I wanted to share a fascinating interview I came across today with Junot Diaz entitled "The search for decolonial love." certainly well worth reading for anyone in this group,http://www.salon.com/topic/books/
Here's a snippet from the Salon writer:
On May 19, 2012, I met over breakfast with Junot Díaz; we were both attending a two-day symposium about his work at Stanford University. The resulting conversation touched on Díaz’s concern with race, his debt to the writings of women of color, and his fictional explorations of psychic and emotional decolonization.
and a bit from Junot:
Junot: Much of the early genesis of my work arose from the 1980s and specifically from the weird gender wars that flared up in that era between writers of color. I know you remember them: the very public fulminations of Stanley Crouch versus Toni Morrison, Ishmael Reed versus Alice Walker, Frank Chin versus Maxine Hong Kingston. Talk about passé — my students know nothing about these exchanges, but for those of us present at the time they were both dismaying and formative. This was part of a whole backlash against the growing success and importance of women-of-color writers — but from men of color. Qué irony. The brothers criticizing the sisters for being inauthentic, for being anti-male, for airing the community’s dirty laundry, all from a dreary nationalist point of view.
Here's a snippet from the Salon writer:
On May 19, 2012, I met over breakfast with Junot Díaz; we were both attending a two-day symposium about his work at Stanford University. The resulting conversation touched on Díaz’s concern with race, his debt to the writings of women of color, and his fictional explorations of psychic and emotional decolonization.
and a bit from Junot:
Junot: Much of the early genesis of my work arose from the 1980s and specifically from the weird gender wars that flared up in that era between writers of color. I know you remember them: the very public fulminations of Stanley Crouch versus Toni Morrison, Ishmael Reed versus Alice Walker, Frank Chin versus Maxine Hong Kingston. Talk about passé — my students know nothing about these exchanges, but for those of us present at the time they were both dismaying and formative. This was part of a whole backlash against the growing success and importance of women-of-color writers — but from men of color. Qué irony. The brothers criticizing the sisters for being inauthentic, for being anti-male, for airing the community’s dirty laundry, all from a dreary nationalist point of view.
Lots of things to chew on here.