tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3843942948077046842024-03-08T03:31:38.800-08:00SDSU Children's LiteratureDept. of English & Comparative Literature. San Diego State University.
San Diego, California 92182-6020 U.S.
tel (+1) 619-594-5443; fax 594-4998Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04179001297077432918noreply@blogger.comBlogger1415125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-43097775792983610792022-04-22T14:03:00.001-07:002022-04-26T08:45:09.628-07:00CCICL Episode 5 with Newbery Award Winning author Matt de la Peña & NYT bestselling illustrator Loren Long <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p>In the fifth episode of Critical Conversations in Children's Literature Dr. Lashon Daley continues the conversation of collaboration in the industry of Children's Literature with guests Matt de la Peña and Loren Long. They discuss their collaborative process while working on the 2018 New York Times bestselling picture book <i>Love </i>as well as a current project<i>. </i></p><p>Matt de la Peña is the author of middle-grade and young adult novels such as <i>Mexican WhiteBoy, We Were Here </i>and <i>Superman: Dawnbreaker </i>as well as a handful of children's picture books like L<i>ast Stop on Market Street </i>for which he won the Newbery. </p><p>Loren Long is the illustrator of former President Barack Obama's picture book <i>Of Thee I Sing, Mr. Peabody's Apples </i>by Madonna. <i>Change Sings </i>by Amanda Gorman and a host of other picture books including the <i>Otis </i>series. <i> </i></p><p>Watch the video below!</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="366" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/4rFpzIFT9uA" width="468" youtube-src-id="4rFpzIFT9uA"></iframe></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">We hope you enjoy this episode and make sure to follow our Youtube channel for more! </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">CCICL is funded by CAL IRA funds. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">- (NA)</div><br /><p><br /></p>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-78774164146089617122022-04-15T15:55:00.001-07:002022-04-26T08:43:52.410-07:00Episode 4 of Critical Conversations in Children's Literature with guest Lin Oliver<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEje6fryNUuYpgW3tMo2JJPchIjhIn-mitiKsUAVgEcpKZBkkWDN8MmsswTB9thEzryWNfLPqMfRtfE3KUn6-9-kgK-hA-P4RKg8Il0uaFERcaEm4hkD2658BCc8BfNbw_wZYq1PeKThvg5GEnhLmGKDb3kjXd-oLmLdsgOvD7Bx5z23HsKUMcTbYNRMUg/s3872/Lin%20Oliver_Headshot%20(1).jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2592" data-original-width="3872" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEje6fryNUuYpgW3tMo2JJPchIjhIn-mitiKsUAVgEcpKZBkkWDN8MmsswTB9thEzryWNfLPqMfRtfE3KUn6-9-kgK-hA-P4RKg8Il0uaFERcaEm4hkD2658BCc8BfNbw_wZYq1PeKThvg5GEnhLmGKDb3kjXd-oLmLdsgOvD7Bx5z23HsKUMcTbYNRMUg/s320/Lin%20Oliver_Headshot%20(1).jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="font-size: medium; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>Critical Conversations in Children's Literature is a web series developed to bring children's literary writers in conversation with scholars to discuss critical topics brewing within the field. This web series is funded by CAL IRA funds. <p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: times; white-space: pre-wrap;">The series was developed by our very own Dr. Lashon Daley, assistant professor in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at San Diego State University. This series is funded by the College of Arts & Letters Instructional Activities Grant and is hosted in collaboration with the National Center for the Study of Children's Literature.</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: times; white-space: pre-wrap;">Episode 4 titled: "Thoughts on 'Collaboration' in the Industry of Children's Literature" features a conversation between Dr. Daley and Lin Oliver, which</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: times; white-space: pre-wrap;"> centers on the topic of collaboration within the industry of children’s literature. </span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Lin Oliver is the co-founder, along with Stephen Mooser, of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators also known as SCBWI. She serves as its Executive Director. Working from its headquarters in Los Angeles, Lin guides the organization through changes and challenges of the contemporary publishing field and is proud to help launch new careers that will change the face of children's picture books. </span></span></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">So without further ado, here's episode 4 of CCICL:</span></span></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: times;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: times;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="346" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ou9pxJ8wdfE" width="473" youtube-src-id="ou9pxJ8wdfE"></iframe></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: times;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: times;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times;">We hope you enjoy it! Until next time!</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times;">-NA</span></div><span style="font-family: times;"><br /><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><p></p>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-53738717043428146432022-04-15T11:12:00.009-07:002022-04-16T15:00:54.976-07:00Notes on Dr. Maria Tatar's Lecture: “A 'Damn Mob' of Scribbling Girls”<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhK3aof9Fcu8WiKKgyAlNNTW4KeJbgMK7xCqu_KxPsKqEOQ7jBr_70cIGGsUdsBlmH4WGBlUSLknTCk_7KnxXnox35BjxAQPcG-mnrviBpn9pJe9ZT7BqssHQT03cwb4STUt-45lrX8MpDYD2ZtTruH5XgffMbVldoDW6Os4zbrIQmfj4mDPWRvRBf6VQ/s1616/image001.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1077" data-original-width="1616" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhK3aof9Fcu8WiKKgyAlNNTW4KeJbgMK7xCqu_KxPsKqEOQ7jBr_70cIGGsUdsBlmH4WGBlUSLknTCk_7KnxXnox35BjxAQPcG-mnrviBpn9pJe9ZT7BqssHQT03cwb4STUt-45lrX8MpDYD2ZtTruH5XgffMbVldoDW6Os4zbrIQmfj4mDPWRvRBf6VQ/s320/image001.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p style="text-align: left;"><span> </span>As someone encountering Dr. Maria Tatar’s work for the first time during this event, I was not disappointed! Dr. Tatar is a research professor at Harvard University and specializes in children’s literature, modern German culture, and folklore. Her research includes authors like the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen, childhood reading and cultural studies, and folklore and mythology. Her most recent work, The Heroine with 1001 Faces, takes on the staggering yet hidden history of heroines, challenging the male-centric models of heroism in Joseph Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces. In this latest publication, Dr. Tatar flips the script on what it means to be a “curious” young woman, emphasizing how these girls depart from the canon through their compassion and craft. Her interests culminated in the event titled “A ‘Damn Mob’ of Scribbling Girls: From Jo March to Starr Carter,” which explored girls from popular media and literature who find agency within domestic spaces and enact their power, not only to survive, but to care for others. </p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Dr. Tatar began her lecture with images of warrior women – cinematic women who are dramatically armed and ready for battle. She highlights their strength that both ornaments and sustains their femininity. Whether glittering in golden armor or fitted in a flowing red dress while riding in a chariot, these young women embody a feminine power that defies the traditional domestic spaces they find themselves in. In this opening, Dr. Tatar introduces her argument: these girls, trained to accommodate themselves in a society of gendered propriety, rebel against dominant power structures through their craft. </p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>The first literary work Dr. Tatar introduces is Louisa May Alcott’s beloved novel Little Women. However, she invokes the character Jo March through the film directed by Greta Gerwig (2019) instead of the novel. While Alcott captures all the dimensions of the domestic, the acts meant to make a home comfortable, Gerwig’s Jo March exuberantly displays how reading, writing, and acting are radical acts of rebellion. This emphasis on a young woman’s reach for autonomy allowed Dr. Tatar to identify the potential for heroism within domesticity. She identifies writing as a craft that provides an opportunity for heroism, an action that involves both curiosity and care. Tatar defines craft as cunning design, work that has been carried out in multiple modalities such as knitting, weaving, storytelling, or simply talking. </p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>In both the novel and the film, the heroes of the story are the fathers heading off to war while the women maintain the home space. Dr. Tatar urges us to ask: Who are our heroes? Our heroines? She grafts onto her argument the concept of the hero from Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces to assert that women are not the ones receiving the call to action. If anything, this persistence of men at the forefront of heroism has become the Hollywood narrative playbook. It becomes an easy correlation to see men returning from war as a literalized hero’s journey. However, Dr. Tatar reminds us that the return in the hero’s journey is always about healing. Here, in curious and caring spaces, is where women can no longer be silenced. </p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>The lecture took a poignant turn when Dr. Tatar connected her ideas with the COVID-19 lockdowns we have collectively experienced in the past two years. In lockdown, she notes, we were looking for heroes. We found them in our community caretakers, like doctors and nurses, childcare workers, and educators. More than anything, though, we encountered silence. Like the image of Philomena weaving her tapestry, the concept of heroism faces a cultural reboot during the COVID-19 pandemic. The investment in healing and care work, fields predominantly held by women, found a refreshed prioritization and attention from the public. Dr. Tatar turns to Carlos Fuentes and restates, “Writing is a struggle against silence.” Here, she draws a comparison to the strategy of silenced women. As mentioned before, craft becomes the strategy to find a voice. Through texts and textiles, women speak truth to power. </p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>One of the tenets of her work, curiosity, is seen as the cardinal sin of women while care is delegitimized on the basis of gender oppressive attitudes. Dr. Tatar moves from writing as a form of discovering identity and self actualization to a desire for immortality. This curiosity thus becomes a commitment to causes these young women are passionate about, concretizing their thoughts and ideas in written word. The literary text Dr. Tatar closes her lecture with is Angie Thomas’s The Hate U Give. Through the protagonist, Starr Carter, Dr. Tatar realizes that self-actualization and a commitment to social causes are not mutually exclusive. From Anne of Green Gables to Matilda, Anne Frank to Harriet the Spy, the craft of writing becomes a mode of achieving an encounter with an empowered self, a political act that speaks truth to power. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVlCDHyXNWR_NIl0fiaDoz10bO5WusSl_nqH4KH0kaqMAZWxUcNR_45lkOQ2vISQECrITBfcJLcKghlBE52b_dVLnwQmmsMSPudYoWmcfIhoqduEUr9UcPQwDXUFaAZoU4v9lTPLUzPAzQlcZVfuUntwafAPNs1-0FmysqggL3NshYWYI1Pio7ItkssQ/s5080/IMG_7585.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3653" data-original-width="5080" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVlCDHyXNWR_NIl0fiaDoz10bO5WusSl_nqH4KH0kaqMAZWxUcNR_45lkOQ2vISQECrITBfcJLcKghlBE52b_dVLnwQmmsMSPudYoWmcfIhoqduEUr9UcPQwDXUFaAZoU4v9lTPLUzPAzQlcZVfuUntwafAPNs1-0FmysqggL3NshYWYI1Pio7ItkssQ/s320/IMG_7585.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p><span> </span>I was very intrigued by Dr. Tatar’s inspirations for this work. One of the most compelling was Scheherazade, a major female character from One Thousand and One Nights who is also a scholar and reader. She is a storyteller, and known as a master of cliffhangers, who understands the seductive power of stories. Dr. Tatar also emphasizes that she is a survivor, ensuring that others will be saved and protected from the antagonist of her story. She also invokes the classic tales of Pandora and Eve, two young women whose bodies are sexualized and whose curiosity is read as carnal rather than intellectual. Through these figures, she calls on us to consider replacing empathy with curiosity, craft, and care. Rather than universalizing our characters or their experiences, Dr. Tatar invites us to raise critical awareness about the codes of gender that inform power in these texts and, ultimately, the way we perceive “domestic” activities as passive. As she states in the lecture, “readers often seek their mirrors in books.” Through the close reading Tatar promotes, we achieve tools for learning how to navigate our real world relationships via the representations we find in these stories and move with the mob of scribbling women. </p><p><span> </span>Readers and writers in the audience also asked some very intriguing questions about Dr. Tatar’s work. Some listeners asked about the labor of our bodies, the work of our hands, and how to reconcile this with the public arena. Dr. Tatar invited us to compare Jo March with Starr Carter, and the modes they used to share their voices. While Jo March hand-wrote her thoughts, Starr Carter takes on a megaphone and a computer keyboard as powerful instruments for securing justice. Other listeners discussed what it means to “give up” one’s femininity in exchange for strength, or if femininity can be perceived as strength itself. Dr. Tatar invokes examples from modern film and media, like Katniss Everdeen of The Hunger Games (dir. Gary Ross) or Snow White from Snow White and the Huntsmen (dir. Rupert Sanders) – both of these young women display strength while also being connected to poetry, song, and art. A few others brought up the question of rethinking passivity from past to present. We’re invited to look more deeply into domestic actions while understanding the circumstances of women like Jo March as narrow. Dr. Tatar inspired me to use that historical past to reimagine curiosity, craft, and care in today’s world. This reimagining allows us to reconstruct our imaging of girlhood while understanding our own writing as heroic.</p><p style="text-align: right;">DN</p>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-56994851457621757962022-03-18T12:31:00.002-07:002022-04-26T08:43:30.239-07:00Episode 3 of Critical Conversations in Children's Literature with guest Dr. Libby Gruner <p><span style="background-color: white; font-family: times;"><span style="font-size: medium; white-space: pre-wrap;">Critical Conversations in Children's Literature is a web series developed to bring children's literary writers in conversation with scholars to discuss critical topics brewing within the field. </span></span><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large; white-space: pre-wrap;">This web series is funded by CAL IRA funds. </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: times; font-size: large; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><span style="background-color: white; font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">The series was developed by Dr. Lashon Daley an assistant professor in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at San Diego State University. This series is funded by the College of Arts & Letters Instructional Activities Grant and is hosted in collaboration with the National Center for the Study of Children's Literature.</span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">
</span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">
</span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Episode 3 features a conversation between Dr. Daley and Dr. Libby Gruner, centered on the topic of collaboration within the academic field of children’s literature.</span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">
</span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">
</span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Libby Gruner is the 2021-2022 President of ChLA, which is the Children's Literature Association (ChLA). Libby is a scholar of both YA and Victorian literature. She has taught at the University of Richmond since 1993, where she is a Professor of English and Coordinator of Faculty Development in Teaching.</span></span><div><br /></div><div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Without further ado, here's episode 3 of CCICL:</span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: times;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="348" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/b176YtU_qZg" width="481" youtube-src-id="b176YtU_qZg"></iframe></div><br /></span><div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: times;"><span style="font-size: medium; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: times;"><span style="font-size: medium; white-space: pre-wrap;">We hope you enjoy this episode! </span></span></div></div></div>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-5116212804104499782022-03-17T13:50:00.004-07:002022-03-17T13:53:42.388-07:00Review of Pet by Akwaeke Emezi<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh44MGgK8tUAi3Tzqffs9BgmIht1CwYZfEpgzsz4VE-py5EpxO2u6Y04-dYoDO4m4RyYP7o_sIt8jlM1UQdkwbMwbwFTpwG4za5zePiNELYl7VkUlSSgj4O0l10sKFnYvwEXt7HjYt7LIR_dvnEJFE7nOx28z8KHLeZ4biCRmjw1ZP02uECXbj7Yo8yDQ=s500" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="500" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh44MGgK8tUAi3Tzqffs9BgmIht1CwYZfEpgzsz4VE-py5EpxO2u6Y04-dYoDO4m4RyYP7o_sIt8jlM1UQdkwbMwbwFTpwG4za5zePiNELYl7VkUlSSgj4O0l10sKFnYvwEXt7HjYt7LIR_dvnEJFE7nOx28z8KHLeZ4biCRmjw1ZP02uECXbj7Yo8yDQ=s320" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-51d1ef26-7fff-f79b-faba-7fd634ab38b0"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Akwaeke Emezi’s young adult fantasy novel </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Pet</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> follows Jam, a selectively mute trans girl, as she embarks on a hunt with Pet, a creature that emerges from one of her mother’s paintings after drops of her blood meet its surface. Before Jam’s world is altered forever, she lives in the aftermath of a revolution in Lucille, a utopian city. The revolution worked to rid Lucille of beings called “monsters” by way of “angels.” Or so Jam’s family believes. Communicating telepathically, Pet tells Jam that her best friend, Redemption, is in danger and only she and Pet can seek out the monster that threatens him. Against the wishes of her mother, Bitter, and father, Aloe, the strange pair begin their hunt for the monsters they believe were defeated. Readers are asked the same question put to Jam and Aloe: are we too afraid to see the unseen and to know the unknown? </span></span></p><p><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 14pt; font-style: italic; white-space: pre-wrap;">Forgetting is how the monsters come back. (20)</span> </p><p></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-a8ddaa99-7fff-15a7-9642-877acf6e72bf"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">At the center of the narrative is Jam, a selectively mute young woman. Her muteness was an inclusion I hadn’t seen before, where a character chose to speak only when she deemed it necessary. Jam spends much of the story using sign language with those around her. However, when Pet appears, their telepathy provides yet another avenue for Jam to communicate her thoughts and feelings. Despite Pet’s ability to read her thoughts, Emezi gives Jam a great deal of narrative agency by asserting that Jam speaks out loud on her own terms. In the moments she is speaking, we, as readers, understand her urgency and desire to impart her own ideas in a world that prioritizes sound. </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;"><span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-152c288a-7fff-d0ca-6089-36afb556fed0"><span style="font-size: 14pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Of course there were still monsters, Jam thought. Could you really make something stop existing just by shoving it away somewhere else? (50)</span></span></span></span></p><p></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-1c77026d-7fff-10e1-4f59-3ad0411c1b31"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Jam’s relationship with her best friend, Redemption, and his family illustrate a wonderful example of community. Redemption’s family’s home dynamics come to represent the power of unity in home-making. When Emezi introduces Redemption’s family, you’re immediately immersed in their complete care. You can almost smell what Redemption’s mother, Malachite, is preparing in the kitchen and hear his baby cousins playing. I also loved reading about the friendship between Redemption and Jam. Their bond is clearly intimate and purely platonic, always assuaging one another’s fears and anxieties. Together, they are a wonderful example of a friendship that thrives without the pressures of heteronormativity, which sets Emezi’s story apart from what we might encounter in this genre.</span></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><br /></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-9b5d6e24-7fff-3faa-dbfb-15432fd78b54"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The world we enter when opening up </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Pet</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> is easy to describe as “utopic”: Lucille is a town whose monsters were eradicated by angels. However, Emezi is careful to note that this utopia did not come about solely by the miracle of angels. Creating Lucille took work, labor, and trial and error. In this world, identity is fluid, evolving, and boundless. However, Pet is only there for one thing: to eliminate a monster. The knowledge of a monster in Lucille shocks Jam. She knows there aren’t supposed to be any more monsters in Lucille. Her father, Aloe, has reassured her plenty before. This novel deals with difficult topics, such as sexual ab*se, and Emezi doesn’t shy away from them. They grant their characters a great deal of narrative agency. I was inspired by their determination to rid their world of a monster and continue their practice of community care.</span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-743a6ac6-7fff-5923-dbd1-4474acd25111"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 14pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></span></p><blockquote style="text-align: center;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-4dead4f8-7fff-3a7d-4b50-10b36e1f4107"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 14pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A pool of water with the moon reflecting in it… who would want to throw a stone and break the picture? It is fine to be afraid, to have a fine fear, to not want to cross a fine line. (94)</span></span></blockquote><p></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-53afd909-7fff-9155-1001-d03a6750e90b"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">For Jam, the world seems split in two: she lives in a world where verbal communication is prioritized, and another with its own interrelated, nuanced layers of non-verbal understanding. I was drawn to her through these multiple modalities, and moved to follow her lead as an emotionally mature, loving daughter. A third world is opened up when Pet emerges from her mother’s latest painting, however, that challenges both the closeness she feels with her parents and her understanding of the world. Born from a deep maternal legacy that drives much of the narrative we encounter, the connection between Bitter, Jam, and Pet is shared (literally) by blood and through art. Pet’s maternal nature allows Jam to navigate between these two worlds she finds herself in with deaf/mute culture while simultaneously reckoning with the split she’s experiencing in her reality. Pet brings Jam to an understanding that monsters are still lurking, despite all of our efforts to eradicate them, whether it be through pure goodness or rehabilitation. However, despite this painful reality, Pet’s presence and collaboration with the kids reveals how the power rests in the voices of our youth, no matter how they show up in the world.</span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: right;"><span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">DN</span></span></p>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-52860021091735727322022-03-04T16:21:00.004-08:002022-03-23T10:51:33.049-07:00Review of No Filter and Other Lies by Crystal Maldonado <p style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #555555; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><img height="338" src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/UHwy2nQA5BsjomgRPRZRdS5cc9PEuNu5YXz_R88atdHo89K_xvEoryix8APzaUSR2QdTmD39pYR61pYJsWn0RbZ3F5RXyEoi3YXu1d0lBFUNL_3QJy_0gVL4N8mGL9S6K6vPXlaJ" style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="224" /></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the first reviews that I wrote for this blog was for Crystal Maldonado’s debut novel, </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. One year later, here I am with a review for Maldonado’s sophomore work, </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">No Filter and Other Lies</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. It feels like I have come full circle as a Grad Assistant.</span></span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-5b7d9c06-7fff-b7c1-d94b-e8fa87333c4e" style="font-family: times;"><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 17pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">No Filter and Other Lies</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> follows Kat Sanchez, a half-Puerto Rican high-school senior, as she navigates family relationships, self-love, sexuality, and friendships. Extremely obsessed with her follower count, Kat finds herself increasingly disappointed that the photography she posts to her account doesn’t receive the recognition she believes it deserves. At the beginning of the novel, she wonders why her pictures do not get as much engagement on Instagram as she hopes: “I don’t know what I’m doing wrong, but my account is practically dead…Yet, my aesthetic on that account is AMAZING…every single picture is serving a </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">vibe</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> and a </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">color scheme</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> and a </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">mood, </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and they look good </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">as a whole” </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(9). Kat is proud of her pictures and understands how talented she is, but the worth of her photographs is tied to how many likes, comments, and followers she gains per post. Validation through social media is one of the themes of the narrative. As the story progresses, readers gain insight into the downfalls of seeking validation via social platforms. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 17pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Kat lives with her grandparents and, while she loves them, she wishes she had a more traditional family. Her parents had her while they were still in high school, since they were so young her grandparents–Ray and Bethie–agreed to take care of Kat themselves. Even</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">though she stayed with her grandparents, her brother (Leo), who was born a year later, lives with their parents. Kat is asked to lie about her family situation at a very young age and this eventually leads her to lie constantly. </span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-ae3f95b7-7fff-0722-6387-789a6d9bfffd"><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 17pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the aspects of Maldonado’s work I adore is her tendency to explore complicated family dynamics. We got a glimpse of this in her previous book (</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">) with Charlie and her mother. </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">follows Charlie as she experiences first love and self-acceptance. Charlie and her mother have a difficult relationship because her mom insists on Charlie losing weight and pushes her to diet. This causes a rift between them. In </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">No Filter and Other Lies </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">the exploration of these family dynamics continue, which dramatizes unflinchingly Kat’s relationships with her mother, father, and sibling. Kat’s mother, Sarah, wants to have a picture perfect family, which makes Kat feel ostracized. Their dynamic drives how Kat views herself and how she approaches honesty. Then there’s her father, Anthony or Pop, who is a bit distant but despite this Kat wants a deeper connection with him. She wants to learn more about her Puerto Rican roots since he lived on the island when he was younger. Her brother, Leo, and her do not have a close relationship, but Kat yearns for a deeper sibling bond. All of Kat’s relationships with her family members inform the choices Kat makes throughout the narrative. Family dynamics is one of the biggest topics explored in </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">No Filter and Other Lies</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. It was great to see a children’s book featuring family structures besides the nuclear family or single-parent homes.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 17pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Kat lies about her family situation constantly, she tells people in her school and on social media that she lives with her parents and brother. She was first asked to lie about her family when she was in elementary school by her mother and since then Kat has felt uncomfortable telling others the truth. She calls this lie “the first lie” and it ripples to other parts of her life, this one little lie leading to others of increasing magnitude. How do you stop yourself from lying when you’ve been asked to do so for such a long time? It was great to see the web of lies and how it was not something teen Kat crafted but how it started due to her parents. This modeled behavior becomes the source of her lying. Maldonado weaves all of them fantastically. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 17pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Our main character is delightfully messy. She lies constantly and is selfish, but she is so beautifully characterized that we like her despite these flaws, as it is clear that she’s just a young woman trying to figure out who she is, making plenty of mistakes along the way. I absolutely loved Kat’s character journey! </span></p></span><span id="docs-internal-guid-f1f61647-7fff-3d7e-af30-66bb4e2cb3cc"><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 17pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Throughout the novel Kat realizes she is bisexual as she develops an unexpected crush. The narrative does not center solely on this aspect of Kat’s life, so it does not turn into a “coming-out” narrative. Maldonado deviates from common YA narratives, which center the pain of being queer and brings the focus to the importance of discovering who you are. Her sexuality does not become a point of tension instead it is an opportunity for Kat to express self-love. It presents the exploration of sexuality as a normal occurrence of adolescence. </span></p></span><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 17pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Kat can’t get away from her phone, constantly comparing herself to others as a result of being glued to Instagram. I was pleased that this is such a big part of the novel. I</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">found Kat’s struggles with Instagram extremely relatable and it made me evaluate my relationship with the platform, and it will doubtlessly encourage young readers to do the same.</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Whenever Kat talks about how she feels about IG I couldn’t help but think of “Jealousy, Jealousy” by Olivia Rodrigo. Especially, the song’s chorus: “</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Com-comparison is killin' me </span></span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">slowly/ I think I think too much/ 'Bout kids who don't know me.” Kat’s acceptance and confidence does not come from herself but ,as the song mentions, from external sources. </span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-b739a45d-7fff-77a5-5eb4-65efd38bd03f"><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 17pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The book deals heavily with catfishing, a trope that I don’t like; however, the narrative does a good job addressing how it is harmful. The effects of catfishing are not glossed over, it shows how there are consequences to breaking the trust of someone who cares about you. Despite its overuse in YA, Maldonado gives the reader a nuanced representation of the catfishing trope. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 17pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I also enjoyed the character dynamics. </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">No Filter and Other Lies</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> has a great cast of characters. Kat’s friends (Hari, Luis, and Marcus) were just as flawed as she was. Making their group dynamics a pleasure to read. It was nice to see how they all developed as a group too, from the expected youthful antics to the more vulnerable moments they share. She develops other friendships along the way through social media and her work at a local animal shelter. Two of these friendships lead Kat to uncover her family trauma and find new ways to cope with it. Through her work in the animal shelter she strikes a friendship with a three-legged dog, which was absolutely heartwarming to read. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 17pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">No Filter and Other Lies</span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> is ultimately a story about coping with family trauma, accepting yourself as you are, and learning to share your true self with the ones you love. The novel has bi representation and a super cute 3-legged friend that will steal your heart. Moreover, Crystal Maldonado has become one of my favorite contemporary authors. Her stories are straight-forward, fun, and raw. I am extremely grateful to have stories with amazing Puerto Rican representation, something I desperately wished for when I was a child. </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.44; margin-bottom: 17pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 11.5pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">-NA</span></p></span></span>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-44854570418474182052022-02-18T14:12:00.001-08:002022-02-18T14:12:12.494-08:00Meet Our New Graduate Assistant! <p><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">We are so excited to welcome our new Graduate Assistant, Dani Nouriazad! Graduate Assistant Natalie asked Dani a few questions to get to know them. Read more about it below!</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhcm3jrshLU3gEpSgoChGRIRUBFW1T7rhMsaJBYzix3keNFEFybKU1f9o2XmSZDFQhzfJL7Lim_Akjm_erunnHefTpfyCqVt9rxXdenVs7DCJPogpfmqounpcaPTdI2vXgejahxYNqnVINDqgxfoK3y7gBgeCXp2LH2ZTwZbvnUZq1Iyp47tpDMcXrOWg=s1000" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="814" height="372" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhcm3jrshLU3gEpSgoChGRIRUBFW1T7rhMsaJBYzix3keNFEFybKU1f9o2XmSZDFQhzfJL7Lim_Akjm_erunnHefTpfyCqVt9rxXdenVs7DCJPogpfmqounpcaPTdI2vXgejahxYNqnVINDqgxfoK3y7gBgeCXp2LH2ZTwZbvnUZq1Iyp47tpDMcXrOWg=w302-h372" width="302" /></a></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><br /></span></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; white-space: pre-wrap;">Tell us a bit about yourself. How long have you been in the MA program? What are your scholarly interests? Are you teaching at the moment? </span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-a05a0d8e-7fff-acf4-35ae-aba35a5e4710"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">My name is Dani Nouriazad. I’m in my second semester of the MA program, studying children’s literature with a special interest in queer studies and gothic/horror studies. I’ve been interested in the world of children’s literature for about three years now! I’m particularly invested in young adult literature, but find myself enjoying picture books and poetry for children more and more. I am also an instructor on campus, teaching RWS 200: Rhetoric of Written Arguments in Context, with special focuses on poetry, community, and radical movement. So far, we’ve enjoyed grappling with what makes poetry meaningful, and how it accomplishes that impact. It has been a challenge, but I’m enjoying all that I’m learning about what it means to be on the other side of the desk.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What do you like to do in your spare time/outside of school?</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">As an English major, I'm sure you won't be surprised by my answer: I love reading! Many of my favorite stories include gothic themes and horror tropes, queer characters, fantastical landscapes, and perhaps a cheeky, lovable sidekick for comedic relief. From graphic novels to picture books, if it’s got a little strangeness, I’ll love it. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Lately, I’ve enjoyed Jewell Parker Rhodes’s </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ghost Boys</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, Anna-Marie McLemore’s </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When the Moon Was Ours</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, and Emily Lloyd-Jones’s </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Bone Houses</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. I also love Gloria Anzaldúa’s </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Amigos del Otro Lado </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Friends from the Other Side</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">), Matt de la Peña’s </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Milo Imagines the World</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, and Marjane Satrapi’s </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Persepolis</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. I especially enjoy toting along a good book as I lounge in many of the beautiful parks San Diego has to offer, with a sweet caffeinated beverage steaming by my side. I also enjoy reading and writing for small independent zine creators and poetry presses, like local magazine SOFT Quarterly. Otherwise, I find myself going on long walks around town, thrifting, and consuming far too much local artisanal ice cream. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What excites you most about starting as a graduate assistant for the NCSCL?</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">As someone who’s invested in our ability to transgress and disrupt the status quo, I am excited about working at the National Center for the Study of Children’s Literature, a great place to platform those voices and narratives that otherwise go unnoticed or unappreciated. The Center features so many diverse books and authors, it’s tough to choose just one world to explore at a time. The authors that the Center uplifts have shared stories that depart from the traditional narratives that we all know and appreciate. From offering LGBTQIA+ young adult protagonists to explorations of adverse experiences, like houselessness and addiction, the Center continues to add to the archive of childhood narratives, experiences, and subjectivities. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I’m certainly excited to have access to so much more material in the realm of children’s literature and to share what I learn with others. There is much to be gained from active study in this field, where we plant the ideas for movement makers, dreamers, and critical thinkers. It all starts with the kinds of access, information, and appreciation that NCSCL can provide. Whether it be book reviews, interviews, or sharing new and exciting releases, I’m thrilled to be a part of this team that continues the conversations in children’s literature. Being able to share it with anyone and everyone who finds the Center and our work intriguing is what makes it most worthwhile. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">[Image Description: Dani, wearing their hair down and in a leopard print top, holding up Gloria Anzaldúa's picture book, <i>Prietita and the Ghost Woman, </i>to show the cover<i>. </i>With the book covering the bottom half of their face, Dani is peeking over the book, making eye contact with the camera.]</span></p></span>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-35457091871402879082021-11-19T14:31:00.000-08:002021-11-19T14:31:17.943-08:00Introducing: Critical Conversations in Children's Literature - A Web Series<p><i style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA1iihuPmk4i3JRP_rf5-rVQoqEfBlhAWE0ycFNKN9rEelCigF-JY9hcWp14LVdfKqF4TVZEQbf02TZPW5wVzZbHlTKJVaRkHjHlHhC0G8TQIps3BZs0FxEYLGtrDFX1x53svEh0nlGaH8/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="400" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA1iihuPmk4i3JRP_rf5-rVQoqEfBlhAWE0ycFNKN9rEelCigF-JY9hcWp14LVdfKqF4TVZEQbf02TZPW5wVzZbHlTKJVaRkHjHlHhC0G8TQIps3BZs0FxEYLGtrDFX1x53svEh0nlGaH8/" width="240" /></a></div></div><p style="text-align: left;"><i style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Critical Conversations in Children’s Literature</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"> is a web series developed by Dr. Lashon Daley to bring together children’s literature authors and scholars to discuss critical topics brewing within the field. </span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">The first episode features a conversation between Tae Keller, the 2021 Newbery Award winner, and Dr. Daley, an assistant professor in the Department of English and Comparative Literature, discussing the representations of girlhood presented in Keller's novel, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">When You Trap A Tiger</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">. Their conversation provides new insights into representations of girlhood as it intersects with concepts of postmodern girlhood, decolonizing girlhood, and the impact of trauma on girlhood.<i> </i></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Watch it here:</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="351" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YVRP171iccI" width="491" youtube-src-id="YVRP171iccI"></iframe></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">The second episode, part two to Dr. Daley's conversation with middle-grade author Tae Keller, features Dr. Charlene Tung sharing her insights on the historical and theoretical context of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">When You Trap a Tiger. </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Tung, a professor of Women's and Gender Studies at Sonoma State University, specializes in gender and globalization, Asian American women's history/contemporary (im)migration, and gender and race-ethnicity in popular culture.</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Watch it here:</span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="365" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/c-weLMwGsqg" width="484" youtube-src-id="c-weLMwGsqg"></iframe></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Critical Conversations in Children’s Literature</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"> is funded by the Department of English and Comparative Literature at San Diego State University and is in collaboration with the National Center for the Study of Children's Literature.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">We hope you enjoy the series! </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">- (NA)</span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-86717463198689028452021-11-08T12:42:00.001-08:002022-03-23T10:52:01.135-07:00A Discussion of The Witch Boy by Molly Ostertag <p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-dc27a2b3-7fff-7fe1-2611-e0f39c02493a"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 475px; overflow: hidden; width: 317px;"><img height="475" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/gEKcbujBvj23jjmRjbsczszSjXG3DQpE9609iBy-MIeK8UQML1ug1EaNWC54b9L1Y9r3uaWYf5I234lba6dKnTbMCIAYTn4qfhc_735u4xJFs72l4w_GVnH09JTrc_IqSf488Cyu" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="317" /></span></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Molly Ostertag’s debut middle-grade graphic novel </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Witch Boy</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> was first published in 2017. The graphic novel was written and illustrated by Ostertag, and it follows Aster, a boy who wishes to practice witchcraft despite it being forbidden for boys. He lives in a magical community with his family, which is separated from human society and the only contact they have is with other magical families around the area. Each member of the community contributes to sustaining the way of life. The men in the community become shapeshifters whereas the women learn about witchcraft and perform spells. Aster has no interest in shapeshifting or physical fighting, instead, he wants to learn spells and the ways of the witches. Men and boys are forbidden from learning witchcraft since the community adheres to strict gender roles. There is only one man in the community who attempted to learn witchcraft before and it did not go well. Besides the challenges Aster faces due to his gender-nonconforming identity, his cousins are mysteriously going missing. </span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-49e7cfdc-7fff-f3bb-2804-a11a424854e6"><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">While reading this graphic novel, I could not help but pay attention to the representation of girlhood and how the novel constructs it. Currently, I am taking a class with Professor Lashon Daley in which we look at representations of girlhood in Middle-Grade and YA novels. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Witch Boy</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> is a graphic novel that interacts heavily with gender roles and how girlhood has been constructed in a magical society. </span></p><br /><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Witch Boy</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> does not waste any time in depicting girlhood. The graphic novel's construction of girlhood mirrors our society’s image of girlhood. For example, Aster is caught spying on the girls’ magical lesson, and an elder scolds him by saying: “Aster! This lesson isn’t for you -- these girls are learning secrets!” (Ostertag 5). Aster, as a boy, is berated for trying to learn girls’ “secrets.” </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">While reading this, I could not help but think about how girls and boys are separated for sex education in middle school</span><span face="Roboto, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #3c4043; font-size: 10.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Boys are not allowed to learn about girls’ bodily changes. The boys in the graphic novel do not have lessons like the girls’; they just play around and sometimes practice their shapeshifting. We learn quickly how gender roles are strictly upheld in this world, which very much mirrors our own. I enjoyed how this is how we are introduced to Aster. Immediately, we know that he does not fully fit into his community because of what is being said to him and where he is on the page (up on a tree at a distance). </span></span><div><div style="text-align: center;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-095907f4-7fff-b6d1-408e-fe68a72afe99"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><br /></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">In Dr. Daley’s course, we read Megan Henesy’s article ‘Leaving My Girlhood Behind’: Woke Witches and Feminist Liminality in </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Chilling Adventures of Sabrina</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">,” which centers Sabrina as the gothic figure due to how she navigates two worlds (2). In class, we discussed how Sabrina, as the “woke witch,” embodies the following characteristics: liminality, activism, being 16 years old, being a virgin, encountering a dark wizard, feeling out of place, choosing her place in society, and having a sidekick. I believe that </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The Witch Boy </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">is a great book to read through this lens. </span></p><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Many of the elements of Henesy’s “woke witch” framework are present in </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The Witch Boy. </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">First we have liminality. Aster exists in two spaces, boyhood and girlhood, and because of this he does not fit into his culture. The second characteristic is “activism,” which Aster engages in due to questioning why boys cannot perform witchcraft. Once Aster is caught spying on the girls’ magic lesson he has a conversation with his mother about not being able to perform witchcraft: “I don’t understand why Juniper and Hazel and them can all learn how to talk to trees and make potions and do spells and I can’t...It’s not fair” (7). After this he goes on to perform magic on his own, challenging the system in place. Furthermore, Aster does not meet the age requirement for the “woke witch.” </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The Witch Boy </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">is a middle-grade text, and his age is not specified. Aster can be presumed to be an older tween (10-12) or a young teen (13-14). As for the virginal state, </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The Witch Boy</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"> does not engage with sexuality, and due to his age Aster mostly likely fits this criteria of the “woke witch.” Aster does have an encounter with a dark wizard, which in this case is the villain of the narrative. The villain in this text is a dragon-like creature who wants Aster to join him in his dark magic endeavors. The “dark wizard” is similar to Aster, but he has embraced the “dark side” of magic.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-92f9a637-7fff-cb86-e2a0-614432a302cc"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The next characteristics of the “woke witch” framework are feeling out of place, choosing your place, and having a sidekick. Aster’s family constantly reminds him that witchcraft is solely for girls. For example, his mom explains to him: “But, Aster, that magic is for you...Women and men have different types of magic” (8). She then tells the story of Mikasi, Aster’s great uncle, who did not adhere to the gender roles and was ostracized in the community, “[h]e was cast out for he was a danger to himself and the family” (11). Aster’s mother lets him know that if he were to practice magic openly he could be banished from the community. This serves as a warning and solidifies how out of place he is within the place he calls home and the people who are supposed to love him unconditionally, his family. Moreover, Aster is able to choose his place when he meets Charlie. She is a human he meets while walking outside his community. They share the same feelings of not belonging in their communities. Charlie is a girl who loves sports and has two dads. As the story progresses she becomes Aster’s sidekick, encouraging him to perform magic. She eventually asks him to heal her injured leg (75-76). </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-ed45107d-7fff-1245-8c90-833e5e6ed66b"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Aster’s journey in </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The Witch Boy </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">follows the dynamics of Henesy’s “woke witch,” except for the age. Reading this graphic novel and looking at it through this framework was a fun exercise! I wanted to showcase how children’s literature scholarship can be applied widely and the type of exercises graduate students like me engage in. </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span></span></p><div><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-aaf9ca99-7fff-4897-a453-4fda338300a3"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">I hope you will pick up </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The Witch Boy </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">by Molly Ostertag because it is truly a wonderful graphic novel. I know I will be reading the following volumes in this trilogy (</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Hidden Witch </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">and </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The Midwinter Witch). </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Also, it is being adapted into a </span><a href="https://screenrant.com/netflix-witch-boy-movie-animated-musical-haim/" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Netflix animated musical</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">, so why not get ahead of the movie release?</span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">References:</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Henesy, Megan. “‘Leaving My Girlhood behind’: Woke Witches and Feminist Liminality in Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.” </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Feminist Media Studies</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">, 2020, pp. 1–15. </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Crossref</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">, doi:10.1080/14680777.2020.1791929.</span></p><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Ostertag, Molly. </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The Witch Boy: A Graphic Novel (The Witch Boy Trilogy #1)</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">. Illustrated, e-book, Graphix, 2017.</span></span></div></span></span></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">- (NA)</span></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span></span></div></span></div></div>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-30212827358796410772021-10-19T13:51:00.002-07:002021-10-19T13:55:05.507-07:00Community Event with Children's Literature Librarian Linda Salem <p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6MA0vkOmDH03Ma97pC-vv1j4sIjzkrQHVP9UlnZ60nxradOzNmHYLlB4A08fohe7n2j_qiUWu5-XawhYcfLgHbdlNyHZu1k1BBUU9PEHqwlo7ZkNkObbifzO0bSt2UAnUJ1aJG9_VweO5/s262/linda-salem.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="262" data-original-width="220" height="262" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6MA0vkOmDH03Ma97pC-vv1j4sIjzkrQHVP9UlnZ60nxradOzNmHYLlB4A08fohe7n2j_qiUWu5-XawhYcfLgHbdlNyHZu1k1BBUU9PEHqwlo7ZkNkObbifzO0bSt2UAnUJ1aJG9_VweO5/s0/linda-salem.jpeg" width="220" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Hello, Children’s Literature scholars! </span><p></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-c1dc3bce-7fff-d363-a706-ebf9a7347dc7"><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We want to invite you all to join Children’s Literature Librarian, Linda Salem, in a public reading of author and illustrator Takeo Takei’s Aruki Taro. Takeo Takei is well-known by manga artists </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">for his 139 kampon books and children's illustrated works. Aruki Taro has been somewhat forgotten, but Linda has translated it, giving us an introduction to Takei’s other works. Besides this introduction, the presentation will also include a history of Japanese illustration. The event is </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">this upcoming </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Wednesday, October 20th, at 6:30 pm in the Shiley Special Events Suite at Central Library. </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The event is hosted by the San Diego public library and will be in-person. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">To learn more and register for the event please follow this link: </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><a href="https://sandiego.librarymarket.com/events/takeo-takei-aruki-taro-and-japanese-childrens-literature-illustration" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">https://sandiego.librarymarket.com/events/takeo-takei-aruki-taro-and-japanese-childrens-literature-illustration</span></a><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We hope you can attend!</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">-NA</span></p><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span></div>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-33242054346094196912021-10-16T11:55:00.016-07:002021-10-16T12:07:05.388-07:00Being Both “Teacher” and “Student”<span id="docs-internal-guid-5270588f-7fff-e492-f0ce-6f8ddef0f767"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;"></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 36pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlbeLpkOrBHsL5_akDWDbRB8EbrNAPc6erPfYc4d0bK8gciGmYXw58nC2xoXAvbjiiiSArEtQWX4Uj9z0oFblhWI7otBVOkNffTW5FGRnELQ3btdnjv7wUDbs_5gme7n0Tc90m_0q_bfVV/s621/stitches_disappear1.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="621" data-original-width="500" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlbeLpkOrBHsL5_akDWDbRB8EbrNAPc6erPfYc4d0bK8gciGmYXw58nC2xoXAvbjiiiSArEtQWX4Uj9z0oFblhWI7otBVOkNffTW5FGRnELQ3btdnjv7wUDbs_5gme7n0Tc90m_0q_bfVV/w258-h320/stitches_disappear1.jpeg" width="258" /></a></div><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 36pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 36pt;">Education has always been an essential part of my life, even at a young age. I’ve always looked forward to going to school, as it felt like a safe space for me. I also looked at my teachers and professors in absolute awe as I saw them as the pinnacle of knowledge, the holder of all truths, and I wanted to be that. </span></p></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 36pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span><p></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 36pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">This semester I had the remarkable opportunity to hold the title that I felt so fondly of. During my final year as a graduate student, I was offered a TA position, in which I built my schedule and syllabus from scratch to teach English 220: Introduction to English. I quickly learned that I now hold two titles: teacher and student. It’s a strange phenomenon because from eight in the morning until lunch I am the teacher. I make lesson plans, email students, grade assignments, and am front and center in the classroom to lecture with curious eyes on me. But then my role is reversed once I attend my grad seminar and make my way to my desk. Often, my roles may intertwine, such as when my students ask insightful questions and inform me of things I haven’t heard of or considered. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Being a full-time graduate student while teaching my very first course is a constant rollercoaster of emotions. One moment, I love what I’m doing; I enjoy attending my classes and giving my students help and resources, but then the next, I feel burned out, overwhelmed, and frustrated because I put myself on the back burner. Finding a balance between work, school, family, friends, and </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">yourself</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> is difficult, but it’s mandatory. Otherwise, you’ll end up feeling like your work is burdensome, but it isn’t; it’s simply a lot, and that’s okay. Being honest with myself, my peers, professors, and even my students has been a huge relief for me, and it reminds you that this feeling of chaos and distraught isn’t just a “you” thing. Having those open and honest conversations reminds me of how far I have come and that I should be proud of the progress I have made. Whether I am the teacher or student, it is all a learning experience, and I’m thrilled that at least I am fortunate enough to have this significant memory in my lifetime. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">-LA</span></p><div><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-53234265545856789022021-10-08T15:54:00.002-07:002021-10-08T15:54:41.379-07:00Interview with Professor Lashon Daley <p> <span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">The NCSCL is honored to present an interview with Dr. Lashon Daley, the Department of English and Comparative Literature’s new assistant professor of children’s literature. The interview was conducted online by Natalie Alvarez and Lara Amin, graduate assistants for SDSU’s National Center for the Study of Children’s Literature. We thank Professor Daley for taking the time out of her busy schedule to talk with us, and we’re proud of the opportunity to better acquaint our readers with our newest professor and her exciting work!</span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-008c3cc7-7fff-42d8-e09c-81d7b7cf0d59"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7gOrA6tTa9Scg32r77YQKSyIYCpQYV5xNixGpGw-s4mKHnCjx5LCyVMAjZrFpJZytNAOAl29bNB8qAz1NrrVMdPZ4YINNPSLvaIgLvUh4Ju9tVgPqx8nG_NL6GkmvJUPisTqqohzTNI5p/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1900" data-original-width="2048" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7gOrA6tTa9Scg32r77YQKSyIYCpQYV5xNixGpGw-s4mKHnCjx5LCyVMAjZrFpJZytNAOAl29bNB8qAz1NrrVMdPZ4YINNPSLvaIgLvUh4Ju9tVgPqx8nG_NL6GkmvJUPisTqqohzTNI5p/" width="259" /></a></p></span><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Tell us a bit about yourself: Where are you from? What were some of your favorite books as a child? How did you become interested in children’s literature and childhood stud</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">ies, and what </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">do you find particularly interesting about it?</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I grew up in Miami, Florida, and spent most of my childhood climbing the mango tree in my backyard and the avocado tree in my front yard. As a result, I rarely read for leisure. Being outside and playing with my siblings brought me more joy than reading on my own. And to be honest, I hated reading. I preferred making up stories in my mind and telling them to my very attentive collection of stuffed animals. I did begin writing down my own stories when my mother gave me my first journal at the age of seven. I wrote my first children’s book shortly thereafter. It was about a blue rose that did not know how to bloom and had to learn on its own. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When I eventually began to tolerate reading, I fell in love with serial collections like </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Berenstain Bears</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> b</span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">y Stan and Jan Berenstain</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Clifford the Big Red Dog</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> by</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Norman Bridwell, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Spot</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> by Eric Hill. In addition, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I’ll Fix Anthony</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> by Judith Viorst was also a favorite because it mimicked my experience of being the youngest child and allowed me to feel seen.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">As you can see, my love for children’s literature was a slow burn. It finally caught fire when I was working as a marketing assistant at the Louisiana Children’s Museum in New Orleans. I had the privilege of working with my colleagues to implement children’s educational programs, and childhood literacy was a major part of our core mission. I had a running knowledge of what was popular in the industry, what books were used to hit literacy goals, and essentially what made a good children’s picture book. So, I decided to write my own. My children’s book, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Mr. Okra Sells Fresh Fruits and Vegetables</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, was published in 2016 by Pelican Publishing, and it launched me into the industry in a new way. Performing the text at festivals and in classrooms made me even more curious about children’s literature. When the book was released, I was in my first year of my doctoral studies at UC Berkeley. Through a series of research pursuits, children’s literature, especially children’s literature as it intersects with Black girlhood studies, eventually became one of my research fields.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Children’s literature is a fascinating field of study because of its depth and breath. Essentially everyone from children, to parents, to educators, to librarians, to the top </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">scholars within the field, to the illustrators, to the writers themselves all, play a role in expanding this field of study. The infinite possibilities of where this field can go means that I am limitless in my research. And for me, that is a beautiful place to be. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When you applied to SDSU, what aspects of the university and the Department of English and Comparative Literature did you find most attractive?</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">While my Ph.D. is in Performance Studies, my heart has always been based in English and Comparative Literature. I received my BA in English, my MA in Folklore, and my MFA in Writing. So applying to the department felt like a homecoming for me. I was extremely impressed by my colleagues Phillip Serrato and Joseph Thomas, whose research interests are so fascinating. I felt that I was going to be among scholars who also remained curious and limitless in their approach to the field and to their research. I felt a strong connection to so many of the professors in the department, who are not only top scholars, but also creatives as well. Plus, the opportunity to work with, teach, and mentor English majors and minors is an absolute dream. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What were the most significant challenges or obstacles for you during or post-graduate school?</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When I was pursuing my MFA in Writing at Sarah Lawrence College, I had a desire to pursue publishing after graduation. I did not. However, that desire manifested itself again while I was preparing for my qualifying exams in the third year of my doctoral program. I was feeling so overwhelmed by the requirements of becoming a top scholar that I considered leaving my program. I began to research the job market in publishing and even applied for a position at a children’s literary publisher. I never told my advisor because I knew that she would talk me out of it. Once I passed my exams, I did feel much more confident in my ability to complete my degree. I am grateful that I persevered because now I have the opportunity to continue my research and to be in conversation with those within the industry. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What seminars would you like to teach? </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Tell us about them and how they relate to your research. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I would love to teach a seminar on research methods for fiction writers. Since I pursued my MFA before pursuing my PhD, I feel like I missed out on some crucial knowledge on how to conduct research for my creative master’s thesis. Being taught the craft of writing is super important, but I believe that teaching research methods in MFA programs would be a game changer. I am a really great example of why this is important. For my MFA thesis, I was writing a young adult novel about a Black girl coming to terms with heartache and grief after the tragic passing of her father. Now as a scholar at the intersection of children’s literature and Black girlhood studies, I feel much more equipped to write and construct a world for my character that is based in real-world research.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Which of your current projects excites you the most?</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I have some children’s picture book manuscripts that I put on hold in order to complete my dissertation. I am excited about returning to those manuscripts. And then, of course, I am excited about turning my dissertation into a book.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What advice would you give to a student starting graduate school in 2022? </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When you wake up in the middle of the night with the perfect word or sentence for your manuscript, write it down immediately. You will NOT remember it in the morning. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">**</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Thank you so much to Dr. Daley! We’re grateful to have the opportunity to showcase SDSU’s brilliant new professor of children’s literature!</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">- (NA) & (LA)</span></p><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-3487955408706479852021-10-01T13:01:00.000-07:002021-10-01T13:01:17.924-07:00Review of Home is Not a Country by Safia Elhillo <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="318" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/DFrlUVws9ab-EPwpeXeL_3-Qrl6plifLDuWf33Ab8tVE595PKoPID8j2zKIbQHg_98R57t85OrQgurp7v7pMteII7EPjKECwbCodbKdRmEYEI0MhX8NXFxacUTI1Xzfgcpz9dvGk=s0" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap;" width="210" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Book cover for Safia Elhillo's <i>Home is Not a Country</i></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: center;"> </p><p><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">About two weeks ago, I looked at the </span><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/17/books/national-book-awards-2021-longlist.html" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Young People’s Literature nominees for the 2021 National Book Award</span></a><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. I wanted to see which books I had read and which to add to my ever-growing reading list. Since I had been on the lookout for novels-in-verse, Safia Elhilo’s </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Home is Not a Country </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">particularly interested me. Then, while browsing the stacks at The National Center for the Study of Children’s Literature, I noticed we had a copy of it. This felt like fate! I knew this had to be my first review for the semester. </span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-78ca59cc-7fff-de03-5c00-78240b7bfbcd"><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Home is Not a Country </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">takes place in the early 2000s and follows the story of Nima as she navigates loneliness, family dynamics, friendship, and nostalgia for a home she’s never visited. These complex issues are explored in only 224 pages. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">My reading of this book was hybrid, meaning that I read both the book and listened to the audiobook. The author’s narration of the audiobook enhanced my experience of the book. I could feel the emotions Nima goes through and the loneliness she experiences. Nima attributes this loneliness to her mother. This is the introduction the reader gets to Nima and her mother’s relationship. The organization of the poems itself tells you what parent she values more and points to the complicated relationship she has with them. Nima’s relationship with her parents, especially the one with her mother, was my favorite aspect of the novel. Her mother is Nima’s sole caretaker, and a lot of the resentment Nima feels is directed towards her. Their relationship reminded me of how children of single parents tend to glorify the parent that is absent from their lives, and this is definitely present in </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Home is Not a Country. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There’s an instance in which Nima contemplates what her mother must have sacrificed to come to America:</span></p><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I can’t help but imagine</span><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"></blockquote><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">that her life was enormous before we came here</span><span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">loud & crowded & lively as any party...(36)</span></p></span><span><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Nima talks about how her mother’s life became smaller with her move to America. She recognizes that her mother is as lonely as she is. I loved this because it made me realize something about my own family. As my world expanded due to moving to a different country, my parent’s world shrank. In the name of progress and opportunity, parents sacrifice lives they’ve built-in their home countries and say goodbye to social relationships they may have. They give away their support systems for their children. I think this was so important to include in the book, for Nima to understand how living in a different country has affected her parents as </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">well as her.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="509" src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/xuKAhqwlJXXVaAF_lyvMntvs9YgvbaVLTEs_LPQb7C0rQcdziWmRvnHP_C-d0vYtazhlEudoomJyuo1qWoamdu0r4W0Ju_UFCpKEcqmJOtg_NVy26dp0Wdc63tDhnI3rep2_bblT=s0" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px;" width="383" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-352305cc-7fff-6f63-9ade-2e371f5893f0"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Image of </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Home is Not a Country</span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">’s</span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">backflap which includes a picture of the author, Safia Elhillo by Aris Theotokatos
</span></span></td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The novel has a bit of magical realism, which I was not expecting. However, it was a welcomed surprise. This element takes the form of self-doubt and realizing where you belong. One of Nima’s desires is to see her homeland through the eyes of her family, to experience it as they did. When Nima wishes for such, she gets to live it but at a cost. These moments highlight how important it is for us to view the whole picture instead of what we believe to be true. Sometimes truth isn’t present because it can hurt us, but knowing that truth allows us to see the world clearly and appreciate the life we have. This is what Nima experiences in those instances of magical realism. They are absolutely beautiful and poignant. The book uses magical realism for its climax, which wonderfully brings together all the threads of the story. I had read books where magical realism was in the narrative from beginning to end, but not one like this. That’s one of the reasons why this book became such a memorable experience. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The writing is gorgeous and lyrical. Here’s an example from one of my favorite poems in the book “A Single Possibility”:</span></p><br /></span></div></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">she isn’t my sister we are opposite ends of a single</span><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"></blockquote><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">possibility an only child forming in <br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">our mother’s belly waiting to be shaped by a name</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">once & for all...(155)</span><br /><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><p style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"><br /></span></span></p></span></span></blockquote></blockquote><span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">One thing that stood out to me was the formatting of the poems, the spacing within them allows the reader to breathe and ponder the lines carefully. The blank spaces in this piece drive the meaning of the words and tell the reader which words deserve a closer look. My favorite part of this excerpt is the line “we are opposite ends of a single/possibility.” The line stood out because it shows how Nima thinks only one version of her is possible. Her lack of consideration for change is put beautifully and succinctly. Elhillo writes about complex contemplations of the self in such a distinct manner and I’m excited to read more of her work. In </span><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Home is Not a Country, </span><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Safia Elhillo presents a magical exploration of family bonds and how understanding ourselves brings upon an understanding of those who love us.</span></span></span><div><span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span></span></span></div><div><span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">- (NA)</span></span></span></div>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-18912808822354992232021-09-17T14:34:00.002-07:002021-09-17T14:34:50.392-07:00New Graduate Assistant <div class="separator"><p style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img height="356" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/7e7ED87uuQFzvKGc1YoeVf4seASnKwGPnfYEZz8nsepptybKFEVBjXmqY4Rg_Fh412iO2uANuTedPPSLA47Mnv3Q6oOCgjfnLRTkBO6tY8B_asLE6zVWpYNeRRdvsQ6jwfyt_N10=w268-h356" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap;" width="268" /><br /><br /></p></div><p> <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Hello everyone!</span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-cb0e859b-7fff-d468-9747-1728cb1b53b1"><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">My name is Lara Amin, and I am currently a second-year graduate student pursuing a master’s in English at SDSU! My specialization is in Children’s Literature, and I’m most interested in literary nonsense like Lewis Carroll’s </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Other scholarly interests include gender and sexualities studies and feminist and queer theory.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This fall semester, I am also a TA for English 220: Introduction to Literature. In my course, I strive to help students understand literature on a deeper level, close read various texts using different mediums, and provide a safe space to learn and grow as critical thinkers. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When I’m not in the classroom, I spend my free time studying astrology and tarot. Astrology has always been a particular interest of mine, and it’s essentially my love language. I utilize astrology with tarot readings to give advice and guidance to others, especially when they need it. To me, astrology and tarot are other forms of close reading, just like with literature. When I’m not studying astrology, I write poetry and post my photography on </span><a href="https://www.instagram.com/porcelain.pen/" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Instagram</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">All in all, I am grateful for the opportunity to be a Graduate Assistant at the National Center for the Study of Children’s Literature. I can't wait to see what I will learn from this deep dive into the scholarly conversations surrounding children's literature!</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">-LA</span></p><div></div></span>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-35121506681439104232021-05-10T18:55:00.006-07:002021-05-10T19:00:04.792-07:00Looking Back and Looking Forward at the End of my M.A. Experience<p><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">The title of “scholar” was one that
intimidated me since before I began my graduate studies -- it felt as though I
would never be able to achieve it. Yet the final question asked during the
defense of my culminating project for this M.A. in English degree was “how do you feel now
that you have joined the scholarly community with your own unique
intervention?” To hear that question of recognition and welcome was truly an
honor. I can honestly say that I achieved what I had hoped to over the course
of my two years in this grad program. Along the way, I’ve learned that becoming
a scholar is less about being inherently intelligent and more about learning
scholarly conventions in order to make a contribution to the conversations that
already exist. I can definitely attest to the fact that hard work, humility,
and perseverance made it possible.</span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 0.5in;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 0.5in;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJwQ5QzVu4rg1gL6x6Cun5z-x6sYL8s2Vk6hb12ypoXb2-gvZC5KxfANyEnLb6ugUomx5svUIwDm_E1PtKrDYbJqucLc5k0jiwHvZSfHdNrA34ZYHRgTpOjX_w-wvrGgsZlePlW-8mtA6x/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="299" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJwQ5QzVu4rg1gL6x6Cun5z-x6sYL8s2Vk6hb12ypoXb2-gvZC5KxfANyEnLb6ugUomx5svUIwDm_E1PtKrDYbJqucLc5k0jiwHvZSfHdNrA34ZYHRgTpOjX_w-wvrGgsZlePlW-8mtA6x/" width="320" /></a></span></div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 0.5in;"><br /></span><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">The Culminating
Experience:</span></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">To provide some context for my journey, I
thought it would be helpful to share a little bit about the M.A. process at San
Diego State. I chose the portfolio option, meaning I revised my star paper to
the point that I might feasibly submit it for publication. The portfolio
workshop began in January. It was truly a rigorous and demanding process. I was
able to engage with children’s literature seriously and had very high standards
to meet regarding the quality of my research and writing. One of the biggest
takeaways was certainly my development of endurance. While I hadn’t really ever
had a problem with working hard, I was used to completing and then submitting
assignments -- done. Though I taught revision in my composition classes, I
didn’t actually have to do it myself as a student. In the workshop, however, I
had to submit section after section of my paper for the weekly assignments,
then go back and revise based on the feedback I received from my peers and
professor while also preparing another section for the following week. It got
to the point where I dreaded reading my own words, and did all of my other
assignments to avoid having to revise.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">My main support throughout this process
was the peers who endured it with me. We were all on the same schedule, which
meant that we had to meet the same deadlines. Even so, the chance to chat in
casual breakout room conversations at the beginning of class allowed us to
destress. It is easy to complain about the detriments of online learning, but I
believe having to undergo the portfolio workshop on Zoom while still in a
global pandemic gave us the opportunity to be more vocal about all of the other
things that affect the writing process. We were able to be vulnerable about
impostor’s syndrome, about the struggle of researching, and about losing sight
of what we had loved about our papers. Through it all, we supported one another
emotionally and intellectually so that we all had intensely revised portfolios
to submit by the beginning of April.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">The portfolio was comprised of the star
paper, a secondary paper, and an annotated bibliography, all of which I had to
be prepared to discuss during my defense. My advisor and an examiner read the
portfolio two weeks in advance, during which time I prepared for the questions
I would likely receive. We practiced answering questions aloud in the portfolio
workshop, and all too soon, it was time for the defense. Upon beginning, I was
immediately overwhelmed with gratitude for the generous, thoughtful engagement
of my advisor and examiner with my work. They expressed their interest in my
subject matter even though Asian American children’s literature is a niche in
the field of children’s literature. Their questions were specific to the
content of my paper, indicating that they had read it thoroughly and could see
new directions in which my ideas could expand. They were also curious about my
overall journey as a student throughout my two years in the program. The
conversation was very enjoyable. Terrifying at first, but ultimately very fun.
It was an experience I will always be grateful for, and I expressed that
sentiment in response to that final question I was posed. I feel confident
taking this paper to present at ChLA 2021 to test out its readiness for
eventual publication. My scholarly journey has only just begun.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">Graduate
Assistantship:</span></b><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">The rigors of graduate-level literary study were
certainly rewarding, but I also had other opportunities outside of the
classroom for which I am thankful. The graduate assistantship that allows me to
write these blog posts has been a fun, informal way to engage with the
scholarly community. I had the chance to read and write on hot-off-the-press books,
learn about the use of social media, correspond with leading intellectuals in
the field via email and Twitter, attend a conference, join professional
organizations, and be involved in lectures by notable scholars. More
importantly, being a graduate assistant allowed me to see and validate passion
for the study of children’s literature. I am forever grateful to Dr. Joseph
Thomas, our Director, as well as my fellow graduate assistants, Sofia and
Natalie, for sharing this space with me. </span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">Teaching:</span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">As I’ve written about before, SDSU gives graduate
students the opportunity to teach first-year composition and literature
courses. I won’t take up too much space reiterating it here, but thanks to
those opportunities, I can pursue teaching as a career with confidence. I
received extensive pedagogical training before and during the courses I taught,
and professional development events were frequent and timely. I am certain that
I can take all that I learned at my time at SDSU to whatever campuses I am at
in the future!</span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">A final word:</span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">It’s hard to not get sentimental, as this is likely
the last blog post I will write for the National Center for the Study of
Children’s Literature. If even one person reads to the end, I will always be
grateful that my words were worth your time. Thank you for this space, and I
truly look forward to ongoing engagement with the study of children’s and young
adult literature as a newly minted scholar. </span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p> - (A.N.)</o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; mso-color-alt: windowtext;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;"><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; mso-color-alt: windowtext;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-34454092128399608682021-04-26T12:01:00.000-07:002021-04-26T12:01:13.835-07:00“We Have Always Dreamed of (Afro)Futures:” a Lecture by Dr. Ebony Elizabeth Thomas <p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAJ5pkFyuALcQ1GJsfVqJYYpEhtLnjCbxjWCtvpraNyuDbKnGy5klOGURigz5TK8o3eEEwqDcEjFstemnAjPc1JtLZeo4Rj5amc9K6_kBxCmJ0xqyBOvQk9pI2_iac7ujjtFk8ddcOmsvt/s526/Flyer.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="526" data-original-width="407" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAJ5pkFyuALcQ1GJsfVqJYYpEhtLnjCbxjWCtvpraNyuDbKnGy5klOGURigz5TK8o3eEEwqDcEjFstemnAjPc1JtLZeo4Rj5amc9K6_kBxCmJ0xqyBOvQk9pI2_iac7ujjtFk8ddcOmsvt/s320/Flyer.png" /></a></div><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">On
April 14, 2021, the NCSCL was delighted to host Dr Ebony Elizabeth Thomas’ for
her fantastic talk “We Have Always Dreamed of (Afro)Futures: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Brownies’ Book </i>and the Black
Fantastic Storytelling Tradition.” With over 100 people registered, we were not
the only ones who were so excited to have Dr. Thomas virtually visit SDSU. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHLV__up9nYgMIzyrnuTpSYherPeKbtes-VN4ONpuYPLVksa86VDxFjEeDQ93fCxhh8_DOL7Ig_yMi3xO42jgO4BlThQEvwm0wyvdZGW82R_4QR7FPVBw5b9obZ43oGFLIuBR5YqcT19es/s460/Headshot.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="327" data-original-width="460" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHLV__up9nYgMIzyrnuTpSYherPeKbtes-VN4ONpuYPLVksa86VDxFjEeDQ93fCxhh8_DOL7Ig_yMi3xO42jgO4BlThQEvwm0wyvdZGW82R_4QR7FPVBw5b9obZ43oGFLIuBR5YqcT19es/s320/Headshot.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Situating
her talk in the time of the COVID-19 pandemic and current anti-Black violence
and racism, Dr. Thomas explores the portrayal of Black characters within
children’s and young adult books and how these characters indicate a future for
those who are represented. Dr. Thomas introduced the concept of “storying,” the
ways in which Black writers have forged their own identities and freedom within
these texts. This act is especially prominent since “we are in a cultural
moment where speculative storytelling reigns supreme.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_FxNlIi6_pndU3dDYicoiYJB4Ot6arWDTobLeE7OaaVC6NUHWli7WSc9KNKS5cGE3g5RRypTA16yqD5DMzqYLHx2maytdf0Nwy3xPGTUtmoD0X18IZGwBgHAmfXpmgKsXD4U0Qq7wv8xt/s624/DarkFantasticBook.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="271" data-original-width="624" height="174" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_FxNlIi6_pndU3dDYicoiYJB4Ot6arWDTobLeE7OaaVC6NUHWli7WSc9KNKS5cGE3g5RRypTA16yqD5DMzqYLHx2maytdf0Nwy3xPGTUtmoD0X18IZGwBgHAmfXpmgKsXD4U0Qq7wv8xt/w400-h174/DarkFantasticBook.png" width="400" /></a></div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As
Dr. Thomas writes in her book <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Dark
Fantastic: Race and the Imagination from Harry Potter to The Hunger Games</i>,
there is a lack of positive representation of people of color in speculative
fiction. Although there have been excellent fantasy novels written by authors
of color as of late, Dr. Thomas focuses her research on the presence of Black
characters in texts authored by the majority population for two reasons: first,
because some of today’s popular texts written by Black authors were not
available at the time of she wrote <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The
Dark Fantastic</i> and second, because the texts written by the majority
population are the ones that make up the mainstream, which is read across
diverse populations. For those reasons, she examines characters such as Rue
from <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Hunger Games</i> in order to
identify what kind of portrayals frame Black characters, concluding that “our
reading and imagination are as segregated as our lives.” Black characters are trapped
in the “Dark Fantastic cycle,” which Dr. Thomas defines as a pattern of
“spectacle, hesitation, violence, and haunting.” Black girl characters
especially are seen as “monstrous, invisible, and always dying;” their stories
mirror the high rate of Black deaths outside of literature. Despite the
oppression and violence they face, Dr. Thomas reminds us Black people have
always dreamed of (Afro)futures. She spotlights the act of “rememory,” using
the example of Toni Morrison who creates an Afrofuturistic world in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beloved</i> wherein the protagonist, Sethe,
recalls memories of the past. Like Morrison’s Sethe, imagination creates a new
world, an Afrofuture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMrgFU2354ujQ6QS7Ww7eI0aaaK1lEbjsEheyLOBOM3RBoMR1BKvHNoVFwbA0yN0M29ca7iH9LEHmJkHkD0JRPR0UL1HDt2QK961k18JCQd6jtFXdRm0v4gLsYg7UrGl_Gzzt0GO-fZzw8/s422/MorrisonQuote.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="255" data-original-width="422" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMrgFU2354ujQ6QS7Ww7eI0aaaK1lEbjsEheyLOBOM3RBoMR1BKvHNoVFwbA0yN0M29ca7iH9LEHmJkHkD0JRPR0UL1HDt2QK961k18JCQd6jtFXdRm0v4gLsYg7UrGl_Gzzt0GO-fZzw8/s320/MorrisonQuote.png" width="320" /></a></div><p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhE6aClpZd8tC6zPA40n67Q_reQNkYEb0Op3BqzOUuQy8X9sQPCTKUXXU40Tz7jKM5eMyxFWi4XDC3eVKi1r6lBXA0oFGfUlMhmt3k6Il6rMgovOrgVEVgpoumzpEsQ5TMafQo2niLUCR-d/s624/Diversitychart.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="304" data-original-width="624" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhE6aClpZd8tC6zPA40n67Q_reQNkYEb0Op3BqzOUuQy8X9sQPCTKUXXU40Tz7jKM5eMyxFWi4XDC3eVKi1r6lBXA0oFGfUlMhmt3k6Il6rMgovOrgVEVgpoumzpEsQ5TMafQo2niLUCR-d/s320/Diversitychart.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">The
above graphic demonstrates that only 10% of characters are Black while 27% of
characters are non-human as of 2018 according to the University of
Wisconsin-Madison. Since that time, the diversity “renaissance” in children’s
literature publishing has excited Dr. Thomas. She recognizes that she has been
cautioned against too much optimism, but wants to give credit where it is due.
Dr. Thomas acknowledges that quality is not guaranteed simply because
representations are present. As Black storytellers forge their own identities
and liberation, there is still much more to be done in the field to address the
books -- and the experiences -- missing from bookshelves. These absent stories
of the everyday experiences of Black readers are labeled “shadow books” for
their invisibility among mainstream readership.</span></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBDMZIFDF_s3ybd8ZlTkRAejqfpmvw-CMdIZwVrSdNKmUMifXaQ6mPJdiI5W638tUfnVq_thLEC-IPmMI_12UUTdR_yVbWjAMe4BjHw7fufh3HZfGTdvtMFv0ZHO68pKYqkmDN6Q6FJ7Ha/s496/Shadowbookchart.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="350" data-original-width="496" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBDMZIFDF_s3ybd8ZlTkRAejqfpmvw-CMdIZwVrSdNKmUMifXaQ6mPJdiI5W638tUfnVq_thLEC-IPmMI_12UUTdR_yVbWjAMe4BjHw7fufh3HZfGTdvtMFv0ZHO68pKYqkmDN6Q6FJ7Ha/s320/Shadowbookchart.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigiwqTB4OWELEhsy3ZduqSTnFbyMgx2xO3dPBg3tIiqLoU7QjyYcdb8CkB7vVJ-4mzDGZVGgzJ7An4uVKFzP59vZX3hRmBTuSSPWPRyV-uUG8t2nGX2hyphenhyphenr5ht4539vitRz3TcdkKvO3VUU/s443/Shadowbook.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="279" data-original-width="443" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigiwqTB4OWELEhsy3ZduqSTnFbyMgx2xO3dPBg3tIiqLoU7QjyYcdb8CkB7vVJ-4mzDGZVGgzJ7An4uVKFzP59vZX3hRmBTuSSPWPRyV-uUG8t2nGX2hyphenhyphenr5ht4539vitRz3TcdkKvO3VUU/s320/Shadowbook.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
light of the past year of the COVID-19 pandemic alongside the current trial of
Derek Chauvin and the discussion of anti-Black violence in our country, Dr.
Thomas reminds us, “the persistence of anti-Blackness in pandemic space-time
cannot be overstated.” She recognizes that the rates of Black deaths in novels
mirror the deaths of the COVID-19 pandemic; that is, they are
disproportionately higher than majority population deaths. Future dreaming
allows an escape for Black readers from this reality. Books written especially
for Black audiences, like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Brownies
Book</i>, allow for a look into the life of a Black child, but these books are
few and far between.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgp16dYKxshzZUZCFSbWaXFZrgV5WIeaLkyNIiEwB3r-ae1fJScnextNdzExkST0T4L0ZyUufXCUYxewcmf0for4S-lOX1YqLk3A2mlKOhmgRjQFkZxbEE0z-b6TNSOYjeGrj3dkeCmgyqM/s431/RestoryingtheSelfChart.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="286" data-original-width="431" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgp16dYKxshzZUZCFSbWaXFZrgV5WIeaLkyNIiEwB3r-ae1fJScnextNdzExkST0T4L0ZyUufXCUYxewcmf0for4S-lOX1YqLk3A2mlKOhmgRjQFkZxbEE0z-b6TNSOYjeGrj3dkeCmgyqM/s320/RestoryingtheSelfChart.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">To
repair for the lack of representation, Dr. Thomas offers the concept of
“re-storying:” how marginalized readers can read themselves into the stories
that have historically excluded them. Re-storying, Dr. Thomas says, is a way
for underrepresented POC to feel seen. The rise in representation follows a
period of time that has been called “The New Jim Crow.” In some of these texts,
narratives of Black pain are the focus, creating a burden on young readers
seeing their own identities being brutalized and murdered. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLEfFDRtOkel-xi9MSQs4uR6PVmTN6kZqNzL1YJgtkHwpJiy5SuJYEUfqfR0GjgDzpZ_uIayQWx4hNyu-1wOwsN3ENigfF88v-6b6fOoSb9LbKLd-6wTsfQudXbmhFtGclLnWMfymXz3mp/s530/Questions.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="327" data-original-width="530" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLEfFDRtOkel-xi9MSQs4uR6PVmTN6kZqNzL1YJgtkHwpJiy5SuJYEUfqfR0GjgDzpZ_uIayQWx4hNyu-1wOwsN3ENigfF88v-6b6fOoSb9LbKLd-6wTsfQudXbmhFtGclLnWMfymXz3mp/s320/Questions.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="mso-no-proof: yes;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBZXj-XJWdrxb-6Mefw2THjOIJLbQEZwEnn6ieC9jCSzZeYGnC3lGgv3HpUTM0RY3WkqjZ6JwZ4pG9FVe1S2t6Sddmg1yCHzWCg4xypwz-w50kX0dHpWi5qQQ1klhWF-b25gtH7R_bZOiH/s445/SlaverywithaSmile.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="276" data-original-width="445" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBZXj-XJWdrxb-6Mefw2THjOIJLbQEZwEnn6ieC9jCSzZeYGnC3lGgv3HpUTM0RY3WkqjZ6JwZ4pG9FVe1S2t6Sddmg1yCHzWCg4xypwz-w50kX0dHpWi5qQQ1klhWF-b25gtH7R_bZOiH/s320/SlaverywithaSmile.png" width="320" /></a></div><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Some
portrayals of enslavement create what Dr. Thomas calls a “sanitized view of
slavery.” These books often position Black characters beside famous white
figures for the comfort of white readers, like in the book <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Unspoken: A Story of the Underground Railroad </i>by Henry Cole, a
white author. Many of these books are written from a third person perspective,
distancing the reader from slavery. Dr. Thomas labels this pattern
“#slaverywithasmile” and argues that humanizing depictions of people in bondage
can reshape the images that dominate Black historical fiction.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8UCMsvwapjvwDpxovcS9fqe73py7VcfW3TwTSt-GPszG9cOdxcSJ4gc7nXkLdi1xXhg3yDgmIawc0n_NFC3A6q9MUmt4B2txBrAIsaOJerZvAnM8YRidxG-yeZT7cQIwGqXBDvSJphliz/s443/Love+Twelve+Miles+Long.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="264" data-original-width="443" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8UCMsvwapjvwDpxovcS9fqe73py7VcfW3TwTSt-GPszG9cOdxcSJ4gc7nXkLdi1xXhg3yDgmIawc0n_NFC3A6q9MUmt4B2txBrAIsaOJerZvAnM8YRidxG-yeZT7cQIwGqXBDvSJphliz/s320/Love+Twelve+Miles+Long.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Dr.
Thomas concludes with the following question: “If even Black authors of youth
speculative fiction are haunted by the afterlife of slavery, what might it mean
for our Afrofuturistic Dreams?”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
would like to turn, now, to the Question and Answer Section in which Dr. Thomas
answered questions posted in the chat. Here are just a few of the thoughtful
questions that were posed, as well as Dr. Thomas’s responses:<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">How do you see multicultural picture
books fitting into this conversation?<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Dr.
Thomas responded that the territory is vast. She turns to friends doing work on
multicultural texts, recognizing that there is much to be read and written on
the works produced by members of the African diaspora, such as Black British,
Caribbean, and African authors. She powerfully claims that “the Afrofuture should
be an inclusive future” and advocates for cultivating scholars with deep
insider knowledge and direct experience with the communities who are producing
those books.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Are there any texts that are
encouraging, enriching, and empowering Afrofuturist narratives out there at the
moment?<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Dr.
Thomas points to resources compiled by colleagues such as </span><span lang="EN"><a href="https://readingblackfutures.com/"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">ReadingBlackFutures.com</span></a></span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> and the work done by </span><span lang="EN"><a href="https://jgu.edu.in/jslh/faculty/dr-rukmini-pande/"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Dr. Rukmini Pande</span></a></span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> (in fan studies from India).<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Do you think that the obstacles to
honesty in children’s literature about black life in America (or abroad) is on
both sides—the dangers of all books being about slavery and horror and trauma
of racism, Jim Crow, etc., thus fetishizing pain and trauma, and leaving out
more positive, nuanced tales. And the problem of too much utopianism without
the realities of racism, trauma, and pain being there to treat black American
(or African) life honestly? If so, how do the best works treat pain and hope
both?<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Dr,
Thomas candidly admitted that she had “been wrestling with this.” She was
frustrated by growing up being told the same Black history by authors, but now
it is “what I breathe.” After studying such a complex issue for so long, she
acknowledges that “it takes a genius to break the Dark Fantasy cycle, and
that’s why so few of us publish.” She also made reference to texts such as NK
Jemison’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Broken Earth </i>trilogy
and Ty Frank’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Expanse</i>. Ultimately,
there is a knife edge between Black pain and Black joy -- not just joy <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">or </i>pain. Black people have a range of
emotions which should likewise be depicted in the texts that portray them. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p><br /></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
would like to extend our gratitude to Dr. Ebony Elizabeth Thomas for making the
time to present such a fascinating and thought-provoking lecture, and to all
who were able to attend. Please follow the National Center for the Study of
Children’s Literature on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to hear about the
events to come!</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-38396632772571640262021-04-19T14:26:00.002-07:002021-04-19T14:26:41.382-07:00Review of The Mirror Season by Anna-Marie McLemore<span id="docs-internal-guid-404a9881-7fff-a4fe-3d2d-f468f9a1b245"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxHk6G62Yr42zsQlR0GLaAQuKV1wbH6vIqmb71ykHXiUOPSSBLQropfiHPwhxvBV5OVNspkudTInTKH_TjM9DQt_VAvQDpPGhXXwcDsAppNtuJ2uiUym7QPavY9WnX8QgSTIJKPZaFkY-3/s1546/TMS.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1546" data-original-width="1000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxHk6G62Yr42zsQlR0GLaAQuKV1wbH6vIqmb71ykHXiUOPSSBLQropfiHPwhxvBV5OVNspkudTInTKH_TjM9DQt_VAvQDpPGhXXwcDsAppNtuJ2uiUym7QPavY9WnX8QgSTIJKPZaFkY-3/s320/TMS.jpeg" /></a></div><br /></span><p></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Mirror Season </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">is my second book by Anna-Marie McLemore even though I own all of their previous releases. This book made it very clear that McLemore’s writing is simply one of my favorites. Their writing is just pure magic! </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Mirror Season </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">had me hooked from its very first line: “When my bisabuela first came to this country, the most valuable thing she carried with her was something only she could see” (1). This is a story of survivors and learning to live in a body that doesn’t feel like yours anymore. The main character, Graciela Cristales, loses her confidence as a result of the assault and her journey centers around redefining who she is and living with the guilt of what happened.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The book follows Ciela’s perspective and the reader learns about the night of the assault through her. The unraveling of the narrative was amazing. We got bits and pieces which Ciela felt comfortable sharing with the reader. She was in control of the narrative, as a sexual assault survivor Ciela felt a loss of control over herself. Through the information she gives the reader she takes control of her story, signaling how SA survivors’ stories are theirs to share how they see fit. I enjoyed how information was revealed to us and so many things caught me by surprise. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Moreover, the layers of her story interweave with Lock’s story. Lock was at the same party as Ciela and their assaults happened simultaneously. They meet once school begins and form a friendship. The dynamic between Ciela and Lock was great and filled with humor. One of the most memorable moments was when Ciela brought a puppet named “Valentina” to cheer up Lock during their time in detention (73-74). Humor is used as another way of taking control of their story. The jokes between the characters is what moves forward their relationship. In an interview with the</span><a href="https://anchor.fm/writeordiepodcast" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="color: #0563c1; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Write or Die podcast</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, AM McLemore mentioned how </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Mirror Season </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">has the most humor out of all their books because it is something SA survivors do. They do so to contrast the traumatic experiences they’ve survived and again as a way to show their autonomy. McLemore’s use of humor shows that even with traumatic experiences there are ways to rediscover the self and that is done with expressions of joy like humor. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzB9mBHAshbc3LN8I4G9vvWunvdkSZYb3eCgqK8JMSSdfexXgpH-GOE9JTaNloSvzpBwAMHt6UtRFRFC8XQJD-hU9TVLdVe5Le9zQxtC0pYSwy00hR-Wjes1k9dfRYwK00z5V0jNgvCAOw/s1018/Anna-Marie+McLemore.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1018" data-original-width="678" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzB9mBHAshbc3LN8I4G9vvWunvdkSZYb3eCgqK8JMSSdfexXgpH-GOE9JTaNloSvzpBwAMHt6UtRFRFC8XQJD-hU9TVLdVe5Le9zQxtC0pYSwy00hR-Wjes1k9dfRYwK00z5V0jNgvCAOw/s320/Anna-Marie+McLemore.png" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Another aspect of Ciela’s journey means becoming La Bruja de los Pasteles once more. Ciela has a gift, inherited from her great-grandmother, which tells her what type of pan dulce someone needs or what pan dulce will soothe them. Losing herself causes Ciela to lose her ability to know about the needs of others. Her healing journey and the way back to her gift means finding herself. McLemore makes it clear with Ciela’s gift that caring for others and being there for them requires the ability to take care of the self first. Furthermore, Ciela’s gift is truly fascinating, and I’m looking to explore it more in an upcoming paper. Here’s an example of her magic in action as customers approach her bakery booth at a town festival: </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Las magdalenas de ma</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">íz to a woman finishing chemotherapy, because she needs something mild to keep but with enough flavor to remind her she can still taste.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Cuernitos de crema to a couple who found each other again forty years after meeting in high school (269). </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ciela’s magic has a healing quality to it which is reminiscent of curanderos. These are healers in Latin American who practice traditional medicine to treat various ailments, they can be physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual ailments. In the passage above Ciela aims to cure ailments with her abilities. She is attuned with whomever visits her booth and knows exactly what will soothe their being. Throughout the book the reader experiences her ability and how it is an essential part of her. Ciela’s magic is part of a familial tradition but it is but a small part of the connection she has with her family.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">By the end of </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Mirror Season,</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Ciela became one of my all-time favorite fictional characters. One of the things I loved most about her was the bond she had with her family. Family interactions in YA is something that I pay close attention to. A lack of family interaction makes the teenage character seem more adult and independent. This fictional emancipation rids the narrative of interactions with family members. Relations with families is an important aspect of identity formation since the family is part of people’s first social interactions. Ciela’s love for her family is found all over this narrative. They are in the stories she tells, her experiences, and as mentioned before in her magic. Throughout the novel, Ciela gives the reader many tidbits on her family and she seems to have a story fitting for many occasions. This is how her love for them comes through and it shows how a teen can have meaningful relationships with her family and be part of a novel. These relationships let the reader know of who Ciela is before the start of the narrative, it gives her a background story, and makes her a more well-rounded character. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Mirror Season</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> depicts how these bonds have a place within YA. Ciela has not been emancipated, yet the journey is still hers.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Another topic McLemore explores is the way society sees and treats brown bodies. The author touches upon how brown bodies are so over-sexualized and seen as an open invitation when they are not. I found this extremely relatable, reminding me of my own experiences and how from a young age my body has been seen like that. Despite the over-sexualization Ciela is taught to love her body from a young age by the women in her family. She describes this experience in the following: “my mother is the one who told me my curvas were worth celebrating. Every day growing up, I came home to a family where hips and thighs meant health and beauty, and it saved me from thinking there was something immodest and shameful about my body” (105). Ciela’s experience with her body is something I also found relatable because it mirrored (I had to do it!) my own experience and journey with loving my body. I think it’s really important to encourage body acceptance from a young age. McLemore shows how we should celebrate bodies like Ciela’s and how doing so may have a big impact on self-esteem.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> In </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Mirror Season </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">the reader is taken on Ciela’s journey of regaining her confidence, finding love, and living as a survivor. The novel uses magical realism and elements of “The Snow Queen” fairytale to</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">present the reader with a raw exploration of being a sexual assault survivor. Her friendship with Lock showed how survivors are not alone and that humor can be a useful tool for finding joy. The story has so many aspects to it that I loved: the fairy tale elements, Ciela’s character, self-love/body acceptance, and the magic are just a few of them. <i>The Mirror Season</i> is going to be one of my top recommendations for a while! </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">-NA </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sources:</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 12pt; margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">McLemore, Anna-Marie. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Mirror Season</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. Feiwel & Friends, 2021. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Valladolid, Fabian. “Who Is a Curandero?” </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Curanderismo</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, www.asu.edu/courses/css335/page3.htm. </span> </p>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-18688279359212542122021-04-04T16:09:00.004-07:002021-04-06T14:36:08.692-07:00"Unhappy Ever After: When fairytales end badly" a lecture by Neil Philip<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZb4B9aNNLSXYVQU5kgUgnHzYmi8BYGhJPf1aa3OkGXWcCVGy2Lk40h9BbWqvP_mG1E1mZZo4GU5cn-qtMIxEZ8l3Rp1arKkJpuQYMq91X01qNGu1rQ9tcjPhZb00xpmMwMaUCiXkCXBXo/s1920/Neil+Philip+FB+Flyer.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="260" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZb4B9aNNLSXYVQU5kgUgnHzYmi8BYGhJPf1aa3OkGXWcCVGy2Lk40h9BbWqvP_mG1E1mZZo4GU5cn-qtMIxEZ8l3Rp1arKkJpuQYMq91X01qNGu1rQ9tcjPhZb00xpmMwMaUCiXkCXBXo/w462-h260/Neil+Philip+FB+Flyer.jpg" width="462" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">On Thursday, March 18th, the NCSCL was delighted to virtually host Neil Philip for his talk, “Unhappy Ever After: When fairytales end badly.” Well over a hundred listeners joined us through Zoom from both sides of the pond.</span><p></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-9a1b1ae7-7fff-d954-d867-742e029ead2e"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The topic that drew so many people to join us was tragic endings. Although most people have come to associate fairytales with the lighter iterations found in Disney adaptations, many of these tales originally end in grief and disappointment. For example, Philip describes how the “greatest of wish fulfillment tale type, Cinderella,” has evolved into a version that ends sadly: in a Brazilian version, Maria’s sister-turned-snake </span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Labismina</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> helps her to escape marriage to her own father but is forgotten when Maria marries a prince. Philip claims that “it is the lonely fate of </span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Labismina</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> that sticks in the mind, not the happy one of Princess Maria,” and goes on to reference Zuni and Eastern Indian versions of this tale with their own tragic endings. He acknowledges that there are also tales that purposefully twist listeners’ expectations of a happy ending via comedy, such as the “English gypsy variant of The Water of Life” told by Taimi Boswell.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">He then transitions into a text that is much more familiar to the audience -- that of Little Red Riding Hood. Perrault’s 1697 version is the one with the question-and-answer dialogue that we recall, but in the Brothers Grimm iteration, Red Riding Hood is eaten along with her grandmother and a woodsman cuts them free from the wolf’s belly. Even more gruesome, however, are the French versions, one of which can be found in Catherine Orenstein’s </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> In this tale, the wolf serves the girl her own grandmother’s flesh, but the young girl manages to escape by claiming she needed to relieve herself. Philip adds a factual tidbit here about the standard three-volume book wherein one can find over 2,000 folktale types across cultures -- Little Red Riding Hood is listed at ATU-333. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Philip notes that even the Grimm brothers’ darker fairytales are a result of altering the original tales to be lighter. Grimm adds what Philip calls a “literary flourish” to the juniper tree tale, which concludes with a happy ending after “a story that is relentlessly miserable.” Dark themes and other key elements carry on through the iterations of stories. Hans Christian Andersen, the author of the original tales of many fairytales we know today, often writes with themes of grief, suffering, and disillusion. Philip explains that Andersen was rarely one to write happy endings, instead the iterations are “infused with melancholy” and he was “merciless to the characters'' in his tales. Although these happier stories are more popular, Philip quotes Oscar Wilde, “there are times when sorrow seems to me to be the only truth.” Ultimately, Philip says, storytelling can be seen as an act of reparation for the world. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 12pt; margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Partway through the talk, an ill-intentioned attendee unmuted himself and interrupted with inappropriate comments. Thankfully, Natalie moved quickly to kick him out and reported him immediately. The lecture resumed without incident, though we were no longer able to admit latecomers. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 12pt; margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">After Philip concluded his lecture, the chat was opened up for questions which came pouring in. A few of them, along with Philip’s responses, are listed here:</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 12pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Q: Why do you think children are associated with fairy tales?</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 12pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A: It started with the Grimm's; they called their collection “Children’s and Household Tales.” The children’s section was really quite short, but as they released newer editions, they realized children were being read these stories, so they softened quite a lot of the elements. Evil mothers become evil stepmothers, for instance. By the end of the 19th century, you get really influential series of books of fairy tales which are specifically aimed at children. The stories are made more acceptable for a child audience. So that’s the beginning of our assumption that fairy tales are expected to be enjoyed by children.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 12pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Q: What do you think is the appeal, aesthetic or psychological, of tragic fairy tales?</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 12pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A: It’s the same as the appeal of horror films and gothic novels; it’s just part of human nature that people like sad things as well as happy things. It is fair to say that the majority of traditional fairy tales do end up with a happy ending, but they put the poor protagonists, both male and female, through the most terrible suffering and troubles along the way. So the happy ending, what Tolkien called the </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">eucatastrophe</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, is won through suffering. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 12pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Q: Why do you think people have edited the original fairy tales to something that can now be read to children?</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 12pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A: The Victorians -- well, 19th century people; let’s not say Victorians since the Grimms’ first version came out in 1812 -- they were sort of prudish about what was suitable for children. It’s interesting what they thought was suitable, like terrible retributions at the end of fairy tales like Cinderella's sisters getting their eyes being pecked out by doves and people being made to dance in red hot shoes regarded as perfectly acceptable. But they tried to weed out the sexual elements. It’s just part of the transition of these stories from an inherited oral folkloric inheritance to a literary one. People like Angela Carter have tried to put back all the things that were taken out.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 12pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Q: It’s refreshing to hear a scholar identify ways their thinking has changed as you mention with the Fens tale or your conception of authenticity’s value or otherwise. Have you experienced any other major shifts in your thinking over the years, scholarly or otherwise?</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 12pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 12pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A: That’s certainly an example when my mind has been changed by someone else’s scholarship. I’m very much more aware of the individual voice of the storyteller in the story and that’s what I value in any particular story, rather than having a more generic interest in Snow White stories, let’s say. That and an interest in all the other elements in a story: the language, cadence, intonation, pauses, gesticulations. The relation between the storyteller and the audience is a very potent, dynamic thing in storytelling. My thinking about folk and fairy tales has remained much the same, but deepened and widened. There are things such as Mrs. Balfour stories where I’ve had a change of heart and thought. I’ve just written, for the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, a biography of a woman called Ruth Tongue, who was a very famous storyteller in the second half of the twentieth century in England. My initial attitude was that Ruth Tongue was basically a fraud, which I thought since I heard recordings of her actual voice: very cut-glass, upper class English and her storytelling voice which is a very heavily accented Somerset dialect. I thought that something is not right here. And learning more about Tongue, I’ve begun to think she is not correct in what she says about where she learned these stories and who she learned them from because it doesn’t stack up, but actually it makes her more interesting as a creative storyteller because she is basically making all this stuff up. Someone said she “collects from herself,” which I thought was a very polite way of putting it.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There were many other questions and answers which we were not able to fit in this blog, but it seemed that many people were able to enjoy the fruit of Philip’s scholarship! His clear expertise, thorough research, and insightful conclusions sparked ongoing conversation on this compelling topic. Even Philip’s cat had something to add! Thank you to those who attended our first virtual scholarly talk. We were delighted to have such an engaged audience.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">For those who missed it, the lecture and Q&A were recorded and can be found here:</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #1155cc;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><u>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBzElceP2nE</u></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #1155cc;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><u><br /></u></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Our next guest lecture will be in April; keep an eye out for the details! In the meantime, we hope you pick up a tale that ends unhappily ever after.</span></p><br /></span>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-36249044587219793662021-03-19T14:43:00.004-07:002021-03-19T14:43:54.654-07:00Review on "Concrete Rose" by Angie Thomas<p class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"></span></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWf7aBopD2ulmZSWiI-SUMWBHyFR90M45illnyGkmoGO6EncXT2uXKIbZ2nny4DwqM0-NoSaTUM5ACSaV6UAr0ylsxd073iPrZihqomGMk7ujulJvQ6ctO0BiikNd2WY-FGSO1pwBCKfGu/s1500/CR.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="1000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWf7aBopD2ulmZSWiI-SUMWBHyFR90M45illnyGkmoGO6EncXT2uXKIbZ2nny4DwqM0-NoSaTUM5ACSaV6UAr0ylsxd073iPrZihqomGMk7ujulJvQ6ctO0BiikNd2WY-FGSO1pwBCKfGu/s320/CR.jpg" /></a></b></div><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Hardback cover</span></div></span><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Angie Thomas’ first novel, <i>The Hate U Give</i>, was
nothing short of groundbreaking. After her sophomore novel, <i>On the Come Up</i>,
Thomas decided to return to something a little more familiar to readers.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The first thing fans heard about Angie Thomas’ junior
novel was that this was a character we already knew in her “Garden Heights”
universe, where <i>The Hate U Give</i> and <i>On The Come Up </i>are set. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Fans went into a frenzy.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Through Twitter, followers of the author soon learned
the protagonist’s name: Maverick Carter, the father of Starr Carter who was the
protagonist of <i>The Hate U Give</i>. <i>Concrete Rose</i> is a prequel set
seventeen years before the award-winning <i>The Hate U Give</i>. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Although it’s a prequel, it is not at all necessary to
read <i>The Hate U Give</i> before <i>Concrete Rose</i>. It felt so exciting to
return to the Carter family, but if <i>Concrete Rose </i>is your first Angie
Thomas novel the only thing that you would miss are character cameos like
Maverick who was in <i>The Hate U Give</i> as an adult. As a returning reader
to Thomas’ novels, it is exciting to see the backstory of Mav, which was
briefly alluded to in <i>The Hate U Give</i>. Not much of Mav’s teenage years
are discussed in <i>The Hate U Give</i>. From what I recall, what is discussed
is that his oldest child, Seven, has a different mother than the rest of his
siblings, which is also discussed in <i>Concrete Rose</i>, and <i>The Hate U
Give </i>also mentions that Mav was incarcerated sometime between <i>Concrete
Rose </i>and <i>The Hate U Give</i> when his children were young.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Going into the novel, I actually couldn’t recall many details
of Mav in <i>The Hate U Give</i> besides the two points I detailed, and honestly
I didn’t need to recall that is it is part of what the book is about. <i>The
Hate U Give </i>in this case serves to give backstory for Mav. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Thomas’ newest novel <i>Concrete Rose</i> follows
seventeen-year-old Maverick Carter who is growing up in Garden Heights as the
man of the house while his father is incarcerated. Maverick, or Mav, has to
juggle school with bringing in money for his family through dealing drugs for
the infamous King Lord gang. </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">However, when he learns he is the father of a baby,
his whole life is turned around. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">One thing I wanted to note is Mav’s emotions
throughout the novel, and how he expresses them. After losing a beloved family
member, Dre, to gang violence, Mav is understandably devastated, but struggles
to express himself, especially around his family: <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">“Men ain’t supposed to cry. We supposed to
be strong enough to carry our boulders and everybody else’s…Ain’t got no time
to grieve” (Thomas, 120-121), and later, he says “I can’t sit around crying
about Dre. I gotta be a man” (Thomas, 163). <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Manhood, especially Black manhood is a prominent theme
in the novel. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Black children or teenagers are often viewed as much
older, or at least given the responsibilities of someone much older, and for
Mav, he truly has to take the role of an adult and a father, when he should
just have to worry about his schooling or prom, but instead he can barely even
focus on school. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Although set more than twenty years ago, the struggles
of Mav are ones that continue even today. </span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">This seventeen-year-old is dealing with gang violence,
having a baby, looking after his grieving family, and trying to financially
make ends meet among so many other things, and he feels like he can’t even show
his emotions. He has to put on a show of “being a man” but this idea is not
often depicted as congruent with crying or showing sadness. By showing this
conflict, Thomas subtly points to the unique pressure that Mav is put under as
a young Black man. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Cleyvis Natera excellently articulates the pressure of
manhood in Mav’s life in a review from Time Magazine: <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">“<span style="background: white; color: black; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">Manhood becomes the confining praxis toward resolution: Is he
a man? How big of a man? How brave of a man? We come to understand that loss
ushers Maverick to redefine himself beyond the confines of gender norms: he
must see himself not as doomed to the legacy of his father’s actions, but as a
parent and a human being focused on the future.”(Natera, 2021)</span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">With Mav’s father’s incarceration, Mav is working to
define his own manhood while also working on surviving. Mav does what he
believes is necessary to survive, having to grow up even more than others his
age. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">What I think is incredibly important is how the
pressures Mav is put under leads him to drug dealing. Mav sells drugs with
King, an infamous drug dealer in the King Lord gang, to make a little bit more
money for his family and his new baby. At no point though is Mav demonized for
this decision, which I think is not only a fresh viewpoint on a black teenager
dealing drugs, but also a critical viewpoint to look at why the person made the
decision to deal drugs, and ultimately how his society let him down, instead of
looking at him negatively for it. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn-wqo8Ip8b4iy9n99jgdmK78V7b98ASroQjOsp941LVFsZ8DyDI3BPtGgbGoqTsJhoaMT8CHIT52KYe4uQ4Jlw_V5PdiBTJGmPojfuROB7SB85Ub_XUNgnzFaGzUriH0DZbRT-cQEmj50/s475/CR2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="309" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn-wqo8Ip8b4iy9n99jgdmK78V7b98ASroQjOsp941LVFsZ8DyDI3BPtGgbGoqTsJhoaMT8CHIT52KYe4uQ4Jlw_V5PdiBTJGmPojfuROB7SB85Ub_XUNgnzFaGzUriH0DZbRT-cQEmj50/s320/CR2.jpg" /></a></div><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Paperback cover</span></div></span><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Mav is put under pressure that have existed for other
Black men, and Thomas acknowledges the balance she had to achieve while writing
between realism and falling into a stereotype that has been associated with
Black men in an interview with Time Magazine: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">“How do I fight against that [stereotypes]? And for
me, it was again about looking at the person, looking at the why - because
that's how you connect people who may not even identify with Maverick. You may
not live in a neighborhood where there are gangs, but you can understand
wanting to be protected. You may not have a parent who's incarcerated, but you
can understand wanting to help your family out financially. These are all human
emotions.” (Natera, 2021)<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">As Thomas states, at the heart of this novel is pure,
raw emotion. She fights these potential stereotypes by grounding the characters
in dynamic, realistic actions and words that can be related to. Mav has real
intense emotions because Mav represents just one real Black man, not a
stereotype.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Although Mav believes he can’t cry at first, his boss,
Mr. Wyatt, emphasizes the importance of emotions: <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">“Son, one of the biggest lies ever told is that Black
men don’t feel emotions. Guess it’s easier to not see us as human when you
think we’re heartless. Fact of the matter is, we feel things. Hurt, pain,
sadness, all of it. We got a right to show them feelings as much as anybody
else” (Thomas, 164). <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Almost halfway through the novel here, Mav cries for
the first time, and I felt some sort of weight off my shoulders as he cried. I
spent 160 pages watching this character build up a wall to separate a part of
himself from the people who love him, and then he becomes brave enough to knock
it down and show his grief and anxiety. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Mav is constantly trying to fit into this role of a Black
man that society has created, when he finally learns that Black men are the
only ones who should be defining the role of a Black man. After pages and pages
of feeling out of control, he learns he can define himself and his identity. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Concrete Rose </span></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">is
a beautiful portrait of a Black man growing up in America and learning to
define himself, instead of letting the world define him. This is one of those
books that I think everyone should read. Although it is marketed as a YA novel,
Angie Thomas is also read and loved by adults, and I feel like adolescent and
adult readers alike would love and benefit from this book.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Although a young adult novel, I feel that young adults
are not the only readers who could benefit from this novel, and this novel
could both provide an example of the Black experience to non-Black readers,
while also providing a sense of familiarity or understanding for Black readers.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">I commend Angie Thomas for consistently coming out
with both relevant and yet timeless young adult novels, and I highly recommend
you give <i>Concrete Rose</i> a read. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">-SS<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Works Cited: <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style="margin-left: 28.35pt; text-indent: -28.35pt;">Natera, Cleyvis.
“Https://Time.com/5928689/Concrete-Rose-Review-Angie-Thomas/.” <i>Time</i>, 12
Jan. 2021, time.com/5928689/concrete-rose-review-angie-thomas/. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p style="margin-left: 28.35pt; text-indent: -28.35pt;">Thomas, Angie. <i>Concrete
Rose</i>. HarperCollins Publishers, 2021. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p style="margin-left: 28.35pt; text-indent: -28.35pt;">Photos from Goodreads.com<o:p></o:p></p>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-22584165051688087082021-03-12T17:08:00.001-08:002021-03-12T17:20:25.819-08:00Fat Chance, Charlie Vega Review <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 362px; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; overflow: hidden; width: 243px;"><img alt="A person with flowers on her head
Description automatically generated with low confidence" height="362" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/INUDY2AQQMoRmQeLu-iPg9axe7dm76V9jXKHtxLUrDi6qBm0q2ZnW4ITuS2oCKuzQ1huvu-6EBgSV9H-jSbv94OOq5qpUpCRmYNPLQZOt3gSLgYYRO6RaAIueLv_nZg1ha_uBmM" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="243" /></span></div><p> <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I first learned about </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">by Crystal Maldonado while browsing a publishing catalog. I had gotten into the habit of looking at these to not miss authors who are Black, Indigenous, and people of color. My habit served me well because here was a book with a Puerto Rican main character hidden in the depths of a catalog. I rarely see my ethnicity represented in YA, and needless to say I counted the days until </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">’s</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">release day. </span></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-3820c2d7-7fff-2bfc-7f7e-4ea69e527b27"><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">follows the titular character Charlie, an aspiring teenage writer, as she navigates first love, self-acceptance, and friendship. In an interview with </span><a href="https://thenerddaily.com/crystal-maldonado-author-interview/" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Nerd Daily</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> author Crystal Maldonado states the novel is about </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“[t]he five Fs…: fat fashion, feelings, friendship, and first love! At its core, I think this book is really about love in general — the kind you have for your friends, the kind that gives you butterflies in your stomach, and the kind you give to yourself” (Koehler, “Q&A: Crystal Maldonado, Author of ‘Fat Chance, Charlie Vega’”). This book celebrates love, and we accompany Charlie as she learns the importance of each iteration of it. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Exploring different types of love </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">delves into complex familial relationships. For instance, Charlie and her mother (Jeanne Vega) often disagree about Charlie’s weight. Mrs. Vega was once fat, but after a family loss she lost all the weight and thus insists Charlie does the same. Charlie, however, wants to accept her body as it is. The mother/daughter relationship in the novel dramatizes how the pressure for body conformity does not only comes from culture at large but also from within our own family. Charlie’s relationship with her mother changes for the better over the course of the novel, stressing how familial tensions like these are not resolved overnight – if ever. Charlie recognizes that she cannot change her mother, and that most of the change must come from within herself. Fatphobia exists everywhere in our society, and </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> depicts that it can come from those who we are meant to love deeply, our family. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Two of the other main types of love explored are friendships and romantic love. Charlie and her best friend Amelia have been inseparable since they were little. However, as they grow older, Charlie starts noticing how everyone prefers Amelia over her, this occurs when it comes to other friendships and romantic relationships. Through their relationship Maldonado illustrates how easy it is to put one’s self down by constantly comparing ourselves to our friends or peers. I thought this topic was handled well and it showed how fine the line is between admiration and comparison. The novel depicted the importance of recognizing how careful we must be when loving our friends because putting them on a pedestal could lead to resentment. Furthermore, the novel also explores first love. Charlie has never been kissed and daydreams about finding someone who will love her as she is. As an aspiring Romance writer, she wants to experience it for herself. Once she does, she finds herself consumed by her romantic relationship. I found the relationship between Charlie and the romantic lead sweet and well developed. We see Charlie realize who she is within the context of the relationship and how her self-love does not need to come from her partner’s validation. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3WsOSLw1VVpKzecLy7OcqG4dKqAll0wxVdbxulaadZNuiXg5wLMsT1QkPNhuUB6jQRl60U3u3dw3wderEFg1rdbTzH5kBr6Yt6wztp9X5QW62guKGSpsSKsAYpbaA51m-nyVuaMLEjcL1/s2048/Headshot+3.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3WsOSLw1VVpKzecLy7OcqG4dKqAll0wxVdbxulaadZNuiXg5wLMsT1QkPNhuUB6jQRl60U3u3dw3wderEFg1rdbTzH5kBr6Yt6wztp9X5QW62guKGSpsSKsAYpbaA51m-nyVuaMLEjcL1/s320/Headshot+3.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-6efabd0d-7fff-2184-88fd-224ef7df7f97"><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></span></span></p><div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-8f178646-7fff-3ab8-e1d9-02b0f9d6c8e6"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The most celebrated form of love in </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"> is self-love. Charlie’s journey is about accepting herself and her body. This develops throughout the novel as she navigates different types of relationships such as the one with her mother, best friend, and boyfriend. Ultimately, she discovers that her love for herself should not be rooted in these, instead it must come from within. I was glad to see how Charlie slowly came to this realization. She is not a character who is completely self-deprecating since she displays confidence when it comes to her writing skills. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">However, she struggles to see the beauty in herself because everything around her tells her she’s anything but beautiful. Charlie feels the need to embody perfection in order to be worthy of love. Her best friend Amelia gives her some advice when it comes to this by saying, “You need to believe in your value for </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">you</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">, even if you’re not some flawless ethereal being…We’re </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">all </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">messy, Charlie” (316). This encapsulates Charlie’s journey to self-love the realization that no one is perfect, and that value comes from the self not external sources. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">When starting </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">I had no particular expectation as to how I wanted to see my culture portrayed. I felt excitement over a character who shared my cultural identity. However, the representation of Puerto Rican culture delighted me. There was mention of my favorite foods like tostones (twice fried plantains). Yet, what I really loved was how Maldonado approached the topic of Spanish and Puerto Rican culture. Charlie is half Puerto Rican and half white, but mainly takes after her Puerto Rican side. There is some discussion as to how Charlie feels inadequate when it comes to her father’s side of the family because she doesn’t speak Spanish. I thought that this was a great point by the author and one that is important to make. I have heard my own family members voice their concerns about Puerto Rican children who do not speak Spanish. To me this is not something that separates you from your heritage and I’m glad that Charlie realizes this as well. Maldonado depicts the Puerto Rican experience not as a monolith, but as one that is unique to the person. This is such a powerful message that resonated with me and I believe I won't be alone in this. I appreciated how Charlie’s cultural identity wasn’t just about food or any other practices, instead it was weaved with her journey of self-acceptance and provided a powerful message for the Puerto Rican audience living in the US. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Another aspect of the novel that I really enjoyed was the inclusion of fashion and development of style. I love reading fashion descriptions in books and seeing how the author depicts outfits. In the novel we see how Charlie tries to pinpoint her style by frequenting #fatfashion on Instagram and how seeing other people like her inspired her to find her own sense of style. I enjoyed how Maldonado included critique of fashion stores, which often do not carry clothing that would be suitable for a teenager. Instead, these retailers sell matronly looking clothing. The reader can get a glimpse of Charlie’s style in the cover and in other instances of the novel. As someone who is straight-sized this was not something I considered, but I’m glad it was part of Charlie’s journey. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Author, Crystal Maldonado, explores the five F’s (fat fashion, feelings, friendship, and first love) through all the themes I mentioned and does so with a character that we can’t help but root for. </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">is a story of different kinds of love and how they all play a part in the formation of the self. Charlie is a magnificent character who drives this story and helps readers realize that we should embrace all aspects of ourselves. It also can help the reader see how fatphobia is embedded in our culture and how some of the things we say can be harmful to those we love. With a diverse cast of characters and an extremely lovable main character, </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">will take readers on a journey of love and self-acceptance. </span></p><br /><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Sources:</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 0pt 36pt; text-indent: -36pt;"><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Koehler, Mimi. “Q&A: Crystal Maldonado, Author of ‘Fat Chance, Charlie Vega.’” </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">The Nerd Daily. </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">February 1, 2021. www.thenerddaily.com/crystal-maldonado-author-interview/</span></p><br /><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Maldonado, Crystal. </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Fat Chance, Charlie Vega. </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Holiday House, 2021.</span></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">-NA</span></span></span></div></span>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-17853252338618291652021-03-05T10:25:00.002-08:002021-03-05T10:26:16.003-08:00To All the Books I’ve Loved Before<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihIctSvB2B_Oopsa0oW_YpkFOO2NmSTZrJqnSqp-95_VCbG0zExpZxDT83wIFPoAPdAicVlCE6CS4odx_hZIqCDzENInQFIRRR2QH6hnuxIPW_Dv3mhKnyy3X1pdSasC8lC1TBHPyFUSYy/s936/Asian+American+YA+Romance.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="155" data-original-width="936" height="53" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihIctSvB2B_Oopsa0oW_YpkFOO2NmSTZrJqnSqp-95_VCbG0zExpZxDT83wIFPoAPdAicVlCE6CS4odx_hZIqCDzENInQFIRRR2QH6hnuxIPW_Dv3mhKnyy3X1pdSasC8lC1TBHPyFUSYy/w320-h53/Asian+American+YA+Romance.png" width="320" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal">I’ve been thinking a lot about the end
recently.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The end of the semester, to clarify. I bring this up because
it will also be the end of my graduate career (assuming I pass my portfolio
defense – more on that later!). As I reflect on what it means to be awarded an
M.A. degree, I ponder if my relationship with literature has changed. Do I put
literature on a higher pedestal now? Have my “immature” interests matured? Has
studying children’s and young adult literature led me to love it more or hate
the flaws I’ve come to notice?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Which brings me to this blog post. Its title is a reference
to the movie, <i>To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before,</i> whose teen romance genre
reminds me of what drew me to the very first book I wrote a blog post about: <i>I
Love You So Mochi</i> by Sarah Kuhn. I realized only in hindsight that what makes
this novel one of my favorites is that despite all of the books I’ve read
throughout the years that featured romance in any way, it was the first in
which I actually found the love interest attractive. In fact, it was the first
I had read in which there was an Asian male love interest. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">There exist many novels in which young Asian American girls
fall in love, but predictably, their love interests are often white (or
unidentified, and therefore white by default in the popular imagination). The
movie alluded to in this blog post’s title is one example, alongside <i>Starfish</i>
by Akemi Dawn Bowman, <i>Butterfly Yellow</i> by Thanhha Lai,<i> Fake it Till
You Break It</i> by Jenn. P Nguyen, <i>I Believe in a Thing Called Love</i> by
Maurene Goo, and many others. It is much more likely to see an Asian American
teenage girl fall in love with a white character than another Asian American or
someone of another ethnicity, which perpetuates the stereotype of the
submissive Oriental. What about the Asian American boys?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">One reason that Asian American young men are not depicted as
love interests might be the Asian American literary trope that Asian men are frequently
depicted as effeminate or having the characteristics of a woman. Reclaiming
Asian masculinity from this disparaging association that erases their
distinctiveness is vital, and there is some progress within Asian American
young adult literature. Young Asian American men are occasionally depicted as
attractive, such as in <i>I’ll Be the One</i> by Lyla Lee wherein the love
interest is a famous model. Novels such as this and <i>I Love You So Mochi</i> disrupt
the notion that only white boys are of interest and instead provide much-needed
representation. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMTnHQ5w97hPygkT490H0uISR0QJUM4uSazpOLUQHVSfdvg6H52wX7v1HeMiNyndXUD_XjCeQMo4cBtxjeyPqw6ZQxAXNPMfcoxg2FMwnWJZMDTgf0liihGKrCk0Mj9hkb0xnqLiW7OhqO/s144/A+Pho+Love+Story+cover.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="144" data-original-width="95" height="179" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMTnHQ5w97hPygkT490H0uISR0QJUM4uSazpOLUQHVSfdvg6H52wX7v1HeMiNyndXUD_XjCeQMo4cBtxjeyPqw6ZQxAXNPMfcoxg2FMwnWJZMDTgf0liihGKrCk0Mj9hkb0xnqLiW7OhqO/w118-h179/A+Pho+Love+Story+cover.jpg" width="118" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpzAvb6INhfLfqXxOmYsOvFJy_OzJQfSNpvKIrh5YRqiDED0tRXAnqUl4npfq0wusE8JRCXp6QVhm7V7ITjA-gE3Ta8pKhxx9ejs7_fqXO0W3QtperDHDDu9I83Jq0u3e9RMBa79z4eebK/s328/When+Dimple+met+Rishi+cover.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="328" data-original-width="218" height="183" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpzAvb6INhfLfqXxOmYsOvFJy_OzJQfSNpvKIrh5YRqiDED0tRXAnqUl4npfq0wusE8JRCXp6QVhm7V7ITjA-gE3Ta8pKhxx9ejs7_fqXO0W3QtperDHDDu9I83Jq0u3e9RMBa79z4eebK/w122-h183/When+Dimple+met+Rishi+cover.jpg" width="122" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTaKX6TuwxdyXx2HPy8YZuGLgZeQnWFdEl3h3IyECCXYkT0Se-H-ABw-TysOebYe3rZ4QmNLYh9nQJLK5YEa_eixnycmV3Fp95sWUOBuTYyIeCHF4x8DulC8ShNIoWwALzudp0FVacC-OZ/s142/A+Taste+for+Love+cover.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="142" data-original-width="94" height="184" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTaKX6TuwxdyXx2HPy8YZuGLgZeQnWFdEl3h3IyECCXYkT0Se-H-ABw-TysOebYe3rZ4QmNLYh9nQJLK5YEa_eixnycmV3Fp95sWUOBuTYyIeCHF4x8DulC8ShNIoWwALzudp0FVacC-OZ/w122-h184/A+Taste+for+Love+cover.jpg" width="122" /></a><br /><br /></div><o:p></o:p><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Yet we run into another problem when Asian American teens
fall in love with one another and date in YA literature. A surprising pattern
emerges: the relationships very often hinge on secrecy, lies, and/or defying
parental expectations. <i>Rent a Boyfriend</i> by Gloria Chao and <i>Frankly in
Love</i> by David Yoon are several examples in which relationships are faked for
parental approval. <i>Somewhere Only We Know</i> by Maurene Goo chronicles a
relationship that develops over a day of lies about professional work, and <i>Romeo
and Juliet</i> gets a contemporary, Vietnamese American spin in Loan Le’s <i>A
Phở Love Story</i>. <i>When Dimple Met Rishi</i> by Sandhya Menon and <i>A
Taste for Love</i> by Jennifer Yen feature parents who select dating partners
for their children. Just a cursory glance at texts that feature young Asian
American protagonists shows that romance is nearly always entangled with deception
and parental involvement. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Despite this, these novels are <i>engaging</i>. Their
protagonists grapple with parental expectations out of love for these family
members, and the casual depiction of cultural markers is comforting. Rather
than repackage tropes, these novels integrate Asian American experience with
the familiarity of teenage romance. New characterizations fit in smoothly with
canonical ones: respectfully reserved, shy young men, abrasively opinionated,
good-hearted young women, physically attractive boys, and intellectually
impressive girls claim their spaces in the pages. This genre will continue to
expand, and with it, the conceptualization of what it looks like to be Asian
American and in love will continue to grow. Asian American YA romance has much
potential to <span class="normaltextrun"><span style="background: white; color: black;">delineate the “heterogeneity, hybridity, and multiplicity” of Asian
American culture advocated for by Lisa Lowe (66). </span></span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Having explored the genre of Asian American young adult
romance that was so special to me before this M.A. program because of how
rarely I encountered it, I return to my question: do I love it more or do I
hate the flaws I’ve come to see? My answer is that I still love it. Though I
was initially dismissive of the importance of representation as I entered
graduate studies, choosing Asian American children’s literature as my
specialization has led to representation becoming more meaningful to me than before
I had embarked on this exploratory journey. I’ve read and appreciated Asian
American YA literature in the past, but this graduate assistantship has allowed
me to validate it to myself and spotlight it for others to appreciate. What
I’ve learned throughout my time as a blogger of children’s literature academia
is that it is worth it to critically examine what captivates us. We’ll emerge
with a more robust, complex understanding of all the books we’ve loved before.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoListParagraph" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">-<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->(A.N.)<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">*Special thanks to Magical Reads Blog, which has a lengthy
list of YA romances with Asian Characters. Definitely worth taking a look at!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><a href="https://magicalreads7.wordpress.com/2020/05/14/list-ya-romances-with-asian-characters/">https://magicalreads7.wordpress.com/2020/05/14/list-ya-romances-with-asian-characters/</a><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">Scholarly Works
Referenced<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.5in;"><span class="findhit"><span style="background: white; color: black;">Lowe</span></span><span class="normaltextrun"><span style="background: white; color: black;">, Lisa. <i>Immigrant
Acts: On Asian American Cultural Politics</i>. Duke University Press, 1996.</span></span><span class="eop"><span style="background: white; color: black;"> </span></span><o:p></o:p></p>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-67675077776145358242021-02-26T12:38:00.001-08:002021-02-26T12:38:26.301-08:00One of the Good Ones Book Review <p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2vTOC6GZdx2Cdxkn8cB8mbZNkRcARnT2oNkqAoTDsdQPojSVa2O50NRs3BE5dXi8jB14rviScXMn0zzpuunJ13Rg3GOIYyRvWojNNBN7TBTjT_ULoL375OnwtBRXBLaVp6CUGK0BgDxr7/s2048/ONEOFTHEGOODONES_FINAL.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1348" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2vTOC6GZdx2Cdxkn8cB8mbZNkRcARnT2oNkqAoTDsdQPojSVa2O50NRs3BE5dXi8jB14rviScXMn0zzpuunJ13Rg3GOIYyRvWojNNBN7TBTjT_ULoL375OnwtBRXBLaVp6CUGK0BgDxr7/s320/ONEOFTHEGOODONES_FINAL.jpg" /></a></div><br /> <span id="docs-internal-guid-0b664503-7fff-76ff-f071-26cab44a03a7"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 24pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Who gets to be “one of the good ones” and why?</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 24pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Maika and Maritza Moulite’s sophomore novel explores this concept and adds a mysterious twist to it. </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the Good Ones </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">follows sisters Happi and Genny in the aftermath of their sister’s (Kezi) mysterious death. Kezi, a teen activist and YouTuber, is arrested at a social justice protest and dies while in police custody. She is deemed “one of the good ones” by the media, but her family is left grieving. To honor Kezi, Happi and Genny embark on a road trip Kezi had planned before her death using an heirloom copy of </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Negro Motorist Green Book</span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the Good Ones </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">discusses a wide range of topics such as family and social injustice.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 24pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The novel opens three months after Kezi’s death. Happi and her family are attending a ceremony where Kezi was to accept an award for her activist work. As she is listening to the ceremony presenters, Happi reflects on the aftermath of her sister’s death and how the media has portrayed Kezi:</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 24pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“She was mine before she was anyone else’s. All mine. Partly mine. Now she belongs to you and them and shirts and rallies and songs and documentaries. They say she has A Bright Future Ahead of Her and She Was a Star Whose Light Burned Out Too Soon. She Was Going to Make a Difference. That’s all true, but it is not the Truth. She was more than her future. She had a past. She was living her present…She was my sister before she became your martyr, after all” (Moulite 11).</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 24pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This excerpt from the novel expresses its overarching commentary on who is worthy of remembrance by showing how Kezi has been deemed “one of the good ones.” In the above quotation Kezi has become a headline, a trend but to Happi she was her sister. Happi counteracts the sensationalism of Kezi’s death by presenting a headline of her own, which she calls “the Truth.” The truth is what does not get circulated around the news or social media and Happi is there to remind the reader of it. Happi reminds us how before her death Kezi’s story belonged to no one else but Kezi and those who loved her, to them she was a person. This beginning passage sets the tone for the rest of the novel, which explores who these three sisters are in relation to the “one of the good ones” concept and their family history. </span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEdfF4qkDqvSob2bwY8Dh4t34YqrJFWfpsGCRCP6lsRckqj0AOfCJtKPxqi_2Q45PbvwNQC2GVMaKwHh9r4ie3-iOPO-PCDysiIUwKDk3ySf6szkSxqzWZN4nnydQH_5H4o4vOEGfXm9gO/s2048/Moulite%252C+Maika+-+Author+Photo+%25282%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEdfF4qkDqvSob2bwY8Dh4t34YqrJFWfpsGCRCP6lsRckqj0AOfCJtKPxqi_2Q45PbvwNQC2GVMaKwHh9r4ie3-iOPO-PCDysiIUwKDk3ySf6szkSxqzWZN4nnydQH_5H4o4vOEGfXm9gO/s320/Moulite%252C+Maika+-+Author+Photo+%25282%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 24pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><br /></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 24pt; margin-top: 0pt;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhb4AsJehxnHalPNyIb1h3a-5xZ0I4nxbao-VDWppmkQqEtLDgjpB90hgqegfvVMGNWonsw_p7L4ICRJ6zXLDwnhQN6gvFsgo-0mCOHjWv_nsRI1RiztOpzfLH87ExTG7UEnKSFaEYxJKlr/s2048/Moulite%252C+Maritza+-+Author+Photo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhb4AsJehxnHalPNyIb1h3a-5xZ0I4nxbao-VDWppmkQqEtLDgjpB90hgqegfvVMGNWonsw_p7L4ICRJ6zXLDwnhQN6gvFsgo-0mCOHjWv_nsRI1RiztOpzfLH87ExTG7UEnKSFaEYxJKlr/s320/Moulite%252C+Maritza+-+Author+Photo.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0T83anw8zGiwnwxkuZ1EgxGPSzTatHBiqgasqmKq01nkVp6PEcBAZ9xw9MZ3cChb2btajlX5jRmTFp1gE9Oda7fmtah2NXPjroKW4gk9mprtm-vPzewV475MkZHFNVDlQqEh6I5Iqc_XF/s2048/Moulite%252C+Maritza+-+Author+Photo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><br /></a></div><p></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Authors Maika and Maritza Moulite do an excellent job of developing characters who are less than perfect. This is mainly depicted through Happi’s character arc. Happi is constantly juxtaposed with her sister Kezi. Kezi is studious and invested in her relationships with her family and family history; whereas Happi keeps her family at arm’s length, is more preoccupied with her peers, and self-involved. Kezi is positioned as the responsible one while Happi is the more rebellious one. The juxtaposition between Happi and Kezi exemplifies how society expects members of the Black community to be perfect in every way in order to be deemed worthy of remembrance. This is why characters like Happi need to come in abundance. Characters who learn how their actions affect those around them and once they realize such mistakes they are shown reflecting on their choices. Happi’s character arc depicts how easy it is to forget that those close to us are going through different experiences. Happi's arc also shows how there can be</span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> growth without changing the core self, an aspect which I loved. Happi was not perfect and that was the beauty of her character because she was depicted as living her Truth. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 24pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the Good Ones</span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> presents multiple perspectives, some being Happi's, Kezi before her death, and various of their ancestors. The novel</span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">weaves the stories of these different family members through a physical item, </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Negro Motorist Green Book</span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. This guide was used by Black Americans during the segregation era to travel safely across the US, it catalogs places which welcomed Black folks. The novel traces the history of the copy in Happi and Kezi’s family through flashbacks of their ancestors. These show how the use of the </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Green Book </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">changed throughout the generations, but also how despite the book being out of print the US is not a safe place for Black Americans. By doing this Maika and Maritza Moulite present us with the truth of this family and the importance of being connected with our family history because to know it is to understand something bigger than us. Using a physical object, tracing its history through the family, and creating a new narrative with it was absolutely brilliant. The story’s structure offers full immersion by showcasing family history and providing the reader with a larger scope of the story. This aspect of the novel took me by surprise since I was expecting the story to follow mainly the sisters, but instead it depicted the importance of being involved with your family and knowing who they were.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the Good Ones </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">is a wonderful exploration of the concept and should not be bound by one genre. The story is a contemporary one because of the themes explored but it contains elements of mystery. The mystery of it will keep the reader on edge while providing a roller coaster of emotions. The use of valuable physical objects to depict family ties, the narrative structure, and the character work are just some of the amazing aspects of this novel.</span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the Good Ones </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">contains multitudes and it’s a read you won’t want to miss!</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">-NA</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 13pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Moulite, Maika, and Maritza Moulite. </span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the Good Ones</span><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. Inkyard Press, 2021.</span></span><p></p><div><span style="color: #2c2c2c; font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Author and cover images from the publisher. </span></span></div>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-89483774205097673572021-02-19T18:30:00.015-08:002021-02-19T21:12:31.430-08:00Review of "Black Girl Unlimited"<div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimbFh_iTO7TndJUdRBaKqnH8wjH3WVtZcyJYXncc9-GJIrU3FUgq8dg5u7vOCjIBvZ-muahy0cMlD3z_Bg0wU7jaa-lrZiVRNppvnWyfeDnZHdca78aBSJIwh5_Pyf96TTINucsKjcK3I9/s475/BGU.jpg" style="display: block; padding: 1em 0px; text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="307" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimbFh_iTO7TndJUdRBaKqnH8wjH3WVtZcyJYXncc9-GJIrU3FUgq8dg5u7vOCjIBvZ-muahy0cMlD3z_Bg0wU7jaa-lrZiVRNppvnWyfeDnZHdca78aBSJIwh5_Pyf96TTINucsKjcK3I9/s320/BGU.jpg" /></a></div>
Echo Brown’s debut novel, Black Girl Unlimited: The Remarkable Story of a Teenage Wizard may have been one of my favorite books of 2020, and I don’t give those titles out to just any book. <div><br /></div><div><i>Black Girl Unlimited </i>is described as a magical realism memoir. If this sounds counterintuitive, I promise it works.
Echo, the protagonist, is growing up on the East Side of Cleveland with her mother and two brothers. As she navigates through life, she frames her experiences with elements of magic.
What I love about this book is that it fights, and succeeds, to stand out as a unique reading experience. </div><div><br /></div><div>Instead of chapters, the book is split into nineteen sections, or “Lessons” of wizard training that Echo learns throughout her life, including “Evading the Black Veil”, “Performing Miracles of Unity”, and “Forgiving Yourself”. </div><div><br /></div><div>Although this book tackles a lot of heavy topics, including rape, depression, poverty, and drug use, Brown still manages to hold onto the magic throughout the book. </div><div><br /></div><div>The character Echo refers to herself and her mother as wizards, thus the lessons of wizard training at the start of each section. Although this is the magical realism element of the memoir, as I read the book I felt as if Echo and her mother truly were wizards. This book isn’t just being silly, but the use of them as wizards feels purposeful and real because this is based on her real life. </div><div><br /></div><div>Brown states that these lessons (the chapter titles) were healing work that she has done through her life due to her trauma, so each of these lessons was inspired by, as Brown states, her therapeutic and spiritual work to heal herself. She continues, “I also think some of the lessons are rooted in bigger themes I have aspired to in my real life that readers also may find useful. For example, the last lesson, “you are unlimited, be fearless in your pursuits” is something I remind myself of over and over especially when fears and insecurities rise. My hope is that some of the lessons will be inspirational for readers, reminding them of their own potential and abilities” (We Need Diverse Books, 2020). By putting in these lessons she learned based on her real life, they feel relatable and attainable. </div><div><br /></div><div>Although dealing with magic, the book breaks down real life stereotypes. Beautifully said by Karen Valby in the New York Times, “Brown’s greatest gift is evoking intimacy, and as she delicately but firmly snatches the reader’s attention, we are allowed to see this girl of multitudes and her neighborhood of contradictions in full and specific detail. Stereotypes, like the bitter myth of the strong black woman, wither on the page” (Valby, 2020). </div><div><br /></div><div>Echo the character is balancing the worlds of stereotypes, school, her home life, and her magic, while also dealing with a “black veil”. </div><div><br /></div><div>There is a reoccurring image of “black veils” that Echo sees over all people. She first sees a disembodied veil: </div><div><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0 0 0 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">“At first, I assume it’s a bird, but it doesn’t move like a bird…I see it, the black veil, right outside, hovering in the dark of night. I see clearly now that it is an ominous creature with no face, shaped like a rectangular piece of fabric, that ruffles and moves like a flag in the wind.” (Brown, 77)</div></blockquote><div><br /></div><div>Her mother reveals she also has seen the veil in times of intense trauma: “Black and scary-like, hoverin’ right ova me. I started screamin’ at da top of my lungs ‘cause I didn’t know what it was…I would see it e’ry night, until finally, I sank so far down, at da bottom of myself, it finally swooped on down and covered me, my whole head. I felt like I was suffocatin’. I couldn’t breathe.” (Brown, 80)</div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-BUWnEtVJ8-z6kYO1RxgUw9IUwspZpifwtDgwRk0hk7PIO-apCS8pBdut3FzWOdEhbiod9K6cPQBdVIzaPn0SXph4zLKKiy6-krDpzjqMIeiJ8-fwv0h-PtcAXWItGDWfKrwwL7wsfbQ3/s400/echo.jpg" style="display: block; padding: 1em 0px; text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-BUWnEtVJ8-z6kYO1RxgUw9IUwspZpifwtDgwRk0hk7PIO-apCS8pBdut3FzWOdEhbiod9K6cPQBdVIzaPn0SXph4zLKKiy6-krDpzjqMIeiJ8-fwv0h-PtcAXWItGDWfKrwwL7wsfbQ3/s320/echo.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Author Echo Brown
Brown highlights an interesting metaphor of generational trauma. Like the trauma Echo’s mother passes to her, her mother also passes what I would describe as an ability to see the veil, but Echo’s mother emphasizes that the black veil must be evaded. </div><div><br /></div><div>Brown worked with tweaking this metaphor throughout the writing process: </div><div><br /></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0 0 0 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="text-align: left;">“It felt like the black veil needed to descend somehow and submerge the victim, so it eventually changed the black veil that wraps itself around its victims. This was another instance where it wasn’t enough to just describe depression as it is, which is so challenging in real life. I needed a magical concept to really describe its impact and effect in a way that straightforward reality would miss, which is how the concept of the black veil came about.” (We Need Diverse Books, 2020) </div></blockquote><div><br /></div><div>Ultimately, Brown landed on a way to convey her trauma to the reader in such a concrete and innovative way, and in my opinion, an incredibly effective way as well. </div><div><br /></div><div>Only wizards, like Echo and her mother, can see this veil, but they must fight to keep the veil off: </div><div><br /></div><div>“Only way you can keep it off is to stay lifted. Got to stay spirited and in da light….Only way I can get mine off now is drankin’ and druggin’, othawise it’s always on me. I done learned how ta live in it mostly, but sometimes, I just cain’t control it, the darkness inside of me.” (Brown, 83) </div><div><br /></div><div>This section truly spoke to me. The depression is so powerful it has become a physical object that practically suffocates Echo, and appears to have pushed her mother into a deep addiction, something her mother struggles with throughout the novel. It is so real it turns into a physical black veil, almost described as a menacing creature or spirit, that must be evaded. Brown takes this portion of her life, potential trauma, and creates this metaphor of an object that can finally be understood or have logic applied to when these emotions can feel anything but logical. </div><div><br /></div><div>I think this is part of the importance of the magical realism in Brown’s novel. She has these events in life that she could not control and turns them into physical objects that as the author she can control. This book isn’t just Echo overcoming trauma, it’s the author rewriting her own trauma experience, as this is a memoir. Although I do not know to what exact extent the trauma in the novel is based on her own life, in this case the character Echo explores the idea of trauma to show how suffocating it can feel, while also how it is possible to overcome. </div><div><br /></div><div>Magical realism is a tool for Brown to portray trauma, and she uses that tool like an expert. In a way, the trauma as a physical object makes it feel possible to overcome. Trauma can feel incredibly abstract and therefore almost intangible to understand or simply deal with. By making her trauma a physical thing, it both shows the reader the overwhelming aspect of trauma, while also showing that it is possible to manage, in this case through “magic”, or her writing. Ultimately, a step of overcoming this appears to be through writing her own memoir. She wields the genre like a wizard controlling magic. </div><div><br /></div><div>I also notice Brown challenges the very nature of how books are written. She does this fascinating technique where she ends midsentence, then starts a new paragraph finishing the sentence but with a completely new idea. This sounds complicated but she still makes a full sentence.</div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgK6y6GZwas0u0kFM3bzzHWhEy7oJM8U35khyphenhyphenrqGLAHYAicg11IT9SDTyp50CY4n2c3Xce5IliEEsoOJ5VpEwjZB3xlgsuyz2GY348NByfvrgCEtGW1ak8DiA9pQ5jC_rrcH8ncria4o533/s2048/BGU2.jpg" style="display: block; padding: 1em 0px; text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="1174" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgK6y6GZwas0u0kFM3bzzHWhEy7oJM8U35khyphenhyphenrqGLAHYAicg11IT9SDTyp50CY4n2c3Xce5IliEEsoOJ5VpEwjZB3xlgsuyz2GY348NByfvrgCEtGW1ak8DiA9pQ5jC_rrcH8ncria4o533/s320/BGU2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Brown is not only turning what we think of memoirs on its head, but she even challenges the structure of how a book is written, as seen above. The character is not the only magic, this book itself is a magical experience made of careful artistry. </div><div><br /></div><div>An important aspect of the novel is she is challenging what a memoir is. We as the readers are not privy to knowing what truly did or did not happen because of the fantastical elements, so Brown is now in control of not just her narrative, but she can finally control her trauma at least to some degree. Brown takes her story and is finally able to control it. We are being guided through her story by her. Brown is there to control what is or is not seen of her in her story, something that through her experience she was initially powerless to. </div><div><br /></div><div>Although this is her first book, Brown has already made a name for herself in the book community. Brown shows care and expertise in her writing, creating a novel full of love and magic. I cannot wait for her sophomore novel, The Chosen One, set to publish in 2022. </div><div><br /></div><div>-SS </div><div><br /></div><div>Brown, Echo. Black Girl Unlimited: The Remarkable Story of a Teenage Wizard. Holt/Ottaviano, 2020.</div><div><br /></div><div>“Q&A With Echo Brown: BLACK GIRL UNLIMITED.” We Need Diverse Books, 17 Jan. 2020,<span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>diversebooks.org/qa-with-echo-brown-black-girl-unlimited/. </div><div><br /></div><div>Valby, Karen. “In Hollywood, Stories About People of Color Are Still Rare. These Y.A. Fantasy<span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>Novels Pick Up the Slack.” The New York Times, 4 Feb. 2020, <span> </span><span> </span><span> <span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> <span> </span></span></span><span> </span>www.nytimes.com/2020/02/04/books/review/dark-and-deepest-red-anna-mari-mclemore-black-<span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>girl-unlimited-echo-brown.html. </div><div><br /></div><div>Author and cover photo from goodreads.com</div>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-67889625459711383162021-02-12T09:45:00.000-08:002021-02-12T09:45:26.529-08:00Not Lunar New Year<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">When I noticed that Lunar New Year
fell on Friday the 12<sup>th</sup> of February, I thought it would be a perfect
chance to highlight an Asian American text in a blog post. Browsing for
suitable books, I came across a beautifully illustrated cover – that of <i>A
Big Mooncake for Little Star</i> by Grace Lin. I placed a hold immediately,
eager to read and blog about a literary depiction of the Asian holiday so often
eclipsed by Valentine’s Day.<o:p></o:p></p>
<br />
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjob36oZaoYx-DBj4z5K8RpDViY-nzLsFdVHDq74mJKZpDJtla-tjmeglCAML19GWluzE73-5mqWdeauTqRyWN7Yjkpk5r7aScTGttAEtlc8XTj_2pyZ05HUTxpT86LowuPRBfkD0UzXL4H/s273/Big+Mooncake+cover.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="213" data-original-width="273" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjob36oZaoYx-DBj4z5K8RpDViY-nzLsFdVHDq74mJKZpDJtla-tjmeglCAML19GWluzE73-5mqWdeauTqRyWN7Yjkpk5r7aScTGttAEtlc8XTj_2pyZ05HUTxpT86LowuPRBfkD0UzXL4H/s0/Big+Mooncake+cover.png" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The cover of <i>A Big Mooncake for Little Star </i>by Grace Lin</td></tr></tbody></table></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></p>As I read it, delighting in the
lovely images that softly illuminate the starry sky background, I quickly
realized that the storyline had nothing to do with Lunar New Year.<p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Why had I made that assumption?</p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">The fact that I had associated
mooncakes with the wrong Asian holiday felt like a personal mistake, and the
shame I felt upon recognizing this was both uncomfortable and surprising. I’ve
only ever eaten mooncake around the Mid-Autumn Festival, which is clearly
months before Lunar New Year rolls around in February. This wasn’t something I
had to look up; I <i>knew</i> this from my own upbringing. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: center;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: center;"><span style="mso-no-proof: yes;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikK8ddfBVosD14cwcv_X_xOUreayiTu6c1H38-ZYYqZ3dxU9daL24w6NmKhjyXYN3YWKxUaqtevc3g45Kq3UG7DlAys-JDo3lp3sPhxQd67a4Pmh-1OTs8EMeQIM2XN6BtGpSv1eX7iej2/s231/Mooncake+boxes.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="231" data-original-width="222" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikK8ddfBVosD14cwcv_X_xOUreayiTu6c1H38-ZYYqZ3dxU9daL24w6NmKhjyXYN3YWKxUaqtevc3g45Kq3UG7DlAys-JDo3lp3sPhxQd67a4Pmh-1OTs8EMeQIM2XN6BtGpSv1eX7iej2/w306-h320/Mooncake+boxes.png" width="306" /></a> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-4PgkeJ2RVRu0dD2HK4KoYg65h1HvLoYmlNsOcM693r8mtF4TAfZzBu3oYHz7ye_ZFYQ-4T5w4APbcQthY4bvxOK9UaB5loMfng7Z6DViNWQqGJ635EF__cbn4SX5sCZj2N5lSUYgE_go/s341/Mooncakes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="227" data-original-width="341" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-4PgkeJ2RVRu0dD2HK4KoYg65h1HvLoYmlNsOcM693r8mtF4TAfZzBu3oYHz7ye_ZFYQ-4T5w4APbcQthY4bvxOK9UaB5loMfng7Z6DViNWQqGJ635EF__cbn4SX5sCZj2N5lSUYgE_go/w320-h213/Mooncakes.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr></tbody></table></div><p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: center;">Images from San Diego’s Huy Ky Bakery (Yelp), the mooncakes I grew up eating!<o:p></o:p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">But in my need to position myself
as a graduate student specializing in Asian American children’s literature, I
had taken on the mantle of representation to a fault. I had latched onto the
idea that I had to display traditional food and a festive holiday, falling
right into the diversity trap that offers limited and often damaging
representations of cultures through what Dolores de Manuel and Rocío G. Davis call
“tourist-multiculturalism.” Though seemingly benign, this method of showcasing texts
(often in classrooms or library displays) emphasizes Asian culture as foreign
or different than American culture. This construction elides the experience of
Asian Americans, who must contend with and sometimes reject ethnic markers to even
be recognized as American. Asian American experience is more than Asian
traditions, and to look for “foreign” or “exotic” elements in a book to mark it
as “Asian American” is a flawed way to showcase the diversity of this genre and
the multiplicity of the population it depicts.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Lin strikes a thoughtful balance
in this picture book. For starters, the protagonist’s name, Little Star, does
not indicate any particular ethnic heritage. The background images do not
provide any clues such as writing or cultural artifacts to this mystery either.
The characters’ country of origin simply does not matter to the story. What
does matter is Little Star’s agency. Her desire to eat the mooncake, in spite
of the promise she made to her mother to not touch it, leads her to munch away
at it night by night until nothing is left. That the large mooncake was hung in
the sky lends the storyline a touch of magic. The result is a new “myth” to
explain the phases of the moon, distinct from the traditional stories of the
past. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in;">By writing a new storyline, Lin
evades the historical use of multiculturalism, wherein “the proliferation of
folktales meant to teach Americans about Asian cultures instead reinforces and
perpetuates the stereotype of Asians as exotic foreigners” (Manuel and Davis
ix). Rather than focus on difference by rooting the story in a particular ethnic
heritage, Lin focuses on what is relatable: the irrepressible desire to eat
forbidden snacks. <i>A Big Mooncake for Little Star</i> is not meant to be
didactic or to teach an uninformed audience. Instead, it allows Asian Americans
who have eaten mooncake before to see a bit of their traditions portrayed
casually, without emphasis on its “foreignness.”</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /><o:p></o:p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEmn6vSZrL5RyaPStaC-WLFS7irQXg6r1-M3hk_wCtJhjoCwBt_oo48AZD_s_0LjQmTfy0QyM1gyTW7-nM6SwwLBAowRpSwVqz1-3mk7XzmkDshbQdz5uDtMNPSztbViw-6aJkECj8RCJ7/s624/Mooncake+phases.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="241" data-original-width="624" height="248" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEmn6vSZrL5RyaPStaC-WLFS7irQXg6r1-M3hk_wCtJhjoCwBt_oo48AZD_s_0LjQmTfy0QyM1gyTW7-nM6SwwLBAowRpSwVqz1-3mk7XzmkDshbQdz5uDtMNPSztbViw-6aJkECj8RCJ7/w640-h248/Mooncake+phases.png" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image from Grace Lin’s <i>A Big Mooncake for Little Star<br /><br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr></tr></tbody></table>What I’ve learned from this
experience, and what I hope those who are interested in children’s literature
will recognize, is that not all books highlighting Asian characters and a
traditional Asian food is immediately speaking to an “authentic” Asian American
experience. I still have a long way to go before I can present myself as a
scholar of Asian American children’s literature, but beautiful books such as
this can help correct initial misreadings. The lesson: don’t judge a book by
its title, cover image, or author’s last name! Instead, just open it up and
allow yourself to be surprised by something new.<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in;"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;"><br />-AN<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: center;">Works Cited<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; text-indent: -.5in;">Manuel, Dolores de and
Rocío G Davis. "Editors' Introduction: Critical Perspectives on Asian
American Children's Literature." <i>The Lion and the Unicorn</i>,
vol. 30 no. 2, 2006, p. v-xv. <i>Project MUSE</i>, <a href="http://doi.org/10.1353/uni.2006.0023">doi:10.1353/uni.2006.0023</a>.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; text-indent: -.5in;">Lin, Grace. <i>A Big
Mooncake for Little Star. </i>Little, Brown and Company, 2018.<o:p></o:p></p><br /><br />SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-384394294807704684.post-61746345014409163102021-02-05T10:11:00.000-08:002021-02-05T10:11:50.212-08:00New Graduate Assistant <p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDL6MG_Ee7kqtC-t38QFWih1nHukRuzb1oiIVfOjuWR2HARY5cn0sMPh2ZElRy8f5mCrI0PEOIFgNnvkiiba60ypLr3TDfF4_PiGI_EsTTQmz9sYzG17Pk0eUtvXs6OE9MZto6XmZR9VQs/s2048/IMG_1951+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1900" height="301" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDL6MG_Ee7kqtC-t38QFWih1nHukRuzb1oiIVfOjuWR2HARY5cn0sMPh2ZElRy8f5mCrI0PEOIFgNnvkiiba60ypLr3TDfF4_PiGI_EsTTQmz9sYzG17Pk0eUtvXs6OE9MZto6XmZR9VQs/w279-h301/IMG_1951+2.jpg" width="279" /></a></div><p><br /></p> <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Hello everyone!</span><p></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-6759e63b-7fff-0453-8ce0-08a98669599e"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">My name is Natalie Alvarez and I’m currently a first year M.A. student studying English with a specialization in Children’s Literature. Being a new student to the program means that I’m still exploring my definitive areas of research. Nonetheless, areas such as queer studies, media studies, sexuality studies, and Digital Humanities have caught my attention. When it comes to Children’s Literature, I gravitate towards Young Adult Literature. I’m especially interested in YA narratives written by authors of color in the Fantasy genre. I would like to explore how cultural and/or queer identity operate in Fantasy landscapes.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">My love for reading blossomed due to my desire to learn English. I was learning the language in school, but I wanted to experience more than grammar rules and the assigned texts. Then a family member talked to me about a certain book revolving around vampires. After devouring such in a couple of days my journey began. The rest as they say is history and now here, I am now pursuing the degree that I dreamed of when I was younger.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When I'm not doing schoolwork I can be found creating book related content for my <a href="https://www.instagram.com/thefineartofreading/">Instagram</a>. I post everything from book inspired makeup looks to book reviews. Besides reading I enjoy fashion, watching the latest tv series or horror movie, digital art, and blogging.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 16px; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In case you were wondering (and I know you were) some of my favorite books are </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We Set the Dark on Fire </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">by Tehlor Kay Mejia, </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A Song of Wraiths and Ruin </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">by Roseanne A. Brown, and </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Daughter of Smoke and Bone </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">by Laini Taylor. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I’m extremely grateful for the opportunity to be a Graduate Assistant at the National Center for the Study of Children’s Literature, and I can’t wait for all the amazing things this will bring. I’m excited to be part of the conversation and immerse myself more into the scholarly world of Children’s Literature. I look forward to sharing with you all everything related to Children’s Literature and the National Center for the Study of Children’s Literature.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">-NA</span></p><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><p></p>SDSU Children's Literaturehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12989578617144914669noreply@blogger.com0