This Is Major
Notes on Diana Ross, Dark Girls, and Being Dope
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4.7 • 3 Ratings
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- $7.99
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
A National Book Critics Circle Finalist in Autobiography * Finalist for a Lambda Literary Award * Named one of the most anticipated books of the year by USA Today, Bitch Magazine, Parade, Salon and Ms. Magazine
From a fierce and humorous new voice comes a relevant, insightful, and riveting collection of personal essays on the richness and resilience of black girl culture—for readers of Samantha Irby, Roxane Gay, Morgan Jerkins, and Lindy West.
Shayla Lawson is major. You don’t know who she is. Yet. But that’s okay. She is on a mission to move black girls like herself from best supporting actress to a starring role in the major narrative. Whether she’s taking on workplace microaggressions or upending racist stereotypes about her home state of Kentucky, she looks for the side of the story that isn’t always told, the places where the voices of black girls haven’t been heard.
The essays in This is Major ask questions like: Why are black women invisible to AI? What is “black girl magic”? Or: Am I one viral tweet away from becoming Twitter famous? And: How much magic does it take to land a Tinder date?
With a unique mix of personal stories, pop culture observations, and insights into politics and history, Lawson sheds light on these questions, as well as the many ways black women and girls have influenced mainstream culture—from their style, to their language, and even their art—and how “major” they really are.
Timely, enlightening, and wickedly sharp, This Is Major places black women at the center—no longer silenced, no longer the minority.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Poet Lawson (A Speed Education in Human Being), the director of creative writing at Amherst College, offers personal stories and cultural observations in this insightful collection of 17 essays about being a black woman in the U.S. In "American Girls," Lawson, born in Minnesota in 1982, Lawson discusses living in an upscale neighborhood where kids made fun of her for sounding "suspiciously white." In "For Colored Girls," she writes of battling depression in her 20s, and how joining a high school production of Ntozake Shange's For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf helped ground her. She addresses the appropriation of black culture in "I Tried to Be Twitter Famous," an illuminating take on the influence of "Black Twitter," and in "Tammy From HR" she recalls her time working at an advertising agency selling "some palatable version of black cool" to white customers. Lawson's lyrical sensibilities are on display in "You Are Here" and "& Just in Case You Forget Who I Am, I Am," essays that honor Grace Jones and Anita Hill. Other topics include divorce and Tinder dating ("Cake Is Cancelled") and racist portrayals in Disney movies ("Love Songs for Thots"). With sharp insight, Lawson elevates the discussion of race in America. This review has been updated to reflect changes that were made to the book after this review originally published.
