The Latino Literary Cultures Project

What Latinos Are Reading

Friday, February 10, 2012 • 210 Humanities 1

Bringing together writers and editors, this symposium explores the conditions of possibility for US Latino literature today–its varied audiences, the kinds of literacy it presupposes or fosters. How do Latino children and young adults come to see themselves as readers or as authors? What genres and language modalities are most popular, most inventive, most effective in creating a Latino reading public? And in the wake of the controversial Tucson school district book banning, what are Latinos not reading?

Schedule:

Symposium: 1:00-3:00 pm
Readings: 3:15-5:00 pm
Followed by book signings.

Featuring:

Gustavo Arellano, journalist and editor, Orange County Weekly; author of the syndicated column and book Ask a Mexican!; and Orange County: A Personal History
Malín Alegría (Ramírez), author of three Young Adult books, and UC Santa Cruz alum
Theresa Hamman, veteran in Global and Bilingual Children’s Publishing
Moderated by Juan Poblete, UCSC Literature Department and Kresge College Provost

Gustavo Arellano

Gustavo Arellano’s ¡Ask a Mexican! column has a circulation of more than two million in thirty-eight markets (and counting). He has received the President’s Award from the Los Angeles Press Club, an Impact Award from the National Hispanic Media Coalition, and a 2008 Latino Spirit Award from the California State legislature. Arellano has appeared on the Today Show, Nightline, NPR’s Talk of the Nation, and The Colbert Report. For more information, visit AskAMexican.net.

Photograph by Matt Otto.

Malín Alegría

Malín Alegría was raised in San Francisco’s Mission District. She’s a graduate of UC Santa Barbara and received her MA in Education. She is a teacher, permaculture consultant, Aztec dancer, and performer. She’s preformed and wrote with Teatro Nopal & the WILL Collective. Malin is a member of SCBWI and TNAFA. Estrella’s Quinceñera was published by Simon & Schuster in 2006. Her second novel Sofi Mendoza’s Guide to Getting Lost in Mexico was released May 2007. Her short stories have appeared in the anthologies Once Upon a Cuento and 15 Candles: 15 Tales of Taffeta, Hairspray, Drunk Uncles, and other Quinceañera Stories.

Malín currently lives in San Jose, California where she teaches, writes, and is hard at work playing in dirt.

Welcome

The Latino Literary Cultures Project / Proyecto culturas literarias latinas is an interdisciplinary initiative at UC Santa Cruz that studies and promotes creative writing by and about U.S. Latinas and Latinos, past and present. Since 2006, it has brought students and scholars together with writers, translators, reviewers, and librarians through a major biennial conference, as well as smaller events on topics like Latinos and new media. The Project is particularly interested in the inventive uses of multiple languages; in the global circulation and translation of Latino culture; and in the ways that new forms of literacy and attention in the digital age are changing the relationship of text to visual and sound media. The Latino Literary Cultures Project is the only established research group in the U.S. with such a focus.