Decolonize Your Bookshelves with Grace Talusan, The Body Papers

Not every family legacy is destructive. From her parents, Talusan has learned to tell stories in order to continue. In excavating abuse and trauma, and supplementing her story with government documents, medical records, and family photos, Talusan gives voice to unspeakable experience, and shines a light of hope into the darkness.Grace Talusan was born in the Philippines and raised in New England. She graduated from Tufts University and the MFA Program in Writing at UC Irvine. She is the recipient of a U.S. Fulbright Fellowship to the Philippines and an Artist Fellowship Award from the Massachusetts Cultural Council. Talusan teaches at Grub Street and Tufts.Decolonize Your Bookshelves is a book club founded by blogger and activist Eliza Romero, also known as Aesthetic Distance. The group will focus on Asian American writers who tell stories of struggle and triumph, and explore themes of civil unrest, assimilation, racism, and profound alienation. Because a disproportionate number East Asian writers are represented in the American mainstream compared with other Asians, the club will delve into the works of South and Southeast Asian authors , including Filipino, Indian and Vietnamese creators. The goal: thought-provoking discourse that reveal the absolute  necessity of these works to the American collective identity.Writers LIVE programs are supported in part by a bequest from The Miss Howard Hubbard Adult Programming Fund.Re-opening activities are made possible in part by a generous gift from Sandra R. Berman.Recorded On: Tuesday, October 22, 2019