A review by fantasynovel
Talk Like a Man by Nisi Shawl

4.0

I enjoyed these stories, but I thought the best chapters in this collection were the essay and the interview. I was super interested in everything Nisi Shawl had to say about science fiction and science, Ifa and religion, especially when they spoke about Ifa's social technologies, including altars, music, and offerings. "Viewing Ifa more as a spiritual practice, a cultural and social milieu, than as a theoretical construct of the cosmos, it's possible to see certain of its elements as social tools, as parts of a social technology" (89). I was also drawn to the Afrofuturism conversation, and I wish that there had been more time dedicated to that. The next Shawl work I read will be Writing the Other.