QUESTION: Multicultural Memoir Ideas?

[Lindsay Lombardi]

I know this is broad but I've recently taught Persepolis and I'm
currently teaching The Absolutely true Diary of a Part time Indian with
my tenth graders.  I'm looking for more text suggestions. My students
really are enjoying the young narrators that are close in age to them
and I think they are fascinated by learning about different cultures
and experiences.  I'd like to keep varying the cultural, ethnic, social
perspective of the reading so any ideas would be helpful.  In addition
we've been focusing on first person narrative/memoir point of view.


Any ideas?

-Lindsay

[Ryan Goble]

Lindsay, as you know, I work really hard to mix up texts, some print, some audio, some video...

In addition to some of the great suggestions you've gotten in the GN discussion group have you considered some audio texts.

This one is very famous: Ghetto Life 101
And although This American Life does not often feature young narrators this look back at the family babysitting history - Act II is about 15 minutes and kids LOVE it - see 175: BABYSITTING

You probably already know about the book Monster but it is also a classic and written in screenplay form.

[Shirley Durr]

The "sequel" to Ghetto Life 101 is Remorse: The 14 Stories of Eric Morse, and a book about the making of both radio programs, Our America: Life and Death on the South Side of Chicago. The book includes photos. There's also an old 60 minutes episode (13 minutes) about the young reporters winning the Peabody award: And the Winner Is... . I could only find it (at this time) on VHS.

[jan chernin]

Couple of ideas:
Jeanette Walls The Glass Castle

Alexandra FullerDon't let's go to the dogs tonight

Jiang, Ji-Li. Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution. New York: HarperCollins, 1997. Print.
Ji-Li’s memoir describes a terrifying time in twentieth-century history, with the advent of the Cultural Revolution in China. For the next few years, Ji-Li and her family were humiliated by their former friends and neighbors, and they lived in constant terror of arrest.

Mah, Adeline Yen. Chinese Cinderella: The True Story of an Unwanted Daughter. New York: Random House, 1999.
After her mother dies giving birth to her, Adeline’s powerful family considers her bad luck. When her father remarries, she is subject to her stepmother’s distain. She yearns for the love and understanding of her family.

Sacks, Oliver. Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood. New York: Knopf, 2001. Print.
Before he became a neurologist and best selling author, Oliver Sacks was a small English boy fascinated by metals, chemical reactions, photography, cuttlefish, H.G. Wells, and the periodic table.

Silverstein, Ken. The Radioactive Boy Scout: The True Story of a Boy and His Backyard Nuclear Reactor. New York: Random House, 2004. Print.
Growing up in suburban Detroit, David Hahn was fascinated by science and while working on his Atomic Energy badge for the Boy Scouts, his attention turned to nuclear energy. He began a new project: building a nuclear breeder reactor in his backyard garden shed.

Barakat, Ibtisam. Tasting the Sky: A Palestinian Childhood. New York: Farrar, Straus And Giroux (Byr), 2007. Print.
In this memoir, Ibtisam Barakat remembers what it was like to be a child during the Six-Day War. Fleeing from her home and becoming separated from her family, she turns to words and language for refuge.

[Shirley Durr]

You might want to give these a look:

Name Me Nobody, novel by Lois-Ann Yamanaka, reads like memoir. My students found it fascinating. It's relatively easy reading.

Bone Black: Memories of Girlhood is bell hooks' memoir. I've used excerpts quite successfully with students. I believe she continues her memoir in another volume. bone black is a more challenging read than the other two books I've mentioned.

War of the Bloods in My Veins: A Street Soldier's March Toward Redemption by Dashaun Jiwe Morris about his life in street gangs. Very gritty but real. For mature readers. I've recently purchased copies at Barnes and Noble for $3.99 in hardcover and given them to my male reluctant readers who are actually reading it! The author and some of the people he mentions in the book appear in Brick City, the cable show (Sundance channel) about the rough urban life in Newark, NJ. Very urban in language and content. He has a website and email address in the book. He will respond to anyone who contacts him.

[Toby Rajput]

How about busting the 'Save the Muslim girl' stereotype, common in YA books? I recommend Does My Head Look Big in This? by Rana Abdel-Fattah, about a modern Muslim teenager who, in her search for identity, chooses to wear a head scarf in spite of her parents' warnings and the certain name-calling she will face at school. See Rethinking Schools online for the article 'Save the Muslim Girl!' at http://www.rethinkingschools.org/archive/24_02/24_02_muslim.shtml

[Jeremy Greene]

Check this site out:
http://www.memoirreviews.com/
http://www.memoirreviews.com/memoirs.html

[Kelly Farrow]

We read They Cage the Animals at Night by Jennings M. Burch (poverty and foster care) and Three Little Words by Ashley Rhodes-Courter (foster care system) for my book club at a prison for girls 13-21. These were both very well received. They also love memoirs/nonfiction texts b/c they're more relatable for them.