The Good Immigrant: 26 Writers Reflect on America

by Nikesh Shukla (Editor), Chimene Suleyman (Editor)

Overview

By turns heartbreaking and hilarious, troubling and uplifting, these "electric" essays come together to create a provocative, conversation-sparking, multivocal portrait of modern America (The Washington Post).


From Trump's proposed border wall and travel ban to the marching of white supremacists in Charlottesville, America is consumed by tensions over immigration and the question of which bodies are welcome. In this much-anticipated follow-up to the bestselling UK edition, hailed by Zadie Smith as "lively and vital," editors Nikesh Shukla and Chimene Suleyman hand the microphone to an incredible range of writers whose humanity and right to be here is under attack.

• Chigozie Obioma unpacks an Igbo proverb that helped him navigate his journey to America from Nigeria.
• Jenny Zhang analyzes cultural appropriation in 90s fashion, recalling her own pain and confusion as a teenager trying to fit in.
• Fatimah Asghar describes the flood of memory and emotion triggered by an encounter with an Uber driver from Kashmir.
• Alexander Chee writes of a visit to Korea that changed his relationship to his heritage.

These writers, and the many others in this urgent collection, share powerful personal stories of living between cultures and languages while struggling to figure out who they are and where they belong.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780316524230
Publisher:	Little, Brown and Company
Publication date:	02/04/2020
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	336
Sales rank:	427,229
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.20(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Nikesh Shukla is a British writer and diversity activist who conceived and edited The Good Immigrant, the acclaimed collection of essays about race and immigration by 21 writers of color. He is the editor of Rife Magazine, an online magazine for young people, and the author of the novels Coconut Unlimited, which was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award, and Meatspace. He has also been shortlisted for the Liberty Human Rights Arts Award and named as one of Foreign Policy's 100 Global Thinkers 2016. His third novel The One Who Wrote Destiny and his first YA novel will be published in 2018.


Chimene Suleyman is a writer from London who is now based in New York. As well as contributing to The Good Immigrant she has written on race-politics for The Independent, International Business Times, The Debrief, The Pool, and Media Diversified. TV and radio appearances include BBC Newsnight, BBC, and LBC. Her poetry collection, Outside Looking On, was included in the Guardian's Best Books of 2014 list.

Table of Contents

Editors' Note xi

How to Write Iranian-America, or The Last Essay Porochista Khakpour 3

Swimmer Nicole Dennis-Benn 16

Sidra (in 12 Movements) Rahawa Haile 28

On the Blackness of the Panther Teju Cole 36

How Not to Be Priya Minhas 52

After Migration: The Once and Future Kings Walé Oyéjidé 67

On Loneliness Fatimah Asghar 81

Chooey-Booey and Brown Tejal Rao 93

Luck of the Irish Maeve Higgins 104

Her Name Was India Krutika Mallikarjuna 116

Shithole Nation Jim St. Germain 123

Blond Girls in Cheongsams Jenny Zhang 142

The Naked Man Chigozie Obioma 155

Your Father's Country Alexander Chee 169

The Long Answer Yann Mounir Demange 178

An American, Told Jean Hannah Edelstein 197

On Being Kim Kardashian Chimene Suleyman 210

Tour Diary Basim Usmani 223

Dispatches from the Language Wars Daniel José Older 241

Juana Azurduy Versus Christopher Columbus Adrián Sebastián Villar Rojas 248

No Es Suficiente Dani Fernandez 266

Skittles Fatima Farheen Mirza 276

Return to Macondo Susanne Ramírez de Arellano 287

244 Million Mona Chalabi 298

How to Center Your Own Story Jade Chang 301

Acknowledgments 315

Editorial Reviews

★ 01/07/2019

In this revealing follow-up to the 2015 British edition, Shukla (Meatspace) and Suleyman (Outside Looking On) invite 26 artists and scholars, who are immigrants or have ties to multiple countries, to reflect on race, ethnicity, nationality, belonging, and the legacy of colonization, mostly in the context of post-2016 U.S. Written after, and in response to, U.S. President Trump’s Muslim travel bans and references to “shithole countries,” these essays string similar notes—history, memory, pride, and (non)belonging—into many different melodies. Journalist Porochista Khakpour wonders at how she has come to write about nothing but “Iranian-America.” Artists Adrián and Sebastián Villar Rojas lay out Argentina’s struggle between its indigenous roots and its desire to be Western. Teju Cole and Walé Oyéjidé offer contrasting interpretations of depictions of Africa in the blockbuster film Black Panther. French-British film director Yann Demange gives an extended answer to the question, “Where are you from?” and concludes that he will keep giving the short answer, because “the alternative answer can take for-fucking-ever, innit.” The strength of this collection is in its diversity—of gender, sexuality, privilege, experience, and writing style. A gift for anyone who understands or wants to learn about the breadth of experience among immigrants to the U.S., this collection showcases the joy, empathy, and fierceness needed to adopt the country as one’s own. Agent: Sharmaine Lovegrove, Dialogue Books/LBUK. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

"This collection is a resounding success on multiple fronts. Its righteous rage is perfectly matched by its literary rewards...a surround-sound chorus that bristles with an unpredictable, electric energy...Each essay is a tantalizing introduction — and invitation — to the larger body of work these artists have already created and will continue to make long after this moment passes. What unites this defiant chorus of immigrant voices is best expressed in this variation on an enduring line by Langston Hughes: 'We, too sing America.'"—The Washington Post

"The strength of this collection is in its diversity-of gender, sexuality, privilege, experience, and writing style. A gift for anyone who understands or wants to learn about the breadth of experience among immigrants to the U.S., this collection showcases the joy, empathy, and fierceness needed to adopt the country as one's own."—PublishersWeekly (Starred Review)

"This book does what books can do better than other media: it devotes space to the shadowy ranges, to the subjects that are not easily graspable - the ineffable, varied, certainly never simple experiences of being an immigrant."—Rachel Khong, The Guardian

"There are no weak links in this well-curated book."—Kirkus Reviews

"Extraordinary in its attempt to make sense of the current moment...devastating in its ability to coalesce the lived realities of nonwhite Americans and the impact of these acts...Since narratives operate as engines of empathy, granting access to worlds and experiences often overlooked, The Good Immigrant helps counter some of today's more toxic narratives. Hopefully we'll read more of these kind of stories in the future."—Los Angeles Review of Books

"This volume brings together an amazing group of writers...who describe their personal experiences and struggles with finding their place in the U.S. The pieces connect first-person stories with broader cultural and political issues to paint an important picture of the U.S. today."—BookRiot

"Immigration has become a hot-button issue in America for all the wrong reasons (see: racists), and The Good Immigrant is the perfect antidote to all the hate. Through essays from first- and second-generation immigrants like Jenny Zhang, Chigozie Obioma, Fatimah Asghar, and more, you'll get a whole new perspective on everything from '90s fashion to Uber drivers."—PopSugar

Praise for The Good Immigrant (UK):


"The Good Immigrant is a lively and vital intervention into the British cultural conversation around race. Instead of statistics and dogma we find real human experience and impassioned argument - and it's funny and moving, too."
—Zadie Smith

"An important, timely read."—J. K. Rowling

"An act of peaceful defiance; as a document of the now, and as an opportunity to educate ourselves about the lives and experiences of others."—Guardian

"The Good Immigrant is that rarest of beasts, a truly necessary book."—Jonathan Coe, Observer

"As engaging as it is necessary, especially in today's political climate."—Paste

"A timely and important read, filled with gorgeous writing."—Woman's Day

From the Publisher

Winter 2018

The U.S. immigrant experience is profiled in 12 eye-opening essays in this collection edited by novelist Shukla (The One Who Wrote Destiny) and poet Suleyman (Outside Looking On). Representing a range of ethnicities, such as Nigerian, Puerto Rican, and Jamaican, the contributors all tell stories that are unique to their own truths. If there is a similarity among them, it's that they are residents of a country divided by extreme political beliefs; navigating this landscape is at the heart of each essay. A companion volume to the UK collection of the same name, this U.S. edition is most powerful when describing the conflicting feelings of living in a free, democratic nation while still labeled an "outsider." For example, Nicole Dennis-Benn details her journey from Jamaica to Long Island, NY, to a writing career, all while exceeding (or bucking) expectations. "Return to Macondo" is Susanne Ramirez de Arellano's look at Puerto Rico as a U.S. territory not always seen as American, but as a place still haunted by its colonial past. VERDICT These insightful essays from well-known and upcoming writers will appeal to both adult and young adult readers.—Leah Huey, Dekalb P.L., IL

Library Journal

Essays of emotional depth and astutely communicated intellectual insight come to listeners almost entirely in the voices of the writers themselves. Familiar cultural commentators like Korean-American Alexander Chee, Haitian immigrant Jim St. Germain, and Pakistani-American Fatimah Ashgar are joined here by those who may be less well known: Eritrean-American hiker Rahawa Haile, Nigerian immigrant and literature professor Chigozie Obioma, and French-Algerian film director Yann Demange among them. Each essay reveals both American attitudes toward the world and the writer’s personal experiences with moving between cultures. Pacing varies widely among the authors as they share their own work aloud, and some speak with accents that may strike ears attuned to American English as thick. However, part of the high value of this audiobook is the direct experience it provides with these voices. F.M.R.G. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine

JANUARY 2020 - AudioFile

Essays of emotional depth and astutely communicated intellectual insight come to listeners almost entirely in the voices of the writers themselves. Familiar cultural commentators like Korean-American Alexander Chee, Haitian immigrant Jim St. Germain, and Pakistani-American Fatimah Ashgar are joined here by those who may be less well known: Eritrean-American hiker Rahawa Haile, Nigerian immigrant and literature professor Chigozie Obioma, and French-Algerian film director Yann Demange among them. Each essay reveals both American attitudes toward the world and the writer’s personal experiences with moving between cultures. Pacing varies widely among the authors as they share their own work aloud, and some speak with accents that may strike ears attuned to American English as thick. However, part of the high value of this audiobook is the direct experience it provides with these voices. F.M.R.G. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine

JANUARY 2020 - AudioFile