Bunker Hill Community College Announces Some Kind of Girl: An African Girl Looking for America by Caroline Kautsire as 2023 One Book Selection
Monday, October 16, 2023
BHCC Professor’s 2022 memoir explores identity and the immigrant experience in Boston; College kicks off One Book with reading and book signing
Bunker Hill Community College kicked off its annual One Book program with a reading and book signing by Professor of English Caroline Kautsire, author of Some Kind of Girl: An African Girl Looking for America.
The memoir, which tells the story of Kautsire’s experience immigrating to Boston from Malawi, and discovering that the America she saw on television is not an accurate representation of life in the U.S. The book, which is Kautsire’s second memoir, explores issues of gender, race, class, and sexuality while navigating the immigration system, and the worlds of work and education.
“It is an honor to be selected for BHCC’s One Book program,” said Kautsire. “As a BHCC faculty member, I know what a catalyst for conversation and learning the One Book program has become, and I am looking forward to participating in those conversations over the course of the year.”
Kautsire is originally from Malawi, Africa, and currently lives in Boston, Massachusetts. She is an English literature and writing professor at Bunker Hill Community College. In 2020, she published her first memoir, What Kind of Girl? and, over the past several years, she has published numerous poems and works of flash fiction. As a stage actress and director, she was nominated for best supporting actress by the Eastern Massachusetts Association of Community Theatres for her performance as Trinculo in William Shakespeare’s The Tempest. Aside from her teaching and acting, Kautsire gives inspirational talks at colleges in Boston, as well as for organizations that focus on diversity, equity and inclusion.
“It is so critical that programs like One Book center stories like Caroline Kautsire’s,” said BHCC President Pam Eddinger. “Her story will no doubt be familiar to BHCC students, faculty and staff alike—that of an immigrant striving to meet their own ambition and potential. It is a story she tells beautifully and one that I know will resonate at One Book events throughout the year.”
BHCC's One Book program was founded in 2007 by BHCC Professor and Chair of the English Department Jennifer Cohn and has been a BHCC faculty-run program ever since. The program engages the College community in a dialogue about a common text that addresses a current issue. Students, faculty and staff share the experience of reading a text and examining its effects on our community. Faculty who incorporate the text into their curriculum receive copies for their students. Programming is
provided throughout the year to continue the discussions that begin in the classrooms of various disciplines.
The One Book program promotes literacy in an innovative way and creates interest in a subject that students may be encouraged to pursue and advocate for in the future. The program invites analysis, promotes critical thinking, and fosters positive change. Past One Book selections include White Space: Essays on Culture, Race, and Writing by Jennifer De Leon, The Other Wes Moore by Maryland Governor Wes Moore, and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot.