Latino Empowerment: Julia Alvarez
NHCOA MediaBlog
Julia Alvarez was born in New York and grew up in the Dominican Republic. At the age of ten, she returned to the United States, where she began her literary career and where she currently resides. She made her literary debut in 1984 with the poetry collection Homecoming, which she continues to write along with prose.
She began her undergraduate studies at Connecticut College in New London, Connecticut, later transferring to Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont, from which she graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree, Summa Cum Laude. In 1975, she received a Master’s in Creative Writing from Syracuse University in New York. She completed this training along with several graduate courses in English and American Literature at the Bread Loaf School of English, located in Ripton, Vermont.
For several years she developed teaching and literary animation activities in schools at various levels, as well as in communities. During this period, she wrote the novel Yo!, a sequel to her popular 1991 book How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents.
Subsequent work commitments took her to Phillips Andover Academy, University of Vermont and George Washington University. From 1985 to 1988 she was an assistant professor in the English department at the University of Illinois. She has also served on the staff of the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, the nation’s oldest and most prestigious writers’ conference.
Alvarez was honored as one of six Dominican-Americans who have made significant contributions to the Dominican community in both countries, hosted by the Dominican American Assistance Fund and the U.S. Department of State (1995). The John Jay College, The City University of New York, awarded her an Honorary Doctorate in Human Sciences (1996). In addition, the 1997 Santo Domingo Annual Book Fair was dedicated to her work and in September 2000 she was declared Woman of the Year by Latina Magazine.
On July 28, 2014, former U.S. President Barack Obama awarded her the National Medal of Arts. “In poetry and prose, (…) Alvarez explores themes of identity, family, and cultural difference. She illustrates the complexity in navigating two worlds and reveals the human capacity for resistance in the face of oppression,” said former President Obama.
Her novels have been praised by major media outlets in the United States and Latin America. Her first novel How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents was declared Book of the Year in 1991 by the New York Times and Library Journal and has been translated into several languages.
The poet explores and portrays in her verses injustice, pain, and sadness, but also joy, strength, and liveliness. Her creations, without a doubt, are a source of pride for the entire Latino community and shine within the United States and beyond its borders.
Sources:
https://opac.pucmm.edu.do/virtuales/html/dominicanos2/jalvarez/biografia.htm
The New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/es/2018/06/28/espanol/cultura/julia-alvarez-poeta.html