Kym Ragusa Explained

Kym Ragusa
Birth Name:	Kym L. Ragusa
Birth Date:	25 February 1966
Birth Place:	Manhattan, New York, U.S.
Occupation:	Writer, filmmaker, teacher
Alma Mater:	New School for Social Research Hunter College
Genre:	Nonfiction

Kym L. Ragusa (born February 25, 1966) is an American writer and documentary filmmaker based in Brooklyn, New York.

Early life and education

Ragusa was born in Manhattan, New York, to an Italian-American father and an African-American mother. Her paternal grandparents were immigrants from Messina; her maternal ancestors were brought to the United States as slaves.^[1] She spent much of her childhood living alternately with her maternal grandparents in Harlem and her paternal grandparents in Maplewood, New Jersey.^[2]

After attending public schools, Ragusa earned an M.A. in Media from the New School for Social Research. She also studied creative writing at Hunter College, where she was a student of Louise DeSalvo.

Career

Ragusa directed two award-winning short documentary films, Passing (1995) and Fuori/Outside (1997).^[3] Her other films include Demarcations, Threads of Memory, and Remembering the Triangle Fire.

Her memoir, The Skin Between Us: A Memoir of Race, Beauty, and Belonging (W. W. Norton & Co., 2006), was a finalist for the 2007 Hurston-Wright Legacy Award for nonfiction,^[4] and has been well received by critics.^{[5] [6] [7] [8]} An Italian-language edition, La pelle che ci separa, was published in 2008.^[9] Her writing has also appeared in anthologies, such as The Milk of Almonds: Italian American Women Writers on Food and Culture (2003),^[10] Personal Effects: Essays on Memoir, Teaching, and Culture in the Work of Louise DeSalvo (2014),^[11] and Are Italians White? How Race is Made in America (2012).^[12]

Much of Ragusa's artistic work explores themes of racial identity and belonging. In the foreword to Olive Grrrls: Italian North American Women & The Search For Identity (2013), Ragusa describes her uneasiness with pat answers to the question, "What are you?" and concludes that "No identity is singular, clear-cut, fixed; each is situated in histories and in daily lives that are endlessly complex."^[13]

Ragusa has taught Writing and Film Studies at Eugene Lang College and the City University of New York.

Awards

• 1995: Juror's Prize, Women in the Director's Chair, for Passing^[14]
• 1997: Best Video, South Bronx Film and Video Festival, for Fuori/Outside
• 1999: New York Foundation for the Arts film fellowship
• 2007: Hurston-Wright Legacy Award finalist for The Skin Between Us

Further reading

• Book: Giunta . Edvige . Edvige Giunta . Ashyk . Daniel . Gardaphé . Fred L. . Fred Gardaphé . Tamburri . Anthony Julian . Anthony Tamburri . Shades of Black and White: Conflict and Collaboration Between Two Communities . Italian American Studies Association . 1999 . 978-0934675437 . Figuring Race: Kym Ragusa's fuori/outside . 262–274 . 2017-12-27 . 2017-12-28 . https://web.archive.org/web/20171228000058/http://iasa.i-italy.org/ct/news/ta/publications-iasa/me/ti/shades-black-and-white-conflict-and-collaboration-between-two-com . dead .
• Book: Greene . Shelleen . Equivocal Subjects: Between Italy and Africa -- Constructions of Racial and National Identity in the Italian Cinema . A&C Black . 2012 . 9781441190437 . fuori/outside: Gender, Race, and the Italian/African American Experience . 181–184 . https://books.google.com/books?id=1tuHrEVd8ykC&pg=PA181.
• Perez, Hiram. "'It's Just Dark Outside': Kym Ragusa's Memoirs of White Flight" . Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Studies Association, October 12, 2006.

Notes and References

1. Web site: University of Minnesota . Kym Ragusa . https://web.archive.org/web/20150910224034/http://conservancy.umn.edu/bitstream/handle/11299/166310/Ragusa%2c%20Kym.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y . September 10, 2015.
2. Web site: Encyclopedia.com . Ragusa, Kym . Gale . 2009 .
3. Tenzer . Livia . Documenting Race and Gender: Kym Ragusa Discusses 'Passing' and 'Fuori/Outside' . Women's Studies Quarterly . 30 . 1/2 . 2002 . 213–220 . 40004647.
4. Web site: Hurston/Wright Foundation . Kym Ragusa . December 26, 2017.
5. Web site: . Review of The Skin Between Us . May 8, 2006 . December 26, 2017.
6. Web site: . Review of The Skin Between Us .
7. Antonucci . Clara . . Review of The Skin Between Us . 26 . 1 . 2008 . 110–111 . 41353782.
8. Book: Gennari . John . Flavor and Soul: Italian America at Its African American Edge . University of Chicago Press . 2017 . 9780226428468 . The Sounds and the Fury . 227–233 . https://books.google.com/books?id=0D0bDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA227 . Ragusa's memoir is exquisitely poignant, lyrical, and most of all - soundful: it demands a hearing from its readers..
9. Web site: Academia.edu . Baldo . Michela . Painful Italianness: Translating the (post)migrant female body . 2014 . December 26, 2017.
10. Book: DeSalvo . Louise . Louise DeSalvo . Giunta . Edvige . The Milk of Almonds: Italian American Women Writers on Food and Culture . Feminist Press at CUNY . 9781558614536 . Baked Ziti . August 2003 . 276–284 . https://books.google.com/books?id=4r9CdS8DqTEC&pg=PA276.
11. Book: Caronia . Nancy . Giunta . Edvige . Edvige Giunta . Personal Effects: Essays on Memoir, Teaching, and Culture in the Work of Louise DeSalvo . Fordham University Press . 2014 . 9780823262274 . On Vulnerability and Risk: Learning to Write and Teach Memoir as a Student of Louise DeSalvo . 105–110 . https://books.google.com/books?id=M0tGCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA105.
12. Book: Guglielmo . Jennifer . Jennifer Guglielmo . Are Italians White? How Race is Made in America . Routledge . 2012 . 9781136062421 . Sangu du Sangu: Growing Up Black and Italian in a Time of White Flight . 213–223 . https://books.google.com/books?id=82_EdI32PcYC&pg=PT12.
13. Book: Greco . Lachrista . Ragusa . Kym . Olive Grrrls: Italian North American Women & The Search For Identity . Olive Grrrl Press . 2013 . Foreword.
14. Web site: Mixed Race Studies . Kym Ragusa .