| Marquetta Goodwine | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Queen Mother, Chieftess of the Gullah Geeche Nation[1][2][3] | |||||
 | |||||
| Queen of the Gullah | |||||
| Reign | July 2, 2002 - present[4][1][2] | ||||
| Coronation | July 2, 2002 | ||||
| Predecessor | Position established | ||||
| Born | St. Helena Island, South Carolina | ||||
| |||||
Marquetta L. Goodwine is a non-sovereign, elected monarch who serves as Queen Quet, Chieftess of the Gullah Geechee Nation.[2][1] She is an author, preservationist, and performance artist.
Goodwine is a native of St. Helena Island, South Carolina. She attended Fordham College at Lincoln Center and double majored in computer science and mathematics.[5] In 1996 she left Fordham and the founded of the Gullah/Geechee Sea Island Coalition.[5][6] In 1999 she became the first Gullah to speak before the United Nations, giving testimony at an April 1 hearing of the Commission on Human Rights in Switzerland.[7] She participated in the United Nations Forum on Minority Rights which was first established in 2008. At the forum, Queen Quet recorded the human rights struggle of the Gullah/Geechee people for archival by the United Nations.[8]
On 2 July 2002, Goodwine was elected and enstooled as "Queen Quet, chieftess of the Gullah/Geechee Nation."[5][9] Goodwine also serves as the Chair of the Gullah/Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor General Management Plan and Expert Commissioner for South Carolina. She is a member of the 15-person commission established by the United States Gullah/Geechee Cultural Heritage Act which was passed by the United States Congress.
Goodwine is a public advocate for the Gullah/Geechee Sea Islands in the face of increasing storm damage resulting from the climate crisis[10] as well as ongoing flooding due to overdevelopment and poor infrastructure maintenance.[11] Her work includes advocating and the preservation of Gullah/Geechee cultural traditions and resources that are threatened due to gentrification and climate change.[12]
Goodwine served as a consultant for the 2000 Mel Gibson film The Patriot, which featured scenes set on the South Carolina coast of the Gullah/Geechee Nation. She has been an advisor to several historic documentaries, including This Far by Faith: The African American Religious Experience, The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow, Slavery and the Making of America, Reconstruction: The Second Civil War, and The Will to Survive: The Story of the Gullah/Geechee Nation. She also lectures throughout the world.
She is the founder of a historic presentation troupe "De Gullah Cunneckshun," which has recorded several CDs and been featured on films and film soundtracks.[13][14]
In 2022, she was awarded the Order of the Palmetto by South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster, who has sought to preserve the Gullah culture in the state.[15]
