Image of a stack of books.
By Nguyễn Đặng Thiên An ’23
Staff Writer
“The Latin[e] community is extremely diverse by race, gender, class background, citizenship status, country of origin and more,” Associate Professor of Latina/o Studies David Hernández said. “As such, it’s difficult for any project to represent all of these strands of Latinidad. Still, one has to try, and skilled authors pull this off all the time.”
For Hispanic/Latine Heritage Month, Mount Holyoke News has compiled a list of Hispanic and Latine authors who have written extensively about the intersections of immigrant identity and mobility, femininity, gentrification and family splintering.
Valeria Luiselli
Valeria Luiselli is a Mexican-born author who is currently a Writer in Residence at Bard College in New York City. An acclaimed writer of both fiction and nonfiction, Luiselli is the author of award-winning novels “The Story of My Teeth” (2013), “Faces in the Crowd” (2011) and the essay collection “Sidewalks” (2010).
Luiselli has also translated numerous testimonies of undocumented and unaccompanied children who sought asylum. Her nonfiction essay “Tell Me How It Ends: An Essay” (2016) documents the answers to 40 official questions that U.S. immigration officers would ask children to determine if they are eligible to stay in the United States.
Luiselli not only writes about the lives of immigrants, but also documents the idea of mobility, as her writings are often set in multiple locations. For instance, her debut essay collection “Sidewalks” takes the readers to San Michele, an island near Venice, where the protagonist embarks on a pilgrimage to the Russian poet Joseph Brodsky’s grave, to empty urban areas in Mexico City and then to New York City. In an interview with Rain Taxi, Luiselli shared that her childhood and teenage years took place in many countries: Costa Rica, South Korea, South Africa and India. The linguistic dissonance she experienced became an emotional concern for her, which played a role in shaping her identity. Her decision to set “Sidewalks" in Mexico and to write in Spanish was to build herself into a city and culture that she felt disconnected from.
Melissa Lozada-Oliva
Melissa Lozada-Olivia is a Guatelombian (a self-ascribed portmanteau of Guatemalan and Colombian) American poet and screenwriter based in Brooklyn, New York. Her work has been featured in The Guardian, the Kenyon Review, Glamour Magazine and The Huffington Post.
Lozada-Olivia’s first poetry collection, “peluda,” published in late 2017 by Button Poetry and Exploding Pinecone Press, is an invigorating insight of the intersectionality of body policing and Latina identity through the exploration of body hair, family and friendship. The collection is an intimate snapshot of what it means to embrace body hair in a world where white beauty standards dominate.
When discussing the motif of hair in this poetry collection during an interview with Sampsonia Way Magazine, Lozada-Olivia shared that she was inspired by her 16-year-old self who associated body hair with privacy. Through examining the experience of hiding body hair, the adult Lozada-Olivia expressed that “hair is always going to be something that covers you up and something that is showing who you are.”
Her upcoming novel “Dreaming of You: A Novel in Verse” will be published in October 2021 under Astra House. According to Kirkus Reviews, the book resurrects Tejano pop star Selena Quintanilla. Readers are then taken on a “journey through the wasteland of fame, popular culture and femininity identity in a postcolonial world.”
Naima Coster
Naima Coster is a Dominican American writer and recipient of numerous awards, including the 2020 “5 Under 35 Honorees” by the National Book Foundation that recognizes debut fiction writers under the age of 35. She is also a prolific essayist; her essays have appeared in The New York Times, LitHub and The Fordham Observer.
Coster’s debut novel “Halsey Street” centers on a family — a Black father and a Dominican mother, striving to give their daughter, Penelope Grand, a better life amidst the gentrification of Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn. According to Vox, Coster looks at how this family is affected by the changing neighborhood, creating a sense of isolation and resentment.
Coster’s most recent novel, “What's Mine and Yours,” was published in March 2021. The book is a saga of two families — two mothers and their teenage children — intertwined with themes of race and identity denial. The novel takes place in a divided community in North Carolina, but stretches beyond its bounds to other cities such as Atlanta, Los Angeles and Paris.
In a discussion with Hachette Book Group, Coster stated the setting of the novel was inspired by Coster’s experience living in these locations, especially regarding how she perceives race and her sense of belonging differently in these cities. In the interview, Coster further explored how white supremacy and social mobility can complicate racial dynamics within different communities.
From heartfelt poetry to introspective novels, these three authors explore the intersection of place, identity and family relationships, as well as the topics of gender, race and immigration.