Jerald Walker – författare

*** Finalist for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay********Semi-Finalist for the Thurber Prize for American Humor********Finalist for the New England Book Award********Longlisted for the Massachusetts Book Award**** In this engaging follow up to How to Make a Slave and Other Essays, the recipient of PEN New England Award for nonfiction and finalist for the National Book Award sharply examines and explains Black life and culture with equal parts candor and humor.In Magically Black and Other Essays Jerald Walker elegantly blends personal revelation and cultural critique to create a bracing and often humorous examination of Black American life. He thoughtfully addresses the inherent complexities of topics as eclectic as incarceration, home renovations, gentrification, the crip walk, pimping, and the rise of the MAGA movement, approaching them through various Black perspectives, including husband, father, teacher, and writer. The collection’s overarching theme is captured in the titular essay, which examines the culture of heroic action African Americans created in response to their enslavement and oppression, giving proof to Albert Murray’s observation that the “fire in the forging process . . . for all its violence, does not destroy the metal that becomes the sword.”

*** Finalist for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay**** ****Semi-Finalist for the Thurber Prize for American Humor**** ****Finalist for the New England Book Award**** ****Longlisted for the Massachusetts Book Award****In this engaging follow up to How to Make a Slave and Other Essays, the recipient of PEN New England Award for nonfiction and finalist for the National Book Award sharply examines and explains Black life and culture with equal parts candor and humor.In Magically Black and Other Essays Jerald Walker elegantly blends personal revelation and cultural critique to create a bracing and often humorous examination of race in America. He thoughtfully addresses the inherent complexities of topics as eclectic as incarceration, home renovations, gentrification, the crip walk, pimping, and the rise of the MAGA movement, approaching them through various Black perspectives, including husband, father, teacher, and writer. This powerful collection of nonfiction essays captures its overarching theme in the titular essay, which examines the culture of heroic action African Americans created in response to their enslavement and oppression, giving proof to Albert Murray’s observation that the “fire in the forging process . . . for all its violence, does not destroy the metal that becomes the sword.”How does one navigate race, family, and identity in a world of absurd contradictions?Sharp Social Commentary: From the rise of the MAGA movement to the complexities of gentrification, Walker applies a razor-sharp wit to the most pressing issues of our time.Candid Personal Essays: Explore the author’s journey from a childhood in a white supremacist doomsday cult to navigating fatherhood and academia as a Black man in America.Humor as a Survival Strategy: Discover a voice that finds searing humor in the face of absurdity, whether it’s dealing with incompetent landscapers or confronting police.Navigating Racial Identity: A deeply personal look at what it means to be Black in America, from teaching white students about race to the conversations every Black parent must have with their sons.

Masterfully told, marked by irony and humor as well as outrage and a barely contained sadness, Jerald Walker’s Street Shadows is the story of a young man’s descent into the “thug life” and the wake-up call that led to his finding himself again. Walker was born in a Chicago housing project and raised, along with his six brothers and sisters, by blind parents of modest means but middle-class aspirations. A boy of great promise whose parents and teachers saw success in his future, he seemed destined to fulfill their hopes. But by age fourteen, like so many of his friends, he found himself drawn to the streets. By age seventeen he was a school dropout, a drug addict, and a gangbanger, his life spiraling toward the violent and premature end all too familiar to African American males. And then came the blast of gunfire that changed everything: His coke-dealing friend Greg was shot to death—less than an hour after Walker scored a gram from him. “Twenty-five years later, tossing the drug out the window is still the second most difficult thing I’ve ever done. The most difficult thing is still that I didn’t follow it.”So begins the story, told in alternating time frames, of the journey that Walker took to become the man he is today—a husband, father, teacher, and writer. But his struggle to escape the long shadows of the streets was not easy. There were racial stereotypes to overcome—his own as well as those of the very white world he found himself in—and a hard grappling with the meaning of race that came to an unexpected climax on a trip to Africa.An eloquent account of how the past shadows but need not determine the present, Street Shadows is the opposite of a victim narrative. Walker casts no blame (except upon himself), sheds no tears (except for those who have not shared his good fortune), and refuses the temptations of self-pity and self-exoneration. In the end, what Jerald Walker has written is a stirring portrait of two Americas—one hopeless, the other inspirational—embodied within one man.    From the Hardcover edition.

Street Shadows recounts Jerald Walker's renunciation of the "thug life" he had embraced as a teenager on the South Side of Chicago in favor of the education and middle-class life his parents had always dreamed of for their children. By turns ironic, humorous, angry, and poignant, Walker's narrative dramatically captures his pursuit and embodiment of the "American dream": the effort to rise above obstacles such as racism and poverty through hard work and determination.Walker explores questions of race and identity through the lens of personal choice—including decisions he made as a high school dropout, a drug and alcohol abuser, a returning student, a young academic, a visitor to Africa in search of his roots, and a husband and father, as well as the diverse choices made by his blind parents, his six siblings, and his wife and her family. He highlights the importance of education, the values of self-help and self-reliance, and his rejection of the victim mentality that many feel pervades black communities.Winner of the 2011 PEN New England/L. L. Winship Award for Nonfiction, Street Shadows is an eloquent account of how the past shadows but need not determine the present. It is also a stirring portrait of two Americas—one hopeless, the other inspirational—embodied within the same man.