CONTRIBUTOR SPOTLIGHT:
Interview with Jennifer Riggan

Rappahannock Review Fiction Editors: Bill Gates Wants to Take You to America” focuses on the battle Kiflom has with wanting to stay with his family but also giving his students the reins to say what they want, where he can’t have both. What made you want to write about this conflict?

Jennifer Riggan: I’m not sure I’d describe the conflict in exactly that way. We often think of decisions people make to migrate or flee in terms of “push” or “pull” factors. For example, refugees are often thought of as being “pushed” by war or political conditions and migrants are thought of as being “pulled” by the chance to have a better life.  As a person who researches refugees and migration, I’m troubled by this. Thinking of push and pull in binary terms is a problem because the political, economic and social conditions that shape a decision to migrate from or flee one’s home are very complex. This story is intended to challenge the idea that there is a distinction between “push” and “pull” factors. The story is trying to show the complex ways that these factors interact. Like most of us, Kiflom is dedicated to his family and has absolutely no desire to migrate or flee from the place he calls home. He’s mostly just living his life—raising his kid, teaching in a way that he thinks will inspire his students, trying to support his brother and keep him safe. But through no fault of his own, he finds himself being overtaken by events outside his control. I don’t think Kiflom thought of his dedication to family and his desire to be a good teacher as being in conflict with each other and yet circumstances made this the case. 

RR: The idea that celebrities manifest if you talk about them is interesting, seen more specifically when Kiflom meets Bill Gates. What inspired you to create this idea?

JR: This story is, at its root, based on my ethnographic research in Eritrea. When I was doing ethnographic research in schools over twenty years ago, teachers created these amazing, interactive activities for their students. One of those was for students to write letters to Bill Gates. In my research, this teacher was in no danger and no one was paying attention to what was happening in his classroom. My research took place long before Eritrea became a place that large numbers of people migrated from. Many years later, I wanted to write a story that challenged our assumptions about the push-pull factors in migration and refugee flight and I started thinking about the Bill Gates letter writing assignment and the way that might serve as a sort of lure by setting up an idea of the United States as a place where you can gain wealth (the classic “pull” factor). 

RR: There is a repetition seen throughout the story that shows the progressively worsening state Kiflom finds himself in. Why did you choose this method when writing this story?

JR: That’s such an interesting question. I didn’t realize how much repetition there was until you asked it! I think the attention to repetition comes from my ethnographic training. When you do ethnographic research you show up every day and observe and make note of a lot of things that may seem meaningless—and repetitive— at first, but then you start to notice things changing, sometimes in subtle ways, sometimes in dramatic ways. It might be the small signs of the stress people are under, or the way a routine or a reaction shifts. Kiflom’s situation shifts through the story. Things get worse. We see how both his circumstances are changing and how this changes him by paying attention to his everyday routine, the places he visits every day, the conversations he has.

RR: As a department chair and professor of historical and political studies, were you influenced by those studies to write this piece or was there something outside of your work that inspired you?

JR: As I’ve mentioned above, a lot of my fiction has its root in my research on the region where this story is set but also on refugees, militarization, education, and governance. When we write up academic books and articles, they tend to only reach academic audiences, so I’ve been experimenting with other forms of writing. My hope is that writing fiction might allow me to reach an audience who might not have any interest in reading an academic article or books. Writing fiction also allows us to tell stories that are in many ways more honest than what “data” can tell us. Most of the time, my fiction is a sort of collage of different moments from different pieces of research. This particular story draws on material from one piece of research, knowledge of a particularly political context, but also thinking about what motivates migration and refugee flight from a different piece of research

RR: Why did you choose Bill Gates?

JR: I can’t take credit for Bill Gates who was inspired by one of the teachers I met during my research, but I am constantly struck by how different iconic figures show up in different parts of the world (especially pre-internet) and what they mean to people. Bill Gates is an icon of international success. He’s known as a self-made man. But he’s also a philanthropist whose work is known worldwide. He’s very visible internationally. People also think of him as kind of emotionally inaccessible compared to other kinds of celebrities, which makes his appearing in person unexpected. I kind of liked the idea of bringing him into this place where he clearly didn’t belong, bringing him into Kiflom’s world.