Nisi Shawl

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Nisi Shawl
File:Nisi Shawl.jpg
Born 1955
Kalamazoo, Michigan
Nationality American
Ethnicity African-American
Alma mater Residential College, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Genre Speculative fiction
Notable awards 2008 James Tiptree, Jr. Award

Nisi Shawl (born 1955) is an African-American writer, editor, and journalist. She is best known as an author of science fiction and fantasy short stories[1] who writes and teaches about how fantastic fiction might reflect real-world diversity of gender, sexual orientation, race, colonialism, physical ability, age, and other sociocultural factors.[2]

Work, influences, and awards

Shawl is the co-author (with Cynthia Ward) of Writing the Other: Bridging Cultural Differences for Successful Fiction, a creative-writing handbook derived from the authors' workshop of the same name, in which participants explore techniques to help them write credible characters outside their own cultural experience.[3] Reviewer Genevieve Williams of speculative fiction magazine Strange Horizons summed up about this guidebook: "The practices advocated and concepts presented in Writing the Other may seem PC to some, but following them will help to ensure that an author gives more than lip service to diversity and is thoughtful about the creation and development of societies, cultures, and characters (which we all should be anyway). Much of what Shawl and Ward advocate is, quite simply, good practice: the avoidance of cliches, flat characters, unintended effects, and other hallmarks of lazy writing."[4]

Shawl's short stories have appeared in Asimov's SF Magazine, the Infinite Matrix, Strange Horizons, Semiotext(e) and numerous other magazines and anthologies.[1] Brian Charles Clark of the fiction review site, Curled Up With a Good Book, praised her debut collection, Filter House (2008)--which gathered 11 previously published and 3 original short fiction pieces[5]—saying that: "Shawl’s keen sense of justice and her adamant anti-colonialism always ride just beneath the surface of her stories. Never didactic, Shawl possesses the gift of a true storyteller: the ability to let the warp and weft of plot and character do her moral work for her."[6] Her first novel, the Neo-Victorian, Belgian-Congo-set, steampunk story Everfair, will be released by science-fiction publisher Tor Books in 2016, with a cover illustration by Hong Kong artist Victo Ngai.

Among the writers who influence her work, she has named Colette and Raymond Chandler.[7]

Shawl is a member of the Science Fiction Writers of America and a 1992 graduate of the Clarion West Writers Workshop. She is a board member of Clarion West and one of the founders of the Carl Brandon Society. Her stories have been shortlisted for the Theodore Sturgeon Award, the Gaylactic Spectrum Award, and the Carl Brandon Society Parallax Award, and Writing the Other received special mention for the James Tiptree, Jr. Award.[8] In 2008, she won the James Tiptree, Jr. Award for Filter House,[9] which was also shortlisted for a World Fantasy Award.[10] In 2009 her novella "Good Boy" was additionally nominated for a World Fantasy Award.[11]

Contributions to women's, multicultural, and global speculative fiction

In 2009, she donated her archive to the department of Rare Books and Special Collections at Northern Illinois University.[12]

In 2011, her longtime work in the women's speculative fiction was recognized, when Shawl was selected as Guest of Honor at WisCon 35.[13] In 2015, recognized as one of the "go to" teachers and mentors within the speculative fiction community on pedagogical issues of diversity, she served as guest speaker both in the "Black to the Future: An Imagination Incubabor[14]" (widely called the "The Future is Ferguson") public symposium of multicultural speculative fiction artists, academics, and creative writers, at Princeton University (held on September 14, 2015); and in the "Creating Futures Rooted in Wonder[15]" symposium of fairy tale, science fiction, and indigenous storytellers and scholars, at the University of Hawai'i (held from September 16–19, 2015), where she performed in author readings with Pacific Islander, Native Hawaiian, and other indigenous writers, as well as led creative writing workshops.

Her novel Everfair joins with the growing movement of international speculative-fiction writers of color, including editorial efforts by Jaymee Goh of Malaysia and Joyce Chg of Singapore (author-anthologists behind the 2015 collection of Southeast Asian steampunk published in English, The Sea is Ours: Tales of Steampunk Southeast Asia[16]), to repurpose the science fiction trope of alternate history in critical ways that foreground issues of colonialism, globalization, and culture.

Afrofuturist and feminist sf anthologies

Shawl has edited several anthologies of speculative fiction, especially collections of Afrofuturist, feminist/LGBT, and African American sf/fantasy short stories, including recent homages to pioneering black/queer sf novelists Samuel R. Delany and Octavia E. Butler: Stories for Chip: A Tribute to Samuel R. Delany (2015), co-edited with Bill Campbell,[17] and Strange Matings: Science Fiction, Feminism, African American Voices, and Octavia E. Butler (2015), co-edited by Rebecca J. Holden.[18] Shawl's anthology work has been part of her longtime participation within both the feminist and the African American sf writing communities, evidenced in her editing of WisCon Chronicles Vol. 5: Writing and Racial Identity (2011, generated from America's most venerable feminist sf convention);[19] as well as in her stories' publication within women sf writers' literary experiments, such as Talking Back: Epistolary Fantasies (2006, by feminist sf publisher Aqueduct Press)[20] and within African American speculative fiction collections, notably the groundbreaking[21] Dark Matter: A Century of Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora (2000).[22]

Personal life

Shawl was born in Kalamazoo, Michigan. She started attending the Residential College of the University of Michigan in 1971 at the age of 16, but did not graduate.[23] She lives in Seattle, Washington, where she reviews books for the Seattle Times as a freelance contributor.[1][7][24]

Select bibliography

Fiction

  • "I Was a Teenage Genetic Engineer," Semiotext(e) SF, NY, NY, April, 1989, Columbia University.
  • "The Rainses'," Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, April, 1995. (appeared in FILTER HOUSE)
  • "The Pragmatical Princess," Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, January, 1999. (appeared in FILTER HOUSE)
  • "At the Huts of Ajala," Dark Matter: A Century of Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora, NY, NY, July, 2000, Warner Books. (appeared in FILTER HOUSE)
  • "Shiomah's Land," Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, March, 2001. (appeared in FILTER HOUSE)
  • "Vapors," Wet: More Aqua Erotica, Mary Anne Mohanraj (editor), Three Rivers Press, NY, NY.
  • "The Beads of Ku," Rosebud Magazine Issue 23, April 2002. (appeared in FILTER HOUSE)
  • "Momi Watsu," Strange Horizons (website) August 2003 (appeared in FILTER HOUSE)
  • "Deep End," So Long Been Dreaming: Postcolonial Science Fiction and Fantasy, edited by Nalo Hopkinson and Uppinder Mehan, 2004, Arsenal Pulp Press, Vancouver, BC, Canada. (appeared in FILTER HOUSE)
  • "Maggies," Dark Matter: Reading the Bones, edited by Sheree R. Thomas, 2004, NY: Warner Books. (appeared in FILTER HOUSE)
  • "Matched," The Infinite Matrix. (Excerpt from the novel The Blazing World, co-sponsored by the Office of Arts and Cultural Affairs.) May 2005.
  • "Wallamelon," Aeon Speculative Fiction #3, May 2005 (website) (appeared in FILTER HOUSE)
  • "Cruel Sistah," Asimov's SF Magazine, October/November 2005; Year's Best Fantasy & Horror #19, St. Martin's Press, NY, NY, August 2006.
  • "But She's Only a Dream," Trabuco Road (website) March 2007. (appeared in FILTER HOUSE)
  • "Little Horses" Detroit Noir, Akashic Books, Nov 2007 (appeared in FILTER HOUSE)

Non-fiction

  • Writing the Other: A Practical Guide, with co-author Cynthia Ward, Aqueduct Press, Seattle, WA, December 2005.
  • "To Jack Kerouac, to Make Much of Space and Time," Talking Back: Epistolary Fantasies, L. Timmel Duchamp (editor), Aqueduct Press, Seattle, WA, March, 2006.

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Nisi Shawl: Home Page
  2. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  5. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  6. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Reflection's Edge
  8. ↑ James Tiptree, Jr: 2005. [1]. Retrieved 2009-4-27.
  9. ↑ Tiptree Winners Announced. [2]. Retrieved 2009-4-27.
  10. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  11. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  12. ↑ Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) Collection, Northern Illinois University
  13. ↑ WisCon main page accessed May 27, 2011
  14. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  15. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  16. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  17. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  18. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  19. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  20. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  21. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  22. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  23. ↑ Autobiography
  24. ↑ Articles by Nisi Shawl, Seattle Times

External links

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