"Commands your attention from the first page to the last
word." --Morgan Jerkins
When Neema Avashia tells people
where she's from, their response is nearly always a disbelieving
"There are Indian people in West Virginia?" A queer Asian
American teacher and writer, Avashia fits few Appalachian
stereotypes. But the lessons she learned in childhood about race and
class, gender and sexuality continue to inform the way she moves
through the world today: how she loves, how she teaches, how she
advocates, how she struggles.
Another Appalachia
examines both the roots and the resonance of Avashia's identity as a
queer desi Appalachian woman, while encouraging readers to envision
more complex versions of both Appalachia and the nation as a whole.
With lyric and narrative explorations of foodways, religion, sports,
standards of beauty, social media, gun culture, and more, Another
Appalachia mixes
nostalgia and humor, sadness and sweetness, personal reflection and
universal questions.
