Shannon Kelley Email Address

Columnist

Santa Barbara Independent deliver fresh online news, arts, and entertainment coverage all day, every day.

As an experienced writer, editor, and author, I'm deeply at home in the publishing environment, and am enthusiastic about where the industry is headed. In nearly a decade on staff at the Santa Barbara Independent, my responsibilities included planning special issues and regular weekly content; managing staff and freelancers; representing the publication at community and industry events; assigning, packaging, and editing stories for print and online; and writing columns, features, essays, in-depth, reported pieces, and briefs. I'm interested in the big picture as well as the details: I directed a major section redesign (delivered ahead of deadline) and rarely have met a piece I was too busy to line-edit. Additionally, my writing has appeared in Elle, The Washington Post, Aeon, The New Republic, and elsewhere. In 2011, my first book Undecided (Seal Press) was published; in it, I explore feminism's unfinished work and what living in a half-changed world means for women today. Writing about these themes allowed me to develop a solid online presence and led to speaking engagements; outreach from my readers inspired me to get certified as a coach (incidentally, this training has proven as helpful in managing staff and freelancers as it in my work with private clients). An essay I contributed to the 2009 anthology Submerged, about driving across the country to work with Habitat for Humanity in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. A reporting trip to Africa in 2012 was a personal career highlight, and ignited my passion for gender equality in terms of education and opportunity, particularly in the developing world. But my most important and inspiring work is being a mom, which has also made me more patient, flexible, and efficient than I ever imagined I could be.