Karen Lee (she/shi/fi ar) is a performance artist and writer living in Tsi Tkaròn:to, Ontarí:io, Kanata. Her work explores polyvocality, language and refusal, and has appeared in publications including Obsidian, Room, Fiddlehead and Malahat Review. She was shortlisted for the 2018 Small Axe Literary Prize. Lee is a recipient of a 2023 Cave Canem Fellowship, the Bread Loaf Katharine Bakeless Nason Contributor Award in Poetry, and the 2020 Pacific Spirit Poetry Grand Prize from PRISM international. Her first manuscript, Tekkin Back Tongue, takes its name from a self-directed writing residency she began in Ghana and Kenya in 2018, followed by residencies and writing periods in Kenya in 2021, Germany and France in 2022, Jamaica and Senegal in 2024, Jamaica and Barbados in 2025, and Trinidad and Tobago in 2026. Tekkin Back Tongue is currently under publisher review.
