Wannabe

"Aisha Harris has made a name for herself as someone you can turn to for an engaging and incisive take on whatever new show or movie everyone is talking about, or should be taking about - first at Slate, then at the Times, and recently as a co-host of NPR's popular Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast. Here, she turns her analytical talents inward, reflecting on the culture that raised her into the person and thinker she is today. In essays that span the personal and political, the high-brow and low, she contrasts the formative touchstones of her 90s childhood with both iconic precursors and more recent sensations to analyse the various tropes that have shaped her heart and mind. Aisha's observations invite us into her family, her adolescence, her relationships, her work. In the opening essay, an interaction with Chance the Rapper prompts an investigation into the origin myth of her name that becomes an ode to Stevie Wonder, Roots, and her parents"--Provided by publisher.