Did “y’all” originate with 17th century English poetry? A particularly interesting follow-up to my letter of recommendation for “y’all” mentions my own evolution on the word in the context of a larger argument from David B. Parker, a professor at Kennesaw State University.
Illustration for the New York Times Magazine by Clay Hickson. For the New York Times Magazine, I wrote a letter of recommendation for “y’all,” a word I shied away from in my youth as a transplant from Dallas to Miami and have since circled back to not once, but twice. Here’s an excerpt: Growing up in Miami, I dreaded being . . .
Ancestor Trouble is out in the world! If you follow me on social media or receive my newsletter, you may have heard plenty about it by now, but if not, here are some highlights. The New York Times review by Kerri Arsenault is a dream (“extraordinary and wide-ranging,” “a literary feat”), as are reviews by Lorraine Berry for The Boston Globe (“beautiful and complexly nuanced,” with . . .
My book, Ancestor Trouble, is anticipated this month by the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, CNN, the Millions, the Chicago Review of Books, Apartment Therapy, Goodreads readers. Esquire has named it one of the best books of the year so far.