News/Research

SDSU Interviews Lashon Daley on Children's Literature

25 Oct, 2021

SDSU Interviews Lashon Daley on Children's Literature

The NCSCL recently interviewed Dr. Lashon Daley, the Department of English and Comparative Literature’s new assistant professor of children’s literature and BCNM alum. This interview was conducted by Natalie Alvarez and Lara Amin, graduate assistants for SDSU’s National Center for the Study of Children’s Literature.

Lashon describes her journey into writing Children's Literature, and publishing of "Mr. Okra Sells Fresh Fruits and Vegetables" in 2016. She notes that "through a series of research pursuits, children’s literature, especially children’s literature as it intersects with Black girlhood studies, eventually became one of my research fields".

Lashon also describes what kind of seminar she would teach and how they relate to her research:
"I would love to teach a seminar on research methods for fiction writers. Since I pursued my MFA before pursuing my PhD, I feel like I missed out on some crucial knowledge on how to conduct research for my creative master’s thesis. Being taught the craft of writing is super important, but I believe that teaching research methods in MFA programs would be a game changer... Now as a scholar at the intersection of children’s literature and Black girlhood studies, I feel much more equipped to write and construct a world for my character that is based in real-world research."

Read more from the interview here!