Shannon Luders-Manuel

Critical Mixed Race Scholar and Writer

Hollywood, California

I am a master's graduate and freelance writer living in Los Angeles. My primary focus is on issues related to race, representation, and equality. I provide high quality content in many forms, including academic, op-ed, personal essay, and profiles. I also work as a freelance editor, content editor, sensitivity reader, and content writer for individual and corporate clients.

Shannon Luders-Manuel

Critical Mixed Race Scholar and Writer

Hollywood, California

House of Mirrors: Jordan Peele’s Us Reflects My Split Selves
As I drift to sleep, I wonder who the real me is and who’s the imposter.
The Offing
Rediscovering My Father
One night in 2001, newly married and in my first real apartment, I pulled out my grandma’s vintage leather suitcase. Its handle was long gone, but I used it to store hundreds of old photos. I searched through each photo and negative, hoping I might find a double of the one good picture of my dad and me.
The New York Times
Featured
My Grandmother’s Story Is Ending as Mine Begins
My grandmother knew she’d succumb to dementia long before she began to lose her memory, as her two older sisters had shared the same fate before they died. She fought against time to write her life story, but she will never see her dream realized. My grandfather, who died before I was born, knew there was something special about her.
The New York Times
The “Tragic Mulatta” of Bridgerton
While colorblind casting increases opportunities for diverse casts, colorblindness after casting can result in the perpetuation of stereotypes.
JSTOR Daily
Shannon Luders-Manuel MY HERO Portfolio
Stories written by MY HERO Story Director & General Editor Shannon Luders-Manuel
The MY HERO Project
Featured
Of Morgan Freeman, gods and monsters: Men are human, not either saintly or irredeemable
Morgan Freeman recently found himself on the #MeToo list, accused of sexual misconduct. As expected, responses generally landed in two categories: horrified belief and staunch disbelief.
New York Daily News
Featured
Being Biracial: Where Our Secret Worlds Collide: Educators' Guide
Being Biracial: Educators’ Guide now brings the topic to the classroom in a bold examination of race, including considered portraits of current figures from the multiracial community and a section of questions relating directly to the essays within the original book, with ample space for note-taking. Students are encouraged to re-examine these issues in new and thought-provoking ways, giving all aspects of the subject some vital air time at a key point in their academic development.
Coquí Press
Books
Captive America: Smart, Rowlandson and the Colonial Sentiment
In 1682, Mary Rowlandson published The Sovereignty and Goodness of God, which documented her kidnapping by neighboring Native Americans in New England. Over three centuries later in 2003, Ed and Lois Smart published their own captivity narrative about the kidnapping of their daughter Elizabeth Smart in Salt Lake City by a homeless religious zealot.
AmeriQuests
Featured
Meet Gabrielle Gorman: Filmmaker and YoungArts Winner
Earlier this year, Gabrielle Gorman was named one of only seven U.S. filmmakers to be selected as a YoungArts winner, one of the most prestigious awards in the country. Her experimental film Dear America hauntingly touches on body image and race through the medium of improvised narration. Toward the beginning of the film, she intimately tells the viewer, “I remember thinking about cutting all of my skin off, in hopes that the skin that would grow would be pale skin.”.
Essence Magazine
The Simple Trick That Helps Me Feel Grateful (Even on Bad Days)
I’m a positive person, but I’ve never been one for affirmations and I cringe at motivational calendars. But here's something that does work for me—and maybe it will work for you, too.
Real Simple
Shades of Beige: Shannon Luders-Manuel Interviews Tara Betts
TARA BETTS IS a professor, author, and award-winning poet who most recently co-edited the anthology The Beiging of America: Personal Narratives About Being Mixed Race in the Twenty-First Century, along with Cathy J. Schlund-Vials and Sean Patrick Forbes. The anthology, published by 2Leaf Press, is the third in the series “Explorations in Diversity.”.
Los Angeles Review of Books
The Complicated Relationship Between a Daughter and a Father with Substance Use Disorder
Every June, the card section of any store becomes dangerous. Blue becomes the dominant color — not just for graduation, but for Father’s Day. The aisle is marked by commercial masculinity: Boxy shapes, straight edges, images of beer cans and lawnmowers and collared shirts with ties. Letters form words that speak to protection and sacrifice.
The Temper
Friendship Deeper than Politics
Spring of 2018, my high school best friend Pamela and I happened to see each other for the first time in 15 years on the 18th anniversary of the Columbine massacre. Students across the country walked out to protest gun violence, and the school where Pamela teaches had closed for the day in response.
Medium
When a Moment of Solidarity Turns Into Friendship
Last July, I drove down from bustling Los Angeles to sleepy—and very white—Carlsbad, on assignment. I was hired to record a Black man’s life story and was chosen because I’m half-Black. I had some time to kill before the interview, so I stopped in the local Starbucks, ready to plop myself down for an hour of exhaustion and relative boredom.
DAME Magazine
Media Representation and Interracial Couples
A recent hate crime against a white teen and her black boyfriend in North Carolina served as a reminder that people in interracial relationships, especially adolescents, still experience prejudice. Historically, interracial couples have faced numerous attacks, sometimes even from their own government.
JSTOR Daily
Inheriting My Grandma's Crèche Keeps Us Connected
Last Christmas was my first since my grandma died. I couldn’t bring myself to take down the framed, sepia photo of her as a young woman to put up my small, fake Christmas tree. She seemed happy next to my dad — two smiling souls who now lived in my bones, but not in their own. While I kept the unplanned shrine on top of the dresser, I dug into the depths of my closet for the tattered box that reads, “Covered Wagon,” a holdover from my grandpa who passed away before I was born.
Ravishly

About

Shannon Luders-Manuel

Proofreading

Resume Building

Curriculum Writing

Editing

Content Writing

Book Reviewing

Academic Writing

Blogging

Teaching

Personal Essay

Resumes and Cover Letters

Tutoring

Ghostwriting

Lecturing

Public Speaking

Content Editing

ghostwriting

Sensitivity Reading

I work as a critical mixed race scholar and writer, through both academic and creative publications. With a background in such diverse areas as rhetoric, linguistics and creative writing, my work encapsulates a variety of writing styles, and my interests are likewise varied.

I was named Southern Oregon University's best graduate of the past 10 years by the college's linguistics professor. I then went on to receive my Masters in English Literature, where I produced an 80+ page thesis on the "tragic mulatta" genre. I have a scholarly publication in Vanderbilt University's online journal AmeriQuests, and I presented my SOU capstone paper on dictionary history at the Southeastern Conference on Linguistics.

In 2014, I was a featured writer at the Mixed Remixed Festival in Los Angeles for an in-progress memoir about taking care of my father at the end of life. In June 2016, my commissioned book "Being Biracial: Where Our Secret Worlds Collide: Educators' Guide" was published to accompany an anthology of the same name, published in 2015. I have also had the honor of writing profiles about Olympic open-water swimmer Lynne Cox and YoungArts winner and filmmaker Gabrielle Gorman.

I am passionate about using language to bridge divides between races and cultures and to connect with others on a personal level.