Jaswinder Bolina Explained

Jaswinder Bolina (born 1978) is an American poet and essayist.

Early life and education

Jaswinder Bolina was born in 1978 in Chicago, Illinois, in the United States.[1] He received an undergraduate B.A. in philosophy from Loyola University in Chicago, and was awarded a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing by the University of Michigan, and a Ph.D. in English (concentrating on creative writing) from Ohio University.[1]

Career

As of June 2023, Bolina was is an associate professor on the creative writing faculty in the Department of English Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Miami,[2] where he has taught in the MFA program.[1]

Writing corpus

As of the 2020's, Bolina was known as a poet and an essayist.[3] His full-length poetry collections include Carrier Wave (2007); Phantom Camera (2013), which won the Green Rose Prize in Poetry from New Issues Poetry & Prose;[1] and The 44th of July (2019).[4] He is also the author of the chapbook The Tallest Building in America (2014), and of a book of essays, Of Color (2020).[5] As of June 2023, Bolina's poetry volume, "English as a Second Language and Other Poems," was described as forthcoming, from Copper Canyon Press.[6] As of 2019, his poems were being published on the Poetry Society of America's website.[7]

Bolina is featured in Joshua Marie Wilkinson's Poets on Teaching, in a chapter entitled, "What I Tell Them," which begins

I'd like to tell them there are too many poets. I'd like to tell them we don't need any more and don't need any more competition. Too many throbbing bodies, not enough room in the bed. I'd like to tell them, you should go to other departments. You should go to the other department and become exquisite bankers future in-laws will favor. You matter too little, and anyway there isn't any place for poetry. You know too little, what are you doing here? / I don't say these things, though I think sometimes I should. ...[8]

Further reading

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Bolina, Jaswinder & Poetry Foundation Staff . Jaswinder Bolina . Poetry Foundation . 22 May 2020 . [Quote] Born in Chicago, poet Jaswinder Bolina earned a BA in philosophy from Loyola University in Chicago, an MFA in creative writing from the University of Michigan, and a PhD in English with a creative writing concentration from Ohio University. He is the author of the chapbook The Tallest Building in America (2014), and the poetry collections The 44th of July (2019), Carrier Wave (2007), winner of the 2006 Colorado Prize for Poetry, and Phantom Camera (2013), which won the Green Rose Prize in Poetry from New Issues Press and was published in an international edition by Hachette India. / Compared to poets as diverse as John Ashbery, James Tate, and Dean Young, Bolina investigates language, experience, and innovative writing. Poet Ravi Shankar, writing on The Best American Poetry blog, noted that Bolina "breaks new perceptual and sonic ground," adding "he encapsulates the American South Asian immigrant experience, at least as I've experienced it." / Bolina was the 2010–2011 Elma Stuckey Liberal Arts & Sciences Emerging Poet-in-Residence at Columbia College in Chicago. He is the author of the collection of essays Of Color (2020). His critical and creative writing has been included in The Task of Un/Masking (2014), Language: A Reader for Writers (2013), Best American Poetry (2011), and Poets on Teaching: A Sourcebook (2010). Bolina currently teaches in the MFA program at the University of Miami. .
  2. Web site: Bolina, Jaswinder . 2023-06-17 . Jaswinder Bolina . People . English.AS.Miami.edu. 2023-06-17 . [Quote] Jaswinder Bolina is author of Phantom Camera (Green Rose Prize, New Issues Press and Hachette 2013) and Carrier Wave (Colorado Prize, Center for Literary Publishing, Colorado State University 2007). His poems have appeared widely in national and international literary journals and in the Best American Poetry series. His essays have appeared at the Poetry Foundation dot org and The Huffington Post; in magazines including The State and The Writer; and in the anthologies Poets on Teaching (University of Iowa Press 2011), Language: A Reader for Writers (Oxford University Press 2013), The Task of Un/Masking (University of Georgia Press 2014), and The Force of What's Possible (Nightboat Books 2014).. For the departmental affiliation, see also this webpage.
  3. Web site: Melwani, Lavina . Indian-Americans in Wonderland: A Book Universe Highlights Desi Immigrant Tales in New York . CNBCTV18.com . 1 November 2019 . 22 May 2020 .
  4. News: Teicher, Craig . "I Reject Walls": A 2019 Poetry Preview . 3 September 2019 . NPR.
  5. Web site: Stewardship Report Staff . 16 October 2019 . Wonderland@IAAC Literary Festival This Weekend Oct 19-20 in NYC . StewardshipReport.com . 22 May 2020 . November 26, 2019 . https://web.archive.org/web/20191126054515/http://www.stewardshipreport.com/wonderlandiaac-literary-festival-opens-this-weekend/ . dead .
  6. News: Bolina, Jaswinder . June 14, 2023 . What a Dad Wearing a Brash Hat Taught Me About Fear and Fatherhood . June 17, 2023 . The Washington Post. The biographical material presented about his upcoming book, drawn from this source, was material provided by The Washington Post in a biographical header to the autobiographical article, and fact-checking of that header is presumed.
  7. Web site: Bolina, Jaswinder . 2019-08-04 . In Their Own Words: "Pornograph, with Americana" . . 2019-08-04.
  8. Book: Bolina, Jaswinder . Wilkinson, Joshua Marie . 2010 . Poets on Teaching: A Sourcebook . What I Tell Them . 267–269 . University of Iowa Press . 9781587299049 .