The All Welcome Reading Group
The All Welcome Reading Group’s first meeting happened on February 23rd and while we discussed the history and politics of black hair as explored in Emma Dabiri’s Don’t Touch My Hair, little did we know that it would be our group’s only in-person meeting.
While we all went about our March days, reading Bernadine Evaristo’s ‘Girl, Woman, Other’ in anticipation of our next session, Covid-19 was finding its way into our lives, disrupting our work and play and about to keep us from our family and friends.
So the All Welcome Reading Group did what we’ve all have to – we moved our meeting online and have kept our lively and insightful conversations going despite being physically separate. Our reading group focuses on works created by people of colour and this month we’ve chosen two texts, My Sister, the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite and Wanderland: A Search For Magic in the Landscape by Jini Reddy.
We decided as a group to read two books this month in acknowledgement that some of us are finding reading more possible and have more time for it than others. My Sister, the Serial Killer is an entertaining and fast-paced read whereas Wanderland, is a more engaged and reflective text that we hope will provoke a rich conversation about the relationship between people of colour and nature – a subject that I’m deeply interested in as an organic food grower and relatively new appreciator of the natural world.
The details for our next meeting can be found here. You can read one book, both or just join our online conversation on May 24th.
Claire Ratinon
Writer and Organic Grower
Posted by sally on Tuesday 5 May 2020