ABOUT

I am a writer, activist, and ceramic artist in Urbana, Illinois. I live and work on lands that belonged to the Peoria, Kaskaskia, Peankashaw, Wea, Miami, Mascoutin, Odawa, Sauk, Mesquaki, Kickapoo, Potawatomi, Ojibwe, and Chickasaw Nations. My home was the traditional territory of these Native Nations before they were forcibly removed and the stories of their struggles for survival and identity remain embedded in the land today. I am committed to finding and listening to those stories.

I think of my books as inquiries. Whatever the subject, I ask how it came to be, since the past stays with us in ways we often fail to perceive and understand.

For many years I taught creative nonfiction at the University of Illinois and at the University of Iowa’s Summer Writing Festival.

​A longtime ACLU activist, I am past president of my local ACLU chapter and the recipient of two awards from the ACLU. I have also worked with Native and civil rights organizations, including the US Commission on Civil Rights, to urge schools and universities to retire mascots, logos, performances, and team names based on stereotypes of American Indians.

​My geographer husband, Tom Bassett, and I have a longstanding relationship with a farming community in northern Ivory Coast where we first lived in 1981-82. This community has inspired two of my nonfiction books, and I was fortunate to work with and study women potters in this area. Links to my articles about these potters are on the Ceramics page of this website.

After retiring from teaching creative nonfiction, I returned to my first love, clay. I work out of my home studio in Urbana, Illinois, all winter. In summer I travel to New Hampshire, where I belong to the New Hampshire Potters Guild. There, I join a lively crew of New England potters to fire the giant Nakamagama, a cooperative wood kiln we built in the summer of 2024.

Most importantly, and to my great good fortune, I am the mother of two and the grandmother of four.