Tessa Hulls presented on her graphic memoir “Feeding Ghosts.”
Tessa Hulls, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of “Feeding Ghosts: A Graphic Memoir,” held a writers’ workshop and lecture last Friday in Kemper as part of Mixed Heritage Awareness Week (MHAW). Hulls spoke on her struggles with her mixed identity, gender roles in American society, and how she uses graphic novels to express her emotions and life story.
Drawing inspiration from her own family history, Hulls explored how she expresses her identity as an individual of both Chinese and American heritage through her work. She connected this to how widespread polarization today enforces binaries.
“Being mixed in America is a constant sociology experiment. In a culture obsessed with forcing binaries, where does someone with a foot in both worlds and a home in neither fit in? If perspective depends on where you stand, and you stand in multiple places, then you can’t help but think about the big picture. We’re living in a moment where polarization has become extreme to a point that sometimes feels hopeless. We live in a moment where we see us versus them, black and white,” said Hulls.
Hugo Appen ’27, a student attendee of Hull’s talk and a board member of Andover’s mixed heritage affinity group, MOSAIC, expressed that his experiences with his ethnic identity mirrored Hulls’. Appen pointed to language as a potential barrier.
“Her experience as an Asian person in the United States [resonated with me], [as well as] a lot of the anecdotes about being mixed and how she felt outside of a box. I found her story similar to my mom’s, because my grandmother immigrated from China as well. Especially the parts where she wrote about language and how learning Mandarin served as a way for her to try and break down these barriers of cultural acceptance. That was relatable because sometimes because I don’t speak Mandarin, [and] that’s been something that has kept me as an outsider,” said Appen.
In her memoir, Hulls described her perseverance in fighting stereotypical gender roles through her adventures. She biked through America, Ghana, Mexico, Cuba, and Alaska on her own, a feat she felt was a testament to her strength and femininity.
“Every day, someone would tell me the same thing, [that] a woman can’t travel alone. My own life didn’t carry enough weight to serve as a counterargument. These days, when someone tells me what a woman can’t do, I feel methodically researched glee over getting to prove them very, very wrong,” wrote Hulls in her memoir.
Stephanie Curci, Instructor in English and an attendee, explained that she particularly enjoyed how femininity played a role in Hulls’ story. Curci shared her appreciation for how Hulls’ family dynamics echoed her own.
“I loved her stories of the adventures [Hulls referenced] to give presentations about these early feminist adventures. The thing that resonated with me the most was the female lineage of being a daughter of a mother who has her own struggles that are not intertwined with her own mother’s struggles, and [who’s] figuring that piece out. I have some mental health issues in my family, so that part resonated with me. What one’s responsibility is and what it means to care for somebody with those issues,” said Curci.
Francesca Dizon ’26, Co-President of MOSAIC, helped to coordinate several events for MHAW, including the selection of Tessa Hulls as a speaker. As an artist herself, she highlighted where she found inspiration in Hulls’ work.
“I asked [Hulls] about why it’s important for her to create art and also write. I mostly turn to art because I feel as though I can’t express many of these facets of my identity through language, whereas she says that the way that she operates is through language. She only feels as though she can fully understand something when she can understand how to put words to it, and that’s definitely a very rigorous process… That’s very inspiring, and I can look to her to push myself in my practice further,” said Dizon.
