BookTalk: Highlighting Local Latinx Authors
Qué Pasa, OSU Staff Writer 23′-24′
by Astrid Coste, Undergraduate, Journalism
With the rise of “BookTok” on social media, reading for pleasure has risen to new heights with personalized recommendations to niche audiences being made left and right. However, the recommendations that are mainstreamed lack color in the racial make-up of the authors. To combat this, here are three Latinx authors affiliated with Ohio State to add to your “To Be Read” list.
Aline Melo – As an undocumented immigrant from Brazil, Melo moved to the United States with her family at a young age in 1997. In her debut poetry book, More Salt Than Diamonds, Melo writes about her identity, her experiences with it, and its effects on her relationships. In addition to being a graduate student at Ohio State’s MFA in Creative Writing, Melo is an Undocupoet fellow. The Undocupoet Fellowship is a grant given to undocumented poets to support submission fees for their work. The Fellowship also covers costs to attend a six-week workshop with Catapult, a publishing company offering classes to their writers.
Julian Marcel Baldemira – After graduating from ISA: Universidad de las Artes in Cuba, Baldemira is currently pursuing his Ph.D. at Ohio State’s Latin American Literary and Cultural Studies program. In 2016, he published his first book, Nube Oscura Alrededor de la Cabeza. His book is a collection of short stories with characters who experience firsthand the issues and emotions when surrounded by a totalitarian environment. His book won the 2016 Premio Celestino de Cuentos, awarded to young Cuban fiction writers to receive publication under Ediciones La Luz. In 2022, Julian received the Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad Fellowship (DDRA) for a six-month full-time dissertation research in Brazil for his topic, “Breaking Imperial Showcases.”
Frederick Aldama – a.k.a. Professor Latinx, is a professor and the Jacob & Francis Sanger Mossiker Chair in the English Department at the University of Texas in Austin while also being an adjunct professor at Ohio State. His most recent book, published in 2022, Con Papá/With Papá, is a children’s book focusing on fatherhood through the identity of being Latinx. Some of his other works include Latinx Superheroes in Mainstream Comics, Reel Latinx’s Representation in U.S. Films and TV, and Graphic Border discuss the history of representation of the Latinx community in various forms of creative media, such as comic books and television. Frederick’s love for comics has led him to various collaborative projects such as Latinographix, a series of graphic novels, memoirs, and other forms of writing created by Latinx authors and artists. Aldama has won multiple awards throughout his career, including being inducted into the 2022 Ohio State Office of Diversity and Inclusion Hall of Fame.