![]() ![]() In “Another Appalachia” she feels her way through what it was like to grow up part of a small brown minority in a white place and what it was like to be Hindu in a place understood as Christian. This collection is all about what it means to grow up in a small town, smack in the middle of Appalachia, a region as complex as the terrain that defines it. Avashia’s stories expand our notion of who is permitted to have voice in the literary canon as it shatters misconceptions of a place, interpersonal relationships and what it means to be part of a community.Īvashia’s parents came to the United States from India and settled in a small town in southern West Virginia where her father was a medical doctor working for Union Carbide, a chemical corporation. Neema Avashia’s memoir, “Another Appalachia: Coming Up Queer and Indian in a Mountain Place,” to be released next week by West Virginia University Press, demonstrates how woefully incomplete the predominant narrative about Appalachia really is. What if I told you that reading a book would inspire you to pair “Ghetto Supastar” (Pras) with “Islands in the Stream” (Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers) on your latest playlist? Or cause you to attempt your childhood imitation of Magic Johnson’s Junior Skyhook? What if I said that this book gave me such tenderness toward a place that parsing my thoughts about it was like scooping up tadpoles with my bare hands? ![]()
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