Join Sarah Smarsh at the Sydney Opera House for All About Women. In her session ‘Dirt Poor in America’, Smarsh discusses her experience growing up poor and female in America, and her new book Heartland.
The daughter of Kansas farmers, Smarsh grew up amongst the working poor in America's Midwest. Teenage mothers, chewing tobacco, the smell of oil and sweat. Her work of non-fiction, Heartland, is a vibrant picture of the working class, but also a sharp argument on the failure of the American dream. As the daughter of a teenage mother who was the daughter of a teenage mother; Smarsh considers how intergenerational poverty affects women in particular, and how she managed to break the cycle.
With compassion, humour and insight, Smarsh celebrates the American working class, while considering the role of her community in shaping of her country. Don't miss this amazing session which links economic and political realities with individual lives.
About the author
Sarah Smarsh has covered socioeconomic class, politics, and public policy for The Guardian, The New York Times, NewYorker.com, Harpers.org, The Texas Observer, and many others. She recently was a Joan Shorenstein Fellow at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government. A former professor of nonfiction writing, Smarsh is a frequent speaker on economic inequality and related media narratives. She lives in Kansas. Heartland is her first book.
Read an extract from Heartland here.
