Taos on a road lined with cottonwoods. She graduated from Hampshire College after studying creative nonfiction and theology, and served as a campaign organizer before helping to found Faithful Security, a multi-faith coalition dedicated to the elimination of nuclear weapons. Her essays have appeared in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Sojourners, Relevant Magazine, Albuquerque Journal, and Newsweek/Washington Post's On Faith blog. Come September, she will be attending the University of Houston's M.F.A. program in fiction.
