Malavika Kannan: An Author and Activist Celebrating Women of Color
“I think we are taught that success is measured in terms of accomplishments,” Malavika Kannan says over Zoom, “and I know in the past I have very much subscribed to that, having published my first book so young, but I think that I have started to measure my success in my ability to set a precedent, in being able to open the door and hold it open for other people and to focus on ways that we can be part of a community instead of just focusing on the individual.” Malavika, who is the author of the young-adult fantasy novel The Bookweaver’s Daughter, is also an activist, a contributor for publications like Teen Vogue and the Huffington Post, and the founder of The Homegirl Project, a nonprofit organization that builds political power in girls of color. The 19-year-old tells us about her most notable projects, her creative process, and her passion for serving her community.
Malavika is currently a sophomore at Stanford University. Her experience as a college student during the pandemic has definitely been a struggle, as she, like many of us whose lives have been interrupted by COVID-19, “was not anticipating the implications of the pandemic, especially because it was [her] freshman year that got cut off.” Instead of dwelling on the negative, as she often would have done in the past, Malavika reflects on what she has gained through her time back at home. She says, “I have taken this time to focus on my creative process, myself, and giving back to the people in my community. I am a firm believer in the fact that community is not limited to participating in things that require physical contact, rather we can find a sense of community through acts of kindness, such as donating to mutual aid funds and community fridges.”
Malavika has spoken out about how she, as a writer of color, often feels immense pressure to avoid making any errors in spaces like America’s literary scene, which are historically both very white and very patriarchal. She has long coped with the intimidation of perfectionism, especially during her time in quarantine. Finding time for herself is important to her, as it helps her to destress; she finds an escape in thrifting and doing her own makeup. “I have realized that the older I get and the more I study and the more I ground myself, the more I come to terms with the fact that there is enough room for all of us, despite it being true that authors of color do face different barriers and different levels of scrutiny,” she remarks. Ultimately, she is set on the idea that everyone has the permission to grow and expand as they mature in their craft.
Malavika’s book The Bookweaver’s Daughter
The book Malavika has been working on since high school, The Bookweaver’s Daughter, has received praise from many, including Roshani Chokshi, New York Times bestselling author of The Gilded Wolves. When asked where the inspiration for her book came from, she says, “I don’t know if I can pinpoint one ‘aha’ moment, but I actually had the idea for this book when I was in fifth grade, so it has been with me for a while.” She expresses how she has been drawn to the genre of fantasy since she was a little girl, a time when she would spend her free time attempting to rewrite Indian epics. She elaborates on that, following with, “I was at that age where I was reading one book a day in elementary school so because of that I think the conditions of my mind were just right.” While she cannot pinpoint an exact moment of when she knew she had a book idea, she does know what inspired her to write it: Inkheart, a young adult fantasy novel. She cites this book as “an amalgamation of a lot of the things that I was reading at the time, not just the popular books series but also TV shows like Avatar, which inspired me to take the plunge and write my own fantasy book.”
“I have realized that the older I get and the more I study and the more I ground myself, the more I come to terms with the fact that there is enough room for all of us, despite it being true that authors of color do face different barriers and different levels of scrutiny.”
Malavika bridges her South Asian heritage with the theme of female solidarity in her book The Bookweaver’s Daughter. When asked for her thoughts on why female friendships hold such an emotional tenor for her, she explains, “I think that all the best things in my life have stemmed from female friendships. To me, female friendships are the most sacred of relationships. I think there is a real concept in female friendships of caring for each other, like a mutual self-actualization. It means being support systems for each other and being homes for each other.” Sisterhood is another form of female solidarity that is important to her, as she herself is an older sibling and enjoys filling the role of “the eternal big sister.” She wholeheartedly believes that female friendships are a core building block of the lives of powerful women. Various other talented women of color in her life have inspired her and fulfilled this role of a sister, such as Toni Morrison, Amy Tan, and her mom and sister.
Malavika’s workspace
Aside from her engagement in her literary projects, Malavika is the founder of The Homegirl Project, which she describes as “a youth led collective that builds political power and solidarity in girls of color.” She points out that although she is no longer running the organization directly, she has an outstanding team of youth who continue to lead the organization to success, and that it is still very much a significant part of her life. She has a lot to say about the organization she started when she was only 17, the same age when many of us were listening to Ed Sheeran’s “Shape of You” while avoiding biology homework. “At that time I was participating in progressive movements like March For Our Lives and the Women’s March, and it was throughout those experiences that I noticed that although there was a lot of passion amongst young people, there was not always a lot of direct investment in leadership,” Malavika recalls. In other words, she saw a need for a space in which girls of color could build those soft and hard skills, learn from each other, and share resources with one another. She expresses her content with The Homegirl Project’s success, saying, “Although we are a pretty small collective, in 2019 we managed to do a fellowship where we got 11 girls from across the country and did a training program where they all worked with mentors and started projects in their communities.” Initially, her goal was to level the playing field and create a world where girls of color are given the voice, the space, and the power to do what needs to be done while advocating for their communities, but in a larger sense she says her goal for the organization “is a question about dismantling and restructuring who gets power by giving girls tangible tools and a digital space where they can do political work.”
“I think that all the best things in my life have stemmed from female friendships. To me, female friendships are the most sacred of relationships. I think there is a real concept in female friendships of caring for each other, like a mutual self-actualization. It means being support systems for each other and being homes for each other.”
As an ardent political activist who has worked with organizations like the Women’s March, March For Our Lives, Giffords, and Slam Gun Violence, Malavika stresses that our votes this past election will influence the future of policies surrounding extremely pressing issues, such as gun violence, climate change, and mass incarceration. At the same time, she also notes her struggle with understanding the merits of the current systems of government in place, “We have these systems that we work within, an electoral process that we try our best to sway in our favor, and a system of government that was built to not work in our favor, like the way the Supreme Court is built to the point that the rights of so many women rest on the shoulders of one 87 year-old woman.” In her opinion, instead of promoting a somewhat flawed system (which nothing short of radical alteration can fix), she would rather take direct care of her community by doing something as simple as Venmoing or Cashapping donations. To Malavika, “It is important to use these resources that are not dependent on election results to be able to put food on our neighbors' tables.” She considers that kind of service a symbol of hope, as it is immune to the frenzy of politics.
What has brought Malavika hope is working on pieces in isolation. She discusses her thoughts on how to handle the demand to be productive during this challenging time. “The inner-capitalism in our brains is telling us that we have to maximize it (free time),” she says. She remembers coming across tweets at the beginning of quarantine that said something along the lines of at the beginning of the plague, Shakespeare wrote King Lear, so what are you gonna do? and her response is the following: “I think at some point I would have subscribed to that, but not anymore. I won’t say my writing process has taken a hit but it has definitely changed. I find that an important part of the creative process is people and stimulation, and we are not getting that right now, but we need to remember that this isn’t a writer’s retreat, this is a pandemic. I definitely went through phases at the beginning of quarantine where I was like ready to write the next great American novel, but now I have become a lot more content with waiting and thinking and being a sponge.”
STORY SOPHIE MONTALBAN
PHOTOS MALAVIKA KANNAN