FINALISTS
WWW.PUBLISHERSWEEKLY.COM 25Jennifer N. Baker
Production editor
Teachers College Press, New York CityI
n a pay-it-forward gesture, one of last year’s honorees,
Veronica Santiago Liu, founder of Word Up book-
store, nominated Baker, whom she calls an “extraor-
dinary literary citizen.” In and out of the office, Baker
exhibits a tireless dedication to making the pub-
lishing world a better place for all voices who want
to be a part of the art or business of creating books.
“She is everywhere,” Liu says.
Baker’s day job as production editor at Teachers College
Press is only one part of her multifaceted career. She is the
creator and host of the podcast Minorities in Publishing, which
was a finalist for the 2018 Digital Book World Best Use of
Podcasting in Book Marketing Award. She is also a writer and
editor. She is a contributing editor to Electric Literature and
editor of the short story collection Everyday People: The Color
of Life—A Short Anthology (Atria). She was the recipient of the
2017 NYCSA/NYFA Artist Fellowship and a 2017 Queens
Council on the Arts New Work Grant for her in-progress essay
collection. Baker was deeply engaged for several years with
We Need Diverse Books and currently is on the volunteer staff
of the I, Too, Arts Collective, based in the Langston Hughes
House in Harlem. This past summer she conducted work-
shops at the Southampton Writers Conference in New York
State and the Emerging Writers Festival in Alexandria, Va.
It’s hard to imagine that as a 20-year-old student at
CCNY, where she earned her BA and MA in English, she
didn’t know publishing existed—until she was recruited by
David Unger for the newly established Publishing Certificate
Program. At that time, Walter Mosley was helping to fund
the program, and its goal was to get people of color into the
publishing industry, Baker explains. “I knew that books
existed, I knew books got made, and I knew that editors
existed, but I didn’t really think about it until the universe
and stars aligned. And David, knowing that I did not want
to be a teacher, asked me, ‘Well, did you ever think about
publishing?’ ” And from that moment it became Baker’s life.
“I’ve been doing it for 16 years now and really don’t see
myself anywhere else. I love being in the industry and love
the work that really speaks to our belief in what arts can do.
The archival nature of publishing is incredible.”
Baker’s official entree into the industry was an internship
at BookScan. From there she held a variety of positions at
various educational publishers including Scholastic,
Holtzbrinck, Pearson, and Cambridge University Press. But
she has found a very comfortable niche as a production editorat Teachers College Press, which is within the college itself
and publishes materials for those who are attending the
school. Unlike some larger companies, where the production
department’s purview stops at the mechanics and trafficking
of books, her department does “a deep dive into manu-
scripts,” she says.
The books range from the very specific (such as how to
create curriculum) to more political books and more trade-
focused books including graphic novels, and even some that
are “memoiresque,” Baker explains. But all pay close atten-
tion to how literacy affects marginalized children. And
Baker believes that looking at things in a very, very precise
manner, as she does in her job, allows her to ask very smart
and intuitive questions.
Her work inside the office informs her work outside of it,
where she conducts workshops on the craft and editing of
manuscripts, as well as sensitivity training. “It really
becomes an interactive experience,” she says. “You notice
how you are reading things and explore how a tone, or a
character who isn’t saying anything, makes a difference.”
Baker volunteered for We Need Diverse Books from 2014
to 2017, playing a key role in organizing panels and moving
the organization beyond its hashtag. She ended her tenure
there to work on other projects including her anthology,
other editing and writing, and most importantly her podcast,
Minorities in Publishing, which just cele-
brated its fifth anniversary in August.
The podcast came from her realiza-
tion that “if we talk about diverse
books, we also need to talk about
who the people are in the industry
who are representing or helping to
create these materials,” Baker
says. “Obviously we exist and
can find other people to talk
to.” The early list of
potential guests barely
filled a column, but as
Baker connected with
more people, it soon
became “a bevy of art-
ists and profes-
sionals.” It’s a labor of
love for Baker. “I keep
finding more people to talk
to and have genuine organic
conversations. It’s been very
fruitful not from a stand-
point of it’s about me, but
from a standpoint that they are
not alone. And that’s why I
keep doing it.” ©^ roby
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