Justin Douglas Chapman (born September 21, 1985) is an American author and journalist,[1] actor, musician, and politician.
He currently serves as District 6 Council Liaison/Field Representative to Pasadena City Councilmember and former Vice Mayor Steve Madison.
[5] He is the son of Sharon F. Green, a teacher in the Pasadena Unified School District, and Howard D. Chapman III, a handyman and computer programmer.
Chapman graduated from the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts (LACHSA), where he majored in Theatre.
Chapman served as Secretary on the American Civil Liberties Union Southern California Pasadena Foothills Chapter board of directors for five years.
Justin Chapman's memoir is a perfect metaphor for contemporary American youth, painfully trying to work through its own baggage, and openly and sincerely seeking to engage with the world beyond the USA's established physical and cultural borders.
Along the way, he narrowly escaped being locked away in a mental institution, visited an impoverished township that is changing its future with the help of an art-based nonprofit, got into a life-threatening car crash, explored the mystical island of Zanzibar, lived with a group of Catholic priests, witnessed a witchcraft healing ceremony, discovered a pygmy opium den, and chased down riveting stories with a local journalist.
He crossed cultural boundaries, found love and companionship in unusual places, and stared death — with all its visceral stench and gore — directly in the eyeballs.
By embarking on a journey of self-discovery and survival, Chapman explores what Africa really has to offer, and in the process, discovers surprising and unexpected relationships between people and places."