Minal Hajratwala (born 1971) is a writer, performer, poet, and
queer activist
Activism (or Advocacy) consists of efforts to promote, impede, direct or intervene in social, political, economic or environmental reform with the desire to make changes in society toward a perceived greater good. Forms of activism range fr ...
of
India
India, officially the Republic of India ( Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the ...
n descent. She was born in 1971 in
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
,
California
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...
,
US, and was raised in
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 List of islands of New Zealand, smaller islands. It is the ...
and suburban
Michigan
Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...
. She is a graduate of
Stanford University.
Career
She is the author of ''Leaving India: My Family's Journey From Five Villages to Five Continents'' (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009), which
Alice Walker
Alice Malsenior Tallulah-Kate Walker (born February 9, 1944) is an American novelist, short story writer, poet, and social activist. In 1982, she became the first African-American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, which she was awa ...
has called "incomparable," and ''
The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large n ...
'' has characterized as "searingly honest." She researched and wrote the book during a seven-year period, traveling the world to interview more than 75 members of her extended family.
Hajratwala's creative work has appeared in journals, anthologies, and theater spaces and has received recognition and support from the
Sundance Institute
Sundance Institute is a non-profit organization founded by Robert Redford committed to the growth of independent artists. The institute is driven by its programs that discover and support independent filmmakers, theatre artists and composers fr ...
, the
Jon Sims Center for the Arts, the SerpentSource Foundation, and the
Hedgebrook writing retreat for women, where she serves on the Alumnae Leadership Council. For
World AIDS Day
World AIDS Day, designated on 1 December every year since 1988, is an international day dedicated to raising awareness of the AIDS pandemic caused by the spread of HIV infection and mourning those who have died of the disease. The acquired immun ...
in 1999, the
commissioned her one-woman show, "Avatars: Gods for a New Millennium."
She previously worked as a journalist at the ''
San Jose Mercury News
''The Mercury News'' (formerly ''San Jose Mercury News'', often locally known as ''The Merc'') is a morning daily newspaper published in San Jose, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. It is published by the Bay Area News Group, a subsidia ...
'' for eight years, was a board member of the
National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association
NLGJA: The Association of LGBTQ Journalists, is an American professional association dedicated to unbiased coverage of LGBTQ issues in the media. It is based in Washington, D.C., and the membership consists primarily of journalists, students, edu ...
, and was a National Arts Journalism Program fellow at
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manha ...
's Graduate School of Journalism in 2000-01.
In June 2011 Hajratwala and Tom MacMaster, creator of
Amina Abdallah Arraf al Omari
''A Gay Girl In Damascus'' was a weblog purportedly by Amina Abdallah Arraf al Omari who was in fact a fictional character and hoax persona created and maintained by American Tom MacMaster. The identity was presented as a Syrian-American blogger ...
, engaged in an online dispute over the posting of MacMaster's manuscript.
[Mackey, Robert.]
While Posing as a Syrian Lesbian, Male Blogger Tried to Get a Book Deal
" ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
''. June 22, 2011. Retrieved on July 6, 2011.
Hajratwala is the founder of Unicorn Club, "a magical sanctuary where authors of color (and allies who really mean it!) finish our gorgeous, urgently needed books."
Works
*2009 ''Leaving India: My Family's Journey from Five Villages to Five Continents''
*2010 ''
Out! Stories from The New Queer India'' (editor)
*2015 ''Bountiful Instructions for Enlightenment''
References
External links
Official websiteUnicorn Club"The Heart Breaks"
by Minal Hajratwala, published in ''Lion's Roar'' (July 27, 2021)
Interview
with Public Radio International's ''The World'' (March 31, 2009)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hajratwala, Minal
Living people
Lambda Literary Award winners
American women writers of Indian descent
American women poets
Stanford University alumni
American LGBT rights activists
American people of Gujarati descent
1971 births
The Mercury News people
American women non-fiction writers
21st-century American poets
21st-century American women writers