Daniel Chacón (writer)
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Daniel Chacón | |
|---|---|
 Chacón at AWP 2017 | |
| Born | 1962 (age 62–63) Fresno, California, U.S. |
| Occupation | Writer, educator |
| Language | English |
| Nationality | American |
| Education | California State University, Fresno (BA) University of Oregon (MFA) |
| Genres | Fiction, Chicano literature |
| Notable awards | American Book Awards Hudson Prize PEN Oakland Award |
Daniel Chacón (born 1962) is a Chicano short story writer, novelist, essayist, editor, professor, and radio host based in El Paso, Texas.[1] He chairs the University of Texas at El Paso creative writing graduate program, the country's only bilingual MFA program.[2] He founded the Chicano Writers and Artists Association with Fresno State classmate and close friend Andrés Montoya in 1985.[3][4][5]
Chacón was born and raised in Fresno, California; his father was from El Paso, Texas.[1][6] One of his brothers is writer Kenneth Robert Chacón, from whom he was estranged for many years.[7][8] He earned a BA in political science from California State University, Fresno and an MFA in fiction writing from the University of Oregon.[2][9][10] While at CSU, he wrote for the campus newspaper La Voz de Aztlan.[9]
Career
Chacón joined the MFA program at University of Texas at El Paso as an assistant professor in Creative Writing in 2000[11] and has been the department chair since 2017.[12] Since 2011, he has co-hosted the KTEP show Words on a Wire; his original co-host was Benjamin Alire Sáenz and is now Tim Z. Hernandez.[13][9] Guests include Alison Hawthorne Deming, Francisco Aragón, and Garrett Hongo.[14] He serves at the assistant director of the Alisa Ann Ruch Burn Foundation and was appointed chair for the International Association of Burn Camps' Board of Directors in 2018,[15] and is part of the Southwest Festival of the Written Word's advisory board.[16]
He has also edited several books, including A Jury of Trees (a posthumous collection of poetry by Andrés Montoya) (2017), The Last Supper of Chicano Heroes: The Selected Work of José Antonio Burciaga (2008; with Mimi Reisel Gladstein) and Colón-ization: The Posthumous Poems of Andrés Montoya (2017).[17][18][19] His writing has also appeared in several anthologies: Caliente: The Best Erotic Writing in Latin American Fiction (2002), Lengua Fresca: Latinos Writing on the Edge (2006), and Best of the West 2009: New Stories from the West Side of the Missouri (2009), among others.[20] Journals that have published his work include ZYZZYVA, Americas Review, Bilingual Review, Colorado Review, New England Review, and Callaloo.[21] He also dabbles in playwrighting, standup, and poetry.[22][23]
Personal life
Awards and honors
Chacón has received a grant from the Christopher Isherwood Foundation[26] and was inducted into the Texas Institute of Letters in 2019.[27]
| Year | Book | Award Name | Award Body | Reference |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2000 | Godoy Lives | Peter and Jean de Maine Award for an Emerging Writer in Fiction | Clackamas Literary Review | [28][17] |
| 2007 | Unending Rooms | Hudson Prize | Black Lawrence Press | [17] |
| 2009 | The Last Supper of Chicano Heroes: Selected Works of José Antonio Burciaga | American Book Awards | Before Columbus Foundation | [29] |
| 2014 | Hotel Juárez | PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Literary Award | PEN Oakland | [30] |
| Tejas Award for Best Book of Fiction | National Association of Chicana and Chicano Studies | [31] | ||
