A short interview with Fred Wah

Posted in Articles, Asian Diaspora, Autobiography, Canada, Interviews, Media Archive on 2015-08-08 19:05Z by Steven

A short interview with Fred Wah

Jacket2
2015-03-05

Rob McLennan

Fred Wah was born in Swift Current, Saskatchewan in 1939, but he grew up in the West Kootenay region of British Columbia. He studied music and English literature at the University of British Columbia in the early 1960s where he was one of the founding editors of the poetry newsletter TISH. After graduate work in literature and linguistics at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque and the State University of New York at Buffalo, he returned to the Kootenays in the late 1960s where he taught at Selkirk College and was the founding coordinator of the writing program at David Thompson University Centre. He retired from the University of Calgary in 2003 and now lives in Vancouver. He has been editorially involved with a number of literary magazines over the years, such as Open Letter and West Coast Line. His work has been awarded the Governor General’s Award, Alberta’s Stephanson Award for Poetry and Howard O’Hagan Award for Short Fiction, the Gabrielle Roy Prize for Writing on Canadian Literature, and B.C.’s Dorothy Livesay Prize for Poetry. He was Parliamentary Poet Laureate 2011-2013 and he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2013. He has published over 20 books of poetry and prose. Recent books include Sentenced to Light, his collaborations with visual artists, is a door, a series of poem about hybridity, and a selected, The False Laws of Narrative, edited by Louis Cabri. A recent collaboration, High Muck a Muck: Playing Chinese, An Interactive Poem, is available online (http://highmuckamuck.ca/). His current project involves the Columbia River. Scree: The Collected Earlier Poems, 1962-1991 will be published by Talonbooks in the fall of 2015.

Q: I’m curious about your tenure as Poet Laureate. From 2011 to 2013, you were Canada’s fifth Parliamentary Poet Laureate, following in the footsteps of George Bowering (2002–2004), Pauline Michel (2004–2006), John Steffler  (2006–2008) and Pierre DesRuisseaux (2009–2011). In hindsight, what do you feel you were able to bring to the position, and do you feel your tenure was a successful one? What did the position allow you to do that you might not have been able to do otherwise?…

Read the entire interview here.

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One Tough Cookie: Fran Ross’s “Oreo” Written Decades Before Its Time

Posted in Articles, Book/Video Reviews, Judaism, Media Archive, Religion, United States on 2015-08-08 18:44Z by Steven

One Tough Cookie: Fran Ross’s “Oreo” Written Decades Before Its Time

Lawrence Public Library
707 Vermont Street
Lawrence, Kansas
2015-07-31

Kate Gramlich

There are a handful of books I have re-read several times because I found some deep, emotional connection with the characters, and each read is like a conversation with a dear old friend. (I have a dear new friend who revisits To Kill a Mockingbird every year for similar reasons and to see how his opinions on the text change over time.)

Then there are books I have re-read because I just know that I didn’t catch everything the author was throwing down the first time. And I’m here to tell you, folks, that Fran Ross’s Oreo is the queen of those books. Oreo’s heroine’s journey to find the “secret of her birth” had me laughing aloud and wrapping my brain around awesome word puzzles the entire time.

Though originally published in 1974 (more on that later), Oreo was re-printed by New Directions in July of this year, and I was lucky enough to grab it right off our New Fiction shelves at LPL last week…

Read the entire review here.

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In Brazil we do talk about race but not in an honest way – about white privilege, concentration of power, about the importance of diversity – no, we talk about how we’re all Brazilian, we’re all mixed.

Posted in Excerpts/Quotes on 2015-08-08 18:22Z by Steven

“In Brazil we do talk about race but not in an honest way – about white privilege, concentration of power, about the importance of diversity – no, we talk about how we’re all Brazilian, we’re all mixed.” —Paulo Rogerio

Stephanie Nolen, “Three personal stories that show Brazil is not completely beyond racism,” The Globe and Mail, July 31, 2015. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/three-personal-stories-that-show-brazil-is-not-completely-beyond-racism/article25761242/.

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My interracial family needs its own action figures

Posted in Articles, Family/Parenting, Media Archive, United States on 2015-08-08 18:16Z by Steven

My interracial family needs its own action figures

The Washington Post
2015-08-06

Nevin Martell


(Courtesy of the author)

Growing up, I can recall owning only two black action figures in a massive collection that spanned movies, television and comic book characters. There was Lando Calrissian – the smooth talking, caped czar of Cloud City in The Empire Strikes Back – and Roadblock, G.I. Joe’s muscle-bound machine gunner. All of the others were white, aliens or costume clad villains of indeterminate race.

At the time, the absence of racial diversity didn’t register. I was more concerned with having an equitable mix of good guys and bad guys for the elaborate imaginary battles I orchestrated on my bedroom floor and in the backyard.

Now that I have an interracial son, my perspective has changed. I’d love for him to have toys that serve as a jumping off point for his imagination. When I played with a Luke Skywalker action figure, I wasn’t a 5-year-old boy sitting in the sandbox. I was a future hero of the Rebel Alliance, staring across the dunes at Tatooine’s twin sunset. Back then I had blonde hair. So in my mind’s eye, I looked exactly like Skywalker…

Read the entire article here.

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Poitier Revisited: Reconsidering a Black Icon in the Obama Age

Posted in Anthologies, Books, Literary/Artistic Criticism, Media Archive, United Kingdom, United States on 2015-08-08 05:10Z by Steven

Poitier Revisited: Reconsidering a Black Icon in the Obama Age

Bloomsbury Publishing
2015-01-15
288 pages
25 bw illus
229 x 152 mm
Hardback ISBN: 9781623564919

Edited by:

Ian Gregory Strachan, Associate Professor of English
College of The Bahamas

Mia Mask, Associate Professor of Film
Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York

Sidney Poitier remains one of the most recognizable black men in the world. Widely celebrated but at times criticized for the roles he played during a career that spanned 60 years, there can be no comprehensive discussion of black men in American film, and no serious analysis of 20th century American film history that excludes him. Poitier Revisited offers a fresh interrogation of the social, cultural and political significance of the Poitier oeuvre. The contributions explore the broad spectrum of critical issues summoned up by Poitier’s iconic work as actor, director and filmmaker. Despite his stature, Poitier has actually been under-examined in film criticism generally. This work reconsiders his pivotal role in film and American race relations, by arguing persuasively, that even in this supposedly ‘post-racial’ moment of Barack Obama, the struggles, aspirations, anxieties, and tensions Poitier’s films explored are every bit as relevant today as when they were first made.

Table of Contents

  • List of Figures
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes on Contributors
  • Introduction
  • 1. Walking with Kings: Poitier, King, and Obama / Aram Goudsouzian, University of Memphis, USA
  • 2. Historicizing the Shadows and Acts: No Way Out and the Imagining of Black Activist Communities / Ryan De Rosa, Los Angeles Public Schools, USA
  • 3. Caribbean All-Stars: Sidney Poitier, Harry Belafonte, and the Rise of the African-American Leading Man / Belinda Edmondson, Professor of English and African-American & African Studies, USA
  • 4. “Draggin’ the Chain”: Linking Civil Rights and African American Representation in The Defiant Ones and In the Heat of the Night / Emma Hamilton and Troy Saxby, University of Newcastle, Australia
  • 5. Whisper Campaign on Catfish Row: Sidney Poitier and Porgy and Bess / Jeff Smith, University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA
  • 6. To Sir, With Love: A Black British Perspective / Mark Christian, Lehman College, USA
  • 7. Transgression or Legal Union?: The Meaning of Interracial Marriage in 1967 Film and Law / Kim Warren, University of Kansas, USA
  • 8. A Blues the Tom: Sidney Poitier’s Filmic Sexual Identities / Ian Gregory Strachan, College of The Bahamas, Bahamas
  • 9. Black Masculinity on Horseback: From Duel at Diablo to Buck and the Preacher and beyond / Mia Mask, Vassar College, USA
  • 10. Stepping Behind the Camera: Sidney Poitier’s Directorial Career / Keith Corson, Rhodes College and Memphis College of Art, USA
  • 11. No Shafts, Super Flys, or Foxy Browns: Sidney Poitier’s Uptown Saturday Night as Alternative to Blaxploitation Cinema” / Novotny Lawrence, Southern Illinois University-Carbondale, USA
  • 12. Transcending Paul Poitier: Six Degrees of Separation and the Construction of Will Smith / Willie Tolliver, Jr., Agnes Scott College, USA
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Book Review: CAUCASIA

Posted in Articles, Autobiography, Book/Video Reviews, Media Archive, Passing, United States on 2015-08-08 04:46Z by Steven

Book Review: CAUCASIA

MixedRaceBooks
2016-07-26

Bethany Lam

Senna, Danzy, Caucasia: A Novel (New York: Riverhead, 1999)

Two biracial sisters—one light-skinned, one dark—are separated as children. The younger, lighter girl grows into a troubled teenager, but she never forgets her beloved older sister. Can she find her sister again … and with her sister, her self?

Plot Summary:

Seven-year-old Birdie Lee idolizes her big sister, Cole. Growing up biracial in 1970s Boston, she needs Cole’s protection and support to cope with the racial tensions of the time (see “Boston busing desegregation“).

The two girls are so close that they have developed a secret language, “Elemeno.” Together, they dream of a fantasy world, also called “Elemeno,” whose inhabitants can change appearance as needed to blend in and survive. As young children, the sisters retreat to this world to escape the things that threaten them, especially the slow crumbling of their parents’ dysfunctional marriage…

Read the entire review here.

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Book Review: “A Chosen Exile: A History of Racial Passing in American Life” by Allyson Hobbs

Posted in Articles, Book/Video Reviews, History, Media Archive, Passing, United States on 2015-08-08 00:33Z by Steven

Book Review: “A Chosen Exile: A History of Racial Passing in American Life” by Allyson Hobbs

The Santa Fe New Mexican
2015-05-15

Adele Oliveira

A Chosen Exile: A History of Racial Passing in American Life by Allyson Hobbs, Harvard University Press, 382 pages

In the first chapter of The Souls of Black Folk, W.E.B. Du Bois’ 1903 treatise on race, he famously refers to the “veil” that separated black and white America. Du Bois writes about what becoming aware of the veil means: “It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his two-ness — an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.”

Though Du Bois is referring to individuals who are recognizably black, the difficulty of maneuvering dual identities was particularly potent for racially ambiguous Americans — and especially those who chose to “pass” as white, either temporarily or permanently. The complicated practice of passing is the subject of Stanford history professor Allyson Hobbs’ book, A Chosen Exile: A History of Racial Passing in American Life. In the book, Hobbs traces the history of passing from the 18th century until roughly the end of the civil rights movement, examining the choice to pass and its consequences…

Read the entire review here.

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One-sided Biracial TV Families– Why Are So Many Asian Moms MIA?

Posted in Articles, Asian Diaspora, Communications/Media Studies, Media Archive, United States on 2015-08-08 00:06Z by Steven

One-sided Biracial TV Families– Why Are So Many Asian Moms MIA?

AsAmNews
2015-08-05

Laylita Day

I started to notice a disturbing trend among certain TV shows. Each one featured a biracial character, specifically a woman who had an Asian mom and White dad. The disturbing part of this was the fact that none of the Asian moms are actually in the shows with one slight exception. This caught my attention mainly because I too have a White dad and Asian mom. My mother and I are fairly close, so seeing show after show where the biracial daughter has no contact or knowledge of her mother made me feel uneasy. I began to ask myself why there were so many M.I.A. Asian moms in biracial TV families…

Read the entire article here.

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Book Review: Articulate While Black: Barack Obama, Language, and Race in the U.S.

Posted in Articles, Barack Obama, Book/Video Reviews, Media Archive, Politics/Public Policy, Social Science, United States on 2015-08-07 23:51Z by Steven

Book Review: Articulate While Black: Barack Obama, Language, and Race in the U.S.

Jennifer L. Ruef
Stanford University, Palo Alto, California

Urban Education
Volume 50, Number 6 (September 2015)
pages 776-783
DOI: 10.1177/0042085913519339

H. S. Alim, G. Smitherman (2012). Articulate While Black: Barack Obama, Language, and Race in the U.S. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. xv + 199 pp. ISBN-13: 978-0-199-81298-1.

This review highlights the ways in which race is heard and played to advantage or disadvantage. From Barack Obama’s redefinition of presidential—through his deft linguistic style-shifting—to the ways race is read in the speech of students and the general public, Articulate While Black (AWB) challenges the notion of a postracial United States and persuades the reader that who decides the power of racialized English is an open question. Furthermore, it is a call to action for teachers to change the ways race is heard, leveraged, and celebrated in classrooms dedicated to equity and social justice.

Read or purchase the article here.

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The Spirit of London

Posted in Books, Family/Parenting, Novels, Slavery, United Kingdom on 2015-08-07 23:30Z by Steven

The Spirit of London

Matador (an imprint of Troubador)
2015-09-28
198×127 mm
Paperback ISBN: 9781784624057

Rob Keeley

The spirits were at work here, somehow. But why?

On returning to London, Ellie investigates the mystery surrounding 47 Foster Square. Who is the sender of ghostly messages asking her for help? What is the secret of the Meadowes family? And what does Edward know about all this?

With her parents about to divorce, and her Mum acting very strangely, Ellie quickly discovers that a sinister force lies between her and the truth…

The Spirit of London is the second instalment in the thrilling and suspenseful ‘Spirits’ series and follows the success of The People’s Book Prize-nominated Childish Spirits. It focuses on slavery and a mixed-race family in Georgian times. Ellie finds herself facing a very dangerous foe and will need all her courage and humanity to get her through. The Spirit of London also sets up a story arc that will continue into future books in the series. The book will appeal to girls and boys of upper primary and lower secondary age – and to parents and teachers reading the book aloud!

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