I’m an outlier, a black female who swims. There are a few of us, you know. I grew up on the south side of Chicago. There were no public pools back then, but out school found a way. We were required to take swimming, and being on your period was an excuse that went only […]
Sharing or Things that should be learned in kindergarten Read More »
A second Illinois SCBWI member has stepped up to join in the effort to help diverse authors and illustrators attend the annual conference on Nov 5. Children’s book author Urania Smith has also stepped up to sponsor an attendee. We have a wide definition of diverse author/illustrator. So if you are in or near the
On November 5, the Illinois chapter of the Society for Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) is having its annual conference, Prairie Writer’s and Illustrator’s Day. The one-day conference is held at the Wojcik Conference Center, at Harper College in Palatine, Illinois. This conference contains valuable information for people who craft children’s books, with information about
Illinois Writers and Illustrators conference scholarship Read More »
I volunteer at my town’s Senior Citizen’s center a few times a week, working in the computer lab associated with our public library. There I perform crowd control when things get busy, and answer questions about using the computer, printing, and various websites. I get paid with a free cup of coffee (when I remember
Yesterday after reading an article on Facebook about police dismissing the protests of a young black male because…well, because he was a young black male and therefore what he said didn’t matter, (click here to see the article that started the discussion) an acquaintance on Facebook commented that she supported #blacklivesmatter but recognizes that racism
I’m fighting racism, one step at a time Read More »
I am currently (July 2016) teaching a class of authors about writing diverse characters, my Spice of Diversity class. I received a student question that I’ve chosen to answer here, because I think it deserves a wide, thoughtful, answer. I was asked, …when I wanted to write a Spanish hero, another writer with a Hispanic last
Writing cross-culturally Read More »
Today I’m blogging about the E-word. Empathy. You know, that ability to see things from another point of view. To understand and at least temporarily share someone else’s feelings, even if that someone else is outwardly very different from yourself. A lot has happened recently. Parents jerked through social media because a mother dared to be
Empathy – Diversity class Read More »
I laughingly call writing my sub-minimum wage job. Counting the time involved in coming up with an idea, writing the first draft, revising, editing and creating a dozen or more successive drafts, gnawing at my fingernails, sleep-walking and dreaming the story, the ROI is nothing to write home about. And then there\’s all the time
Even if no one paid me Read More »
Earlier today fellow author Gabrielle Luthy asked me a question about a post showing a bunch of women at a Trump rally wearing t-shirts saying – Make America White Again. This turned out to be a bigger question than I first realized, so it’s getting a bigger answer. Sorry, but I decided to get on
Removing The Masks Read More »
In October 2015, I was moderated a panel of authors and illustrators of diverse books at the Illinois Library Association meeting in Peoria, Il. B A Binns, Miranda Paul, Chris Raschka, Laura Park This well attended panel presentation took place in a double room at the Peoria Civic Center on October 23, 2015 in front of a
#ILLibrary15 Illinois Library Association conference panel on Diversity Read More »