Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle Named Shepherd Appalachian Heritage Writer-in-Residence

North Carolina author Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle will visit West Virginia’s Eastern Panhandle this September as Shepherd University’s new Appalachian Heritage Writer-in-Residence.

Since 1998, the Appalachian Heritage Writer-in-Residence program has aimed “to celebrate and honor the work of a distinguished contemporary Appalachian writer,” according to the program’s website. This year’s residency runs from March 2025 to January 2026.

Clapsaddle published her debut novel, “Even As We Breathe,” with the University Press of Kentucky in 2020. The novel received the Thomas Wolfe Memorial Literary Award in 2021, was a finalist for the Weatherford Award and was listed as one of National Public Radio’s Best Books of 2020.

Clapsaddle said she feels “very fortunate” to receive the distinction from Shepherd.

“I was pleasantly — and that’s an understatement — surprised when I found out that I had been awarded it,” Clapsaddle told West Virginia Public Broadcasting. “I’m just really grateful.”

Beyond fiction writing, Clapsaddle has also explored nonfiction writing, including essays on Cherokee identity and community in contemporary North Carolina. Clapsaddle is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, a tribe based in western North Carolina, and is the first writer from her tribe to publish a novel.

“It’s really important to me to talk about Eastern Band Cherokee as a living culture and our place in the Appalachian Mountains,” Clapsaddle said. “I do a lot of writing that talks about the similarities in culture between Cherokee and Appalachia in general. We share a lot of commonalities. And I think a lot of that is rooted in just a respect and reverence for this place — and, of course, a long history in this place.”

Clapsaddle said that manifests in her writing as explorations of how federal policies affect Appalachian and Cherokee communities, plus the value systems and senses of humor that unite members of both communities.

“A lot of time, people talk about values in the past tense, but I like to talk about where our values are manifested and how we carry them in our present day,” she said.

Clapsaddle said writing about indigenous identity in Appalachia can feel especially urgent because of a stereotype that the region is white.

“For me, it’s very much about bringing knowledge of who Cherokee are in the present tense forward. A lot of times we talk about indigenous communities past tense,” she said. “There’s, pun intended, a whitewashing of this region, and this belief that there are no indigenous people here and that all the history belongs in a museum about the past. So it’s a priority for me to talk in the present tense.”

As part of their residency, selected writers judge the West Virginia Fiction Competition, edit the annual Anthology of Appalachian Writers and visit Shepherd’s campus in September to host a series of writing workshops and author talks for students and community members.

Clapsaddle said this fall will not mark her first visit to West Virginia; she previously visited the state for a regional hot dog food tour.

“I do, hot dogs aside, have kind of a soft spot in my heart for West Virginia,” she said. “They’ve always treated me well.”

Benjamin Bankurst, director for the Shepherd University Center for Appalachian Studies and Communities, said the process of selecting this year’s writer-in-residence began with soliciting student feedback. He said many students on campus brought up Clapsaddle’s work.

“‘Even As We Breathe’ was a unanimous choice among our students, a couple of whom had seen Annettee speak at the Appalachian Studies Association conference and had known her work,” he said.

Bankurst said talking about indigenous writing and history in the present tense feels especially important this year, as the United States prepares to host celebrations nationwide commemorating the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 2026.

“I think this is just such a fortuitous coming together of themes as the nation wrestles with the meaning of the 250th anniversary of its founding,” Bankhurst said. “These are discussions that we should be having.”

As writer-in-residence, Clapsaddle succeeds Ohio County poet and children’s book author Marc Harshman, the West Virginia state poet laureate.

Bankhurst said the residency often inspires a sense of community among Appalachian writers, both with those who have previously held the residency and those who represent the future of Appalachian literature.

Writers-in-residence host workshops with local high school students in addition to on-campus events, and the fiction competition they judge is open to high school-age writers, Bankhurst said.

“It really serves as a way of ensuring an intergenerational experience for the community in West Virginia, beyond our students here on campus,” Bankhurst said.

This year, the writer-in-residence program is funded through a grant from the West Virginia Humanities Council, Shepherd announced in a Feb. 13 press release.

Clapsaddle said she is excited to visit Shepherd this fall and immerse herself in West Virginia’s literary community. She said she taught high school for over 12 years, so an educational setting like Shepherd’s campus is familiar territory.

“That’s where I feel most comfortable, with young people,” she said. “That makes me really happy.”

To learn more about the Appalachian Heritage Writer-in-Residence program, visit Shepherd University’s website.