{"id":58681,"date":"2019-08-15T17:41:37","date_gmt":"2019-08-15T17:41:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/?p=58681"},"modified":"2019-08-15T17:41:37","modified_gmt":"2019-08-15T17:41:37","slug":"natasha-diaz-on-turning-her-black-jewish-childhood-into-a-ya-novel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=58681","title":{"rendered":"Natasha D\u00edaz on Turning Her Black Jewish Childhood Into a YA Novel"},"content":{"rendered":"

Natasha D\u00edaz on Turning Her Black Jewish Childhood Into a YA Novel<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Alma<\/a>
\n2019-08-15<\/p>\n

Emily Burack<\/strong><\/a>, Associate Editor<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Natasha D\u00edaz<\/a> was 9 years old when she and her mom went on Oprah<\/em><\/a> to talk about the experience of being a multiracial family. D\u00edaz, who has a Jewish father and a Liberian and Brazilian mom, had recently been featured in a documentary called Between Black & White<\/em>. When Oprah<\/a> asked her a question, young Natasha froze up (you can watch the video here<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Well, she is freezing up no longer \u2014 D\u00edaz\u2019s debut YA novel<\/a>, Color Me In<\/em><\/a>, fictionalizes her childhood and tells the coming-of-age story of Navaeh Levitz. Navaeh is a Black Jewish teenager whose father forces her to have a belated bat mitzvah<\/a> at age 16. Navaeh\u2019s parents are in the midst of a divorce, and the bat mitzvah is her father\u2019s way of having her stay connected to his family. Meanwhile, Navaeh is struggling to figure out her identity, her relationship to her blackness, her privilege, a blossoming relationship, and her family. It\u2019s a compelling and timely read.<\/p>\n

We had the chance to chat with D\u00edaz about writing Color Me In<\/em>, #OwnVoices in young adult literature, and connecting with her Jewish identity.<\/p>\n

How close does the protagonist Naveah\u2019s experience as a Black Jewish teenager mirror your own?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I would say in a lot of ways it\u2019s similar, and in a lot of ways it\u2019s very different.<\/p>\n

We have very similar backgrounds, racially and religiously. I am multiracial, she\u2019s biracial. I\u2019m Brazilian, Liberian, and Jewish, where she\u2019s just half-Black and half-Jewish. And my parents separated, similar to her, although mine separated when I was much younger than she was. And, as a result of my parents\u2019 divorce, it was literally in the divorce papers that I had to be raised Jewish.<\/p>\n

Aside from that, I would say we\u2019re completely different. I was raised very immersed in my culture, especially on my mom\u2019s side, which is where the Black and Brazilian side is. My parents had split custody [over me], so I spent time with both families, but I\u2019m closer to my mom\u2019s family because a lot of my dad\u2019s family doesn\u2019t live in New York City<\/a>. Where Naveah was sheltered from her identity, I was very immersed in mine.<\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t mean that we haven\u2019t, at times, shared a lot of the same insecurities, like feeling you don\u2019t really fit in in either world, or you\u2019re not really sure what part of yourself you have a right to claim or own. I\u2019ve never had an extremely religious connection to Judaism. Culturally, though, especially growing up in New York City, there\u2019s a lot of Jewish cultural things that I connect to on a personal level…<\/p>\n

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

D\u00edaz\u2019s debut YA novel, “Color Me In,” fictionalizes her childhood and tells the coming-of-age story of Navaeh Levitz. Navaeh is a Black Jewish teenager whose father forces her to have a belated bat mitzvah at age 16.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,13743,3601,14646,8,820,20],"tags":[30115,30114,24792,2711,596],"class_list":["post-58681","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-interviews","category-judaism","category-latino","category-media-archive","category-religion","category-usa","tag-alma","tag-emily-burack","tag-natasha-diaz","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58681","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=58681"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58681\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58682,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58681\/revisions\/58682"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=58681"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=58681"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=58681"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}