{"id":45419,"date":"2016-01-27T20:01:57","date_gmt":"2016-01-27T20:01:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/?p=45419"},"modified":"2016-01-27T20:03:30","modified_gmt":"2016-01-27T20:03:30","slug":"author-junot-diaz-packs-thorne-hall%ef%bb%bf","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=45419","title":{"rendered":"Author Junot D\u00edaz Packs Thorne Hall\ufeff"},"content":{"rendered":"

Author Junot D\u00edaz Packs Thorne Hall<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Oxy Newsroom<\/a>
\nOccidental College, Los Angeles, California
\n2015-09-23<\/p>\n

Media Contact: Jim Tranquada<\/a><\/strong> \/ (323) 259-2990<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\nMarc Campos\/Occidental College<\/em><\/small><\/p>\n

Ranging from profane to profound, from wisecracking to wistful, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Junot D\u00edaz<\/a> discussed the complexities and heartbreak of race and identity in America with a capacity crowd at Occidental College Tuesday.<\/em><\/p>\n

For two hours, D\u00edaz mixed readings from his critically acclaimed books The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao<\/a><\/em> and This Is How You Lose Her<\/em> <\/a>with thoughtful, often self-deprecatory answers to questions from the crowd of 800 students, faculty, staff, alumni and community members that packed Thorne Hall.<\/p>\n

Diaz was introduced by novelist Danzy Senna<\/a>, Occidental\u2019s writer-in-residence and an old friend, who called him \u201cOne of the few writers I teach again and again, year after year \u2026 His characters contain multitudes.\u201d<\/p>\n

A native of the Dominican Republic<\/a> who emigrated to the United States as a child, D\u00edaz repeatedly critiqued the idea of authenticity among communities of color \u2013 the existence of an internal formula or standard of authenticity that leaves most people believing that their identity, and the lives they lead, are somehow lacking.<\/p>\n

\u201cI grew up in central Jersey<\/a> in a big African-American community, and black folks were no more willing to accept my complexity than white folks \u2026 they wanted to deny my multiplicity. They said I was just black. And my Dominican family said we\u2019re not black,\u201d he said. \u201cNeither of these formulas satisfy, because a huge portion of me disappears. I fought tooth and nail so every little part of me could be at the party.\u201d<\/p>\n

Such formulas tend to create hierarchies, and \u201csolidarity is impossible with hierarchies,\u201d he continued. \u201cIt might give you a little psychic capital, but its disrupts your ability to connect \u2026 There\u2019s a lot at stake when a community exercises this kind of internal exclusion.\u201d…<\/p>\n

Read the entire article here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Author Junot D\u00edaz Packs Thorne Hall Oxy Newsroom Occidental College, Los Angeles, California 2015-09-23 Media Contact: Jim Tranquada \/ (323) 259-2990 Marc Campos\/Occidental College Ranging from profane to profound, from wisecracking to wistful, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Junot D\u00edaz discussed the complexities and heartbreak of race and identity in America with a capacity crowd at Occidental […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,2895,8,20],"tags":[22836,9143,22835,22834],"class_list":["post-45419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-campus-life","category-media-archive","category-usa","tag-jim-tranquada","tag-junot-diaz","tag-occidental-college","tag-oxy-newsroom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45419","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=45419"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45419\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45422,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45419\/revisions\/45422"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=45419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=45419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=45419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}