Jabari Asim

Jabari Asim (born August 11, 1962) is an author, poet, playwright, and associate professor of writing, literature and publishing at Emerson College in Boston, Massachusetts.[1] He's the former Editor-in-Chief of The Crisis magazine, a journal of politics, ideas and culture published by the NAACP and founded by historian and social activist W. E. B. Du Bois in 1910. In February of 2019 he was named Emerson College's inaugural Elma Lewis ’43 Distinguished Fellow in the Social Justice Center.

Jabari Asim
BornAugust 11, 1962 (1962-08-11) (age 58)
St. Louis, Missouri, United States
OccupationProfessor, editor, author, poet, playwright
GenreAfrican American literature
Notable worksWhat Obama Means, The N Word

In welcoming Asim to The Crisis in August 2007, then-publisher Roger Wilkins said: "Mr. Asim is a seasoned editor, a fine writer and author of a new best selling book. He is a gentleman devoted to the cause of racial justice, is excited about his new role with the NAACP and we are energized by his joining our ranks."[2]

Asim was chosen by the National Book Foundation to serve on the nonfiction panel for the 2013 National Book Awards. Harold Augenbraum, executive director of the foundation, "lauded Asim's ability to approach difficult topics with humility."[3][4]

In April 2009, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation awarded Asim a fellowship in nonfiction, one of 180 awarded to artists, scientists and scholars selected from a group of almost 3,000 applicants.[5]

From 2008 to 2010, Asim was Scholar-in-Residence in African-American Studies and in the Department of Journalism at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign.[6]

Asim spent eleven years (1996–2007) at The Washington Post as deputy editor of the book review section, children's book editor, poetry editor, and editor of the Washington Post′s Education Review. For three years he also wrote a Washington Post Writers Group syndicated column on political and social issues for the Post. Asim is a former vice president of the National Book Critics Circle.[7]

Prior to his stint at The Washington Post Book World, Asim was book editor of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, during which time he was the only African American to supervise book/publishing coverage at a major metropolitan daily. His experience at the Post-Dispatch also included copy editor of the daily editorial and commentary pages, and arts editor of the weekend section.[8]

Jabari Asim lives near Boston, Massachusetts, with his wife and children.

Nonfiction

Asim is the author of What Obama Means (William Morrow, January 20, 2009; ISBN 978-0-06-171133-6), as well as The N Word: Who Can Say It, Who Shouldn't, And Why (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; ISBN 978-0-618-19717-0).

We Can’t Breathe: On Black Lives, White Lies and the Art of Survival, a collection of essays, was published October 16, 2018. It was named A Finalist for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay in 2018.

Fiction

Asim's debut work of fiction, A Taste of Honey, is a collection of 16 connected stories told from multiple perspectives which take place in a fictional Midwestern town called Gateway in 1968, published by Broadway Books in March 2010. It was featured in the March 2010 issue of Essence magazine.

Go On Girl! Book Club selected A Taste of Honey for its 2011 Reading List for May.[9]

In January 2011, A Taste of Honey was nominated for Outstanding Literary Work - Fiction, 42nd NAACP Image Awards[10]

Asim's debut novel, Only the Strong, was published May 12, 2015.

Children's books

The Road To Freedom, Asim's first novel for young readers, was published in 2000.

Other children's books include Whose Toes Are Those, Whose Knees Are These, and Daddy Goes to Work. Girl of Mine and Boy of Mine were published in 2010 by Little Brown.

Fifty Cents and a Dream: Young Booker T. Washington was published December 4, 2012, by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers. The book was on the School Library Journal 2012 Editor's Choice List, was a Kirkus Best Children's Books List Selection, was the Fall 2012 Parent's Choice Silver Award Winner, and was an NAACP Image Award Nominee.[11] It won the Carter G. Woodson Book Award in 2013.[12]

Preaching to the Chickens: The Story of Young John Lewis was published in 2016. It was named a New York Times Best Illustrated Children's Book of 2016.

A Child's Introduction to African American History was published in 2018.

My Baby Loves Christmas was published in 2019.

Poetry

His critical essay "What Is This New Thing?" appears in The Furious Flowering of African-American Poetry (ed. Joanne V. Gabbin, 1999), and an essay appeared in Step Into A World: A Global Anthology of The New Black Literature (ed. Kevin Powell, 2000).

Poetry by Asim was published in African American Writers: A Literary Reader, as well as in the anthologies Role Call: A Generational Anthology of Social & Political Black Literature & Art (eds Tony Medina, Samiya Bashir & Quraysh Ali Lansana, 2002), Beyond The Frontier: African-American Poetry for the 21st Century (ed. E. Ethelbert Miller, 2002), Herb Boyd's The Harlem Reader: A Celebration of New York's Most Famous Neighborhood from the Renaissance Years to the 21st Century (2003), and in From the Black Arts Movement to Furious Flower: A Collection of Contemporary African American Poetry.

In Collections

Can I Teach That? Negotiating Taboo Language and Controversial Topics in the Classroom, was published in 2016.

We Rise, We Resist, We Raise Our Voices was published in 2018.

Best American Essays 2019, was published in 2019.

Bibliography

Non-Fiction
  • What Obama Means: ...For Our Culture, Our Politics, Our Future (William Morrow, January 20, 2009)
  • The N Word: Who Can Say It, Who Shouldn't, and Why (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, March 26, 2007)
  • Not Guilty: Twelve Black Men Speak Out on the Law, Justice and Life (editor) (HarperCollins, November 2001)

Fiction
  • A Taste of Honey (Broadway Books, 2009)

Children's
  • Fifty Cents and a Dream: Young Booker T. Washington (Little Brown Books for Young Readers, December 4, 2012)
  • Girl of Mine (Little Brown Kids, Spring, 2009)
  • Boy of Mine (Little Brown Kids, Spring, 2009)
  • Whose Toes Are Those? (Little Brown Kids, March 2006)
  • Whose Knees Are These? (LittleBrown Kids, March 2006)
  • Daddy Goes to Work (Little Brown, 2006)
  • The Road to Freedom (Jamestown Publishers, 2000, ISBN 0809206250)

References
  1. Emerson College News
  2. "NAACP Press Release". Archived from the original on 2010-11-27. Retrieved 2010-11-28.
  3. Brittany Gervais / Beacon Staff, "Writing to be a part of the conversation: WLP associate professor tapped for National Book Awards panel" Archived 2016-03-13 at the Wayback Machine, The Berkeley Beacon, April 29, 2013.
  4. "You don't know what you got 'til it's gone", The Berkeley Beacon, April 11, 2013.
  5. John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation announcement.
  6. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Jabari Asim.
  7. "NBCC at AWP Jabari Asim on the Black Critical Tradition", Critical Mass blog.
  8. Jabari Asim, Columnist, Truthdig; accessed 2.25.13.
  9. 2011 Book Selections, Go On Girl! Book Club.
  10. Nominees for Literature Archived 2011-01-12 at the Wayback Machine, NAACP Image Awards.
  11. Fifty Cents and a Dream catalog page, LittleBrownLibrary.com.
  12. "Carter G. Woodson Book Award and Honor Winners". National Council for the Social Studies. Retrieved January 3, 2019.
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