Go back

Identities: A Short Story Collection is an illustrative and powerful read

Arts

Yabome Gilpin-Jackson explores the experiences of African immigrants in Canada

Peak Web
Peak Web
1 min.
0
1395
Image courtesy of CreateSpace

By: Ruramai Munyanyi

An adjunct professor in SFU’s Beedie School of Business, Yabome Gilpin-Jackson, sets her foot into the fiction arena and holds her own with some of the best fiction I have ever read. Identities: A Short Story Collection is an enticing summer read about the nuanced experience of the contemporary African immigrant. It’s for anyone who has always wondered about the eclectic lives of Africans, but has been too shy to ask.

     “Where are you from?” Gilpin-Jackson opens with the question most immigrants of colour are asked as soon as people realize they look different, sound different, and carry themselves differently. Spoiler alert: the answer is not always as simple as it seems. To this point, Gilpin-Jackson challenges her reader to immediately ask themselves questions and resist the urge to make assumptions. Anyone who is different often yearns for people to do these things.

     Her work lacks artifice, and she draws her reader in with characters with whom anyone can identify. Gilpin-Jackson evokes both a sense of empathy for the African immigrant’s experience and a sense of camaraderie as she delves into other aspects of human identity that are universal.

     The writer’s voice is what makes this book special. Her ability to illustrate the complicated feelings of being a living bridge between a beloved continent (Africa, in this case) and the strong roots set down in the West is something I never knew I needed. If nothing else, this book feels like it is constantly whispering that ‘you are not alone’; a priceless gift!

Was this article helpful?
0
0

Leave a Reply

Block title

New immunotherapy treatment provides hope for aggressive cancer

News Peak Web -
By: Lucaiah Smith-Miodownik, News Writer Surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation therapy are often recognized as the three most common forms of cancer treatment. Sometimes, the latter two approaches become no longer effective when cancers become drug resistant, allowing the cells to further spread. At the University of Calgary, however, promising developments in immunotherapy intervention seek to provide alternative treatment when common therapies are not viable.  Cells continually divide to replenish dying cells, but certain gene mutations can create cancer cells, which divide and spread in an uncontrolled manner. The human body naturally defends itself from cancerous cells, though sometimes they can “hide from the immune system and avoid being destroyed,” according to the Canadian Cancer Society. Immunotherapy seeks to help strengthen the ability to recognize and fight...

Read Next

Block title

New immunotherapy treatment provides hope for aggressive cancer

News Peak Web -
By: Lucaiah Smith-Miodownik, News Writer Surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation therapy are often recognized as the three most common forms of cancer treatment. Sometimes, the latter two approaches become no longer effective when cancers become drug resistant, allowing the cells to further spread. At the University of Calgary, however, promising developments in immunotherapy intervention seek to provide alternative treatment when common therapies are not viable.  Cells continually divide to replenish dying cells, but certain gene mutations can create cancer cells, which divide and spread in an uncontrolled manner. The human body naturally defends itself from cancerous cells, though sometimes they can “hide from the immune system and avoid being destroyed,” according to the Canadian Cancer Society. Immunotherapy seeks to help strengthen the ability to recognize and fight...

Block title

New immunotherapy treatment provides hope for aggressive cancer

News Peak Web -
By: Lucaiah Smith-Miodownik, News Writer Surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation therapy are often recognized as the three most common forms of cancer treatment. Sometimes, the latter two approaches become no longer effective when cancers become drug resistant, allowing the cells to further spread. At the University of Calgary, however, promising developments in immunotherapy intervention seek to provide alternative treatment when common therapies are not viable.  Cells continually divide to replenish dying cells, but certain gene mutations can create cancer cells, which divide and spread in an uncontrolled manner. The human body naturally defends itself from cancerous cells, though sometimes they can “hide from the immune system and avoid being destroyed,” according to the Canadian Cancer Society. Immunotherapy seeks to help strengthen the ability to recognize and fight...

Simon Fraser University’s independent student newspaper since 1965.

For advertising inquiries: [email protected]
For promotional inquiries: [email protected]

© The Peak Publications Society

Simon Fraser University’s independent student newspaper since 1965.

For advertising inquiries: [email protected]
For promotional inquiries: [email protected]

© The Peak Publications Society