ZRS: <\/b>Where are you from, and how did you get into writing? <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n AMJ: <\/b>A few years ago, I was helping my mom clear out her garage-boxes we’d held onto state after state, decade after decade. Under the battered board games and school binders, I found a faded purple poster covered in dried macaroni. In one corner, in large lop-sided letters: “I WILL BE A RITER.” I don’t remember the kindergarten version of myself well, but she knew something that took adult-me a long time to learn. I’ve always wanted this life. I just didn’t know it was possible. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n In high school, we only read novels written by writers of color for one semester. In college, I learned the history of Bangladesh from a white professor who told me Islam and democracy were inherently at odds. I became a public school teacher because I thought I could offer what I had not been given: the truth. But the truth is messy, layered, dangerous. The US education system prefers order, compliance, answers. I became a writer so I could move closer to the truth, so I could live in the questions. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n ZRS: <\/b>What do you like to explore in your writing, and why?<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n AMJ: <\/b>I start from what I do not know, what I cannot grasp–I start from questions that feel bigger than any possible truths that might fill them. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n ZRS:<\/b> What are your fall and spring classes about?<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n AMJ: <\/b>This semester, I’m teaching a class on the poetics of “The Body & The State” (What is The Body? What is The State? How can language represent either?) Next semester, I’ll be teaching a class on “How We Remember” (How do we hold memory on a page when it is constantly shifting, receding, disappearing? What forms make space for the forgotten?) It is from the wisdom and curiosity of my students that I learn what writing can do in the world. It is beside them that I become the person I long to be.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Zo\u00eb Roos Scheuerman ’24 Professor Aurora Masum-Javed (she\/her) is one of the English department\u2019s new faculty members this year, and she has quickly become a familiar, friendly face around the department. This month, The Words reached out to Aurora with some questions, which she very kindly answered, so that the English community could learn […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":574,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-3840","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/the-words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3840","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/the-words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/the-words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/the-words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/574"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/the-words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3840"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/the-words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3840\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8075,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/the-words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3840\/revisions\/8075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/the-words\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3840"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Aurora](\"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/the-words\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/603\/2021\/09\/A83C0619-0E5F-4954-B8DB-0441DF898DE9_4_5005_c.jpeg\")