Speaker will discuss “Beyond the Mulatto Stereotype” at Cornell

From Cornell College:

MOUNT VERNON - Award-winning writer Danzy Senna will speak on “Beyond the Tragic Mulatto Stereotype” on the Cornell College campus at 6:30 p.m. April 13 in Hedges Conference Room.

The daughter of a black father and a white mother, both writers and activists in the Civil Rights Movement, Senna grew up in Boston in the 1970s. Her experience in this intense racial battleground, a place her mother described as the “worst place to raise biracial children,” was to serve as the backdrop of her childhood, eventually brought to life in her first novel, “Caucasia.” The novel follows the life of Birdie Lee, a young biracial girl whose racially indeterminate features serve as a racial Rorschach for those around her.

The novel won Book of the Month Club's Stephen Crane First Fiction Award and Senna received the Whiting Award in 2002. Senna holds a master of fine arts in creative writing from the University of California, Irvine, where she received several creative writing awards. Her second novel, “Symptomatic,” was published in 2004. She is currently at work on a non-fiction memoir of her mysterious grandmother. In addition to fiction, Senna writes often on issues of race, identity and gender. She holds the Jenks' Chair of Contemporary American Letters at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass.

Senna will hold a book signing in the Russell D. Cole Library following her lecture. Copies of her book will be available for purchase and refreshments will be provided. This event is free and open to the public.