Josina Manu Maltzman

Art Form(s)

Literary Arts


Connect

josinamanumaltzman.com/

[email protected]

Minneapolis


Artist Statement

I love to build: stories, structures, movements. I write creative nonfiction, memoir, and mythobiography. (Inspired by Audre Lorde who used the term “biomythography” to classify her work ZAMI: A NEW SPELLING OF MY NAME, and Toni Morrison’s writing on her own process, “mythobiography” refers to teasing apart fact from truth in writing personal narrative to illuminate universal themes.) I believe personal narratives can be tools for change and that storytelling helps us to understand our world better. I see my work in lineage and conversation with others whose art has contributed to cultural revolution and decolonization. Writers such as Audre Lorde, Dorothy Allison, Irena Klepfisz, adrienne maree brown, and Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha whose creative works have helped to guidepost us in making systemic transformation around ability, class, white supremacy, and (de)colonization. As a Jewish antizionist I see writing as an integral part of creating a thriving diasporic Jewish culture and a way to lift up (the often silenced) support for Palestine liberation. I am also very engaged in the local Twin Cities writing and performing arts communities (as participant, audience member, and production worker), and am constantly inspired by the range of skill and depth of vulnerability that my community offers. I seek to match that range and depth, so that I may be in dialogue with it and contribute to the beautiful world that our change-making is building.

Josina Manu Maltzman (all pronouns welcome) is a writer by passion, carpenter by trade, and rabble rouser by everything else. Josina is published in the anthologies QUEER VOICES: POETRY, PROSE, AND PRIDE (2019), WALK TOWARDS IT (2017), and THAT’S REVOLTING! QUEER STRATEGIES ON RESISTING ASSIMILATION (2004). Jo earned an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from Goddard College in July 2020, a MN State Arts Board Grant for writing in 2014, and was featured on KFAI’s MinneCulture segment in January ‘22 talking about the connections between their writing, carpentry, and activism. For more please visit www.josinamanumaltzman.com

Work Samples

Artist-produced image