Other Tongues: Mixed Race Women Speak Out s an anthology of poetry, spoken word, fiction, creative non-fiction, spoken word texts, as well as black and white artwork and photography, explores the question of how mixed-race women in North America identify in the twenty-first century. Contributions engage, document, and/or explore the experiences of being mixed-race, by placing interraciality as the center, rather than periphery, of analysis.
Adebe De Rango-Adem is a former research fellow at the Applied Research Center, home of ColourLines magazine, and current Cultural Editor of Race-Talk.org, a blog dedicated to writing on race politics and pop culture. She won the Toronto Poetry Competition in 2005 to become Toronto’s first Junior Poet Laureate, and is the author of Ex Nihilo (2010), her debut poetry collection that considers how art can respond to the annihilation of particular identities struggling to exist in an impossibly post-racial world. Ex Nihilo was longlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize, the world’s largest prize for writers under thirty.
Andrea Thompson is a pioneer of the Canadian Slam Poetry scene, whose work has been featured on film, radio, and television; and included in magazines, literary journals and anthologies across Canada for over 15 years. Her spoken-word cd, One, was nominated for a Canadian Urban Music Award in 2005, and her poetry collection, Eating the Seed, has been featured on the reading lists at the Ontario College of Art and Design and the University of Toronto. Thompson is the host of season two of the 13-part television series, Heart of a Poet (Bravo TV, 2007), and the writer and performer of the one-woman spoken word/play “Mating Rituals of the Urban Cougar.”
"In the past 20 years Canada has seen a few mixed race anthologies that reflect both the time, place and language that we use to talk about being of mixed heritage and the many complicated social locations this takes us to. Other Tongues' collection of personal essays, poetry and visual art is an excellent addition to the body of writing already out there. In a nice circular way that happens sometimes, Carol Camper wrote the introduction. The pieces are all short to very short, with the longest piece at around six pages and the average length about two pages long. This is one of the anthology's strengths as it can show the breadth and range of experiences as well as the vast array of how women have dealt with / coped with / celebrated what their racial identity means to them in the context of Canada and the U.S., where the majority of the contributors live. All in all a wonderful collection, with a large selection of very diverse experiences. Highly recommended."
—rabble.ca