2023 Stowe Prize Media Photo Opportunity

For immediate release:

September 18, 2023

Stowe Prize 2023 Photo Opportunity

The 2023 Stowe Prize is awarded to Dr. Ruha Benjamin, a professor of African American studies at Princeton University, for her book, Viral Justice: How We Grow the World We Want.

Benjamin will be available for a media photo opportunity on Thursday, September 21 from 5:15 – 6:15 pm.

The Stowe Prize Program begins at 5:00 pm with General Reception. Benjamin will be in the Katharine Seymour Day House with honored guests.

HARTFORD, CT – The Harriet Beecher Stowe Center will host Dr. Ruha Benjamin for our annual Stowe Prize Celebrations on Thursday, September 21 and Friday, September 22. The program on Thursday, September 21 is the Big Tent Celebration – where media partners are welcome to join us for a photo opportunity with Dr. Benjamin from 5:15 – 6:15 pm, as she mingles with guests under the Big Tent and in the Katharine Seymour Day House. At 6:30 pm, dinner will be served, followed by Dr. Benjamin’s presentation, and to conclude the evening will be a paddle raise.

“Like Harriet Beecher Stowe, Dr. Benjamin writes to prompt action. Viral Justice is a revelation of hope – if social inequities rely on our individual complicity to maintain harmful systems then social justice requires individuals to participate,” said Karen Fisk, Executive Director of the Harriet Beecher Stowe Center.

On Friday, September 22 is the Free Public Event which will be held across the street at the Immanuel Congregational Church – from 5:00 – 6:00 pm will be a Justice Fair featuring local likeminded organizations engaged in a broad spectrum of social justice work, followed from 6:00 – 8:00 pm by a presentation and discussion with Dr. Benjamin. To open the Free Public Event, Stowe Prize program, Dr. Benjamin will be introduced by our 2023 and 2022 Artists in Residence, Kimolee Eryn and Versatile Poetiq from the Artists of Color Accelerator program. “We recognize the power of community and we are working hard to illuminate that in our neighborhood. We are here to lift up those voices that encourage social justice and literary activism,” spoke Cat White, the new Director of Public Programs. “The Stowe Prize is just one of the ways the Stowe Center highlights a critical contemporary issue and gives voice to speak out against injustices.” The Harriet Beecher Stowe Center encourages social justice and literary activism by exploring the legacy of Harriet Beecher Stowe.

Dr. Benjamin is the ninth recipient of the Stowe Prize, following Dr. Clint Smith in 2022 for How the Word Is Passed, Dr. Eddie S. Glaude Jr. in 2021 for Begin Again, Albert Woodfox in 2020 for Solitary, Matthew Desmond in 2018 for Evicted, Bryan Stevenson in 2017 for Just Mercy, Ta-Nehisi Coates in 2015 for The Case for Reparations, Michelle Alexander in 2013 for The New Jim Crow, and Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn in 2011 for Half the Sky.

About Dr. Ruha Benjamin

Ruha Benjamin is an internationally recognized writer, speaker, and professor of African American Studies at Princeton University, where she is the founding director of the Ida B. Wells Just Data Lab. She is the award-winning author of Race After Technology: Abolitionist Tools for the New Jim Crow Code and editor of Captivating Technology, among many other publications. Her work has been featured widely in the media, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, The Root, and The Guardian.

About the Stowe Prize

The Stowe Prize recognizes the author of a distinguished book of general adult fiction or nonfiction whose written work illuminates a critical social justice issue in the tradition of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin. The winning book applies informed inquiry, is accessible and engaging to a wide audience, and promotes empathy and understanding. In creating this award, the Stowe Center recognizes the power of literary activism.

For media partners interested in the photo opportunity with Dr. Ruha Benjamin, please email your attendance to Christina Tom, Communications Manager [CTom@StoweCenter.org].

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The Harriet Beecher Stowe Center is a museum, research library, and program center in Hartford, Connecticut. The Stowe Center’s mission is to preserve and interpret Stowe’s Hartford home and the Center’s historic collections, promote vibrant discussion of her life and work, and inspire commitment to social justice and positive change. For general information and updates, visit www.HarrietBeecherStoweCenter.org.

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CONTACT: Christina Tom

Harriet Beecher Stowe Center

860.522.9258 x305 | CTom@StoweCenter.org

Isabella Beecher Hooker

Isabella Holmes Beecher Hooker (1822-1907)
An ardent member of the woman’s suffrage movement, Isabella Holmes Beecher Hooker joined in the cause along with Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony.

Isabella was the first child of Lyman Beecher and his second wife, Harriet Porter Beecher.

Isabella began her education at Catharine Beecher’s Hartford Female Seminary and lived with her sister Mary Perkins. In 1841 she married John Hooker, a descendant of Thomas Hooker, the founder of Hartford. John Hooker was a lawyer and an abolitionist.

In the early 1860s Isabella got involved in the woman’s suffrage movement. Isabella joined Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony as a member of the National Woman’s Suffrage Association in 1869. She was a founding member of the Connecticut Woman’s Suffrage Association. Isabella’s ideas of equality were influenced by John Stuart Mills’ On Liberty and the Subjection of Women.

In 1871, Isabella organized the annual convention of the National Woman’s Suffrage Association in Washington D.C. and presented her argument before the Committee on the Judiciary of the United States Senate. Her husband, John Hooker, believed in his wife and supported her activities. He helped Isabella draft a bill to the Connecticut Legislature giving married women the same property rights as their husbands. The bill passed in 1877. Isabella annually submitted a bill granting women the right to vote, but it did not pass in her lifetime.

Stowe Prize 2023 Photo Opportunity

The 2023 Stowe Prize is awarded to Dr. Ruha Benjamin, a professor of African American studies at Princeton University, for her book, Viral Justice: How We Grow the World We Want.

Benjamin will be available for a media photo opportunity on Thursday, September 21 from 5:15 – 6:15 pm.

The Stowe Prize Program begins at 5:00 pm with General Reception. Benjamin will be in the Katharine Seymour Day House with honored guests.

School Group Interest Form 2024

Group Tour Interest Form 2022