A review of author Nikesh Shukla’s new book; Brown Baby: A Memoir of Race, Family and Home
By Aaliyah Shaikh
South Asian author and screenwriter, Nikesh Shukla is a huge advocate of using his voice to express diversity. His raw and compelling new book ‘Brown Baby: A Memoir of Race, Family and Home’ is both a manual to his two young daughters, with chapters like ‘How to talk to you about the end of the world’ and ‘How to talk to about your skin colour’ and a love letter to his mum. Sincere, honest, and funny, this book is definitely a great read that will have you invested and hooked right from the start. To celebrate the release of the book, I attended a live stream which was an informal conversation between Nikesh and south Asian journalist Anita Rani exploring the many themes throughout the book. They discussed personal struggles, what ‘home’ means to each individual, and the many ways to navigate parenting.
The book is subsumed by Nikesh’ grief as he struggles to deal with the loss of his mother. You can feel him grappling to comprehend her passing in all of his actions because she was the glue that held the family together with her signature dishes and her singing voice. He opens his heart up about his relationship with food and becomes transparent with the reader about his negative eating habits. During the live stream, Anita asks Nikesh how he dealt with what was essentially an eating disorder. Shocked, he says, “I have never really thought of it like that”. He explains how he knew he liked food and used it to help himself deal with pain and struggle. The ‘signature’ dishes his mum would make and the snacks she would always have stacked up in cupboards all contributed to his childhood experiences with food. When his mum passed, he highlighted how comfort eating through grief and loss, affected his daughter’s perception of him. In his book, Nikesh takes us on a humorous and heart-breaking journey with food and his health.
Also in the book, following his mother’s death, Nikesh examines how he will now raise his daughters without her support and advice, as he is left to navigate through this foreign world as a parent. In particular, Nikesh talks about gender roles and what being a “woke feminist dad” really means to him and how he will raise his daughters in a world where sexism still very much exists.
His five-year-old daughter, whom he refers to as ‘Ganga’, is a mixed-race girl living in today’s society, and he replays stories of how he lived in a traditional brown household and how she will have different experiences. Nikesh illustrates with humour and frustration how her race will pose struggles with identity, inclusion, and perception both of herself and how others see her. This is especially evident when she says, “I want to be white like mummy”. The questions surrounding the ‘white lifestyle’ brown people so badly want, is something Nikesh ponders upon and wonders whether his daughter will fall into this way of thinking. In this way, he discusses how skin colour plays an important part in perception and appearance, with the traditional mindset touting that being fairer makes you appear more attractive - a perception many of us may know too well.
Whether you are a parent or not, this book will relate to you in some way because beyond parenting, Nikesh discusses the very prominent issues of racism and cultural boundaries and how he has learnt to deal with these issues as he has gotten older. He debates what it means to be ‘British’ given his own experiences with brown skin. As well as being south Asian, he also looks at how other ethnic minorities subconsciously acknowledge each other with ‘The Nod’ which is probably something you have done before but not realised, and Nikesh paints an hilarious image of this.
During the live stream, Nikesh also discussed with readers all over the world, how we can find hope and even joy in a world that is racist, sexist, and facing a climate crisis. More importantly, he highlights how you prepare your children for it, but also fill their life with all the limitlessness and excitement that they deserve, and that life has to offer. Ultimately, Nikesh leaves us with thoughts of hopes, dreams, and togetherness giving a soft end to the book.
Surprisingly, with the book being mainly addressed to his daughters, he said in the stream “I feel like if I raised my daughters right, they won’t need to read it!”. As many parents know, there are innumerable fears and thoughts around raising kids in the world right now but, Nikesh so brilliantly points out that despite all of this, raising your children to be the best people they can be, will ultimately help them navigate and tackle the world the best way they know how to. Whether you are a new parent, dealing with the loss of a loved one or feeling a little lost in this perplexing world, this book offers advice, laughs and comfort in the most unusual of ways.
To support the release of ‘Brown Baby: A Memoir of Race, Family and Home’, Nikesh has also recently started a podcast called ‘Brown Baby’. The first episode aired in January of this year. A parenting podcast, in it Nikesh sits down with famous guests to discuss how they raise their kids with joy in an uncertain world. The guests are far ranging, from writers and musicians to chefs and comedians and are fellow parents of brown babies. They discuss the highs and lows of parenting and as is imaginable, is a funny, honest, and comforting podcast, through which Nikesh hopes to discourage listeners from those endless Google searches for answers. With each guest, there is a new experience, as no two parents are the same.
In one episode he talks with singer Jay Sean about how he taught his kids about his fame and how he has a different relationship with his career and image now that he has children. Jay explains how his main focus with parenting is to teach his kids to be humble, polite, and respectful, but also to crack jokes with them. Having fun with your kids, but still having them respect you is a huge issue in parenting so Nikesh looks at how boundaries can be established. Jay and Nikesh share anecdotes about the brutal honesty of kids and how Jay strategically picks out his songs using his daughter’s skills! Children tend to force parents to look at themselves differently and the theme of masculinity is brought up in this episode. Traditionally, masculinity is viewed as being strong, powerful and the inability to show emotion to others. Nikesh and Jay both consider how having children has made them more vulnerable and aware of both their masculinity and femininity, especially with both dads having daughters. The honesty of kids has helped them embrace their emotions and understand them further. This episode, amongst many others with the likes of Nadiya Hussain and Himesh Patel are a captivating and fun listen. The podcast is available on Acast, Apple Podcasts and Spotify so definitely check it out and have a listen!