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MOVING TOWARDS HOME
Book by Jordan, June
213 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1989
2 people are currently reading
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About the author
June Jordan
73 books449 followersJune Millicent Jordan (July 9, 1936 – June 14, 2002) was a Caribbean-American poet and activist.
Jordan received numerous honors and awards, including a 1969-70 Rockefeller grant for creative writing, a Yaddo Fellowship in 1979, a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship in 1982, and the Achievement Award for International Reporting from the National Association of Black Journalists in 1984. Jordan also won the Lila Wallace Reader's Digest Writers Award from 1995 to 1998 as well as the Ground Breakers-Dream Makers Award from The Woman's Foundation in 1994.
She was included in Who's Who in America from 1984 until her death. She received the Chancellor's Distinguished Lectureship from UC Berkeley and the PEN Center USA West Freedom to Write Award (1991).
(from Wikipedia)
Jordan received numerous honors and awards, including a 1969-70 Rockefeller grant for creative writing, a Yaddo Fellowship in 1979, a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship in 1982, and the Achievement Award for International Reporting from the National Association of Black Journalists in 1984. Jordan also won the Lila Wallace Reader's Digest Writers Award from 1995 to 1998 as well as the Ground Breakers-Dream Makers Award from The Woman's Foundation in 1994.
She was included in Who's Who in America from 1984 until her death. She received the Chancellor's Distinguished Lectureship from UC Berkeley and the PEN Center USA West Freedom to Write Award (1991).
(from Wikipedia)
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
February 10, 2022
• Moving Towards Home: Political Essays, 1987, collecting essays from 1968-1987
A rich and eclectic collection of essays, many that appeared in other collected works and publications. Particularly great in this later revised edition are Jordan's personal annotations opening each essay.
On her time as a Visiting Professor at Yale University: "Teaching at Yale was special, as it turned out. There I encountered every traditional orthodoxy imaginable so that, as a kind of flamboyant affirmation, rain or shine, I made myself wear very high heels. Let the hallowed halls echo to the fact of a woman, a Black woman, passing through!" (pg 45)
Essays range from literary criticism - great piece on Richard Wright and Zora Neale Hurston - to travel, academia, LGBTQ as a bisexual woman, to more on "Black English" in her 1972 essay "White English/Black English: the Politics of Translation" debating the use of the term "standard English" as white supremacy. It's a stunning piece.
Another essay that stood out to me, and the previous owner of the book based on the notes in the margins, is the piece "Report from the Bahamas" from 1982. She travels to the Bahamas on a vacation, staying in a upscale hotel - actually called The Sheraton British Colonial. As the daughter of Jamaican immigrants to the US, she is keenly aware of the class differences of the mostly American guests and the Caribbean staff, most specifically with her room's housekeeper 'Olive', and the women she meets in the marketplace selling their wares. It's a powerful piece about race, class, and gender, all through a travel lens.
Eager to read more of Jordan's work. These essays felt like an ongoing dialogue. Passionate and purposeful.
A rich and eclectic collection of essays, many that appeared in other collected works and publications. Particularly great in this later revised edition are Jordan's personal annotations opening each essay.
On her time as a Visiting Professor at Yale University: "Teaching at Yale was special, as it turned out. There I encountered every traditional orthodoxy imaginable so that, as a kind of flamboyant affirmation, rain or shine, I made myself wear very high heels. Let the hallowed halls echo to the fact of a woman, a Black woman, passing through!" (pg 45)
Essays range from literary criticism - great piece on Richard Wright and Zora Neale Hurston - to travel, academia, LGBTQ as a bisexual woman, to more on "Black English" in her 1972 essay "White English/Black English: the Politics of Translation" debating the use of the term "standard English" as white supremacy. It's a stunning piece.
Another essay that stood out to me, and the previous owner of the book based on the notes in the margins, is the piece "Report from the Bahamas" from 1982. She travels to the Bahamas on a vacation, staying in a upscale hotel - actually called The Sheraton British Colonial. As the daughter of Jamaican immigrants to the US, she is keenly aware of the class differences of the mostly American guests and the Caribbean staff, most specifically with her room's housekeeper 'Olive', and the women she meets in the marketplace selling their wares. It's a powerful piece about race, class, and gender, all through a travel lens.
Eager to read more of Jordan's work. These essays felt like an ongoing dialogue. Passionate and purposeful.
Displaying 1 of 1 review