Every Day is Magic: Ada Limón
In her 2015 collection, Bright Dead Things, a National Book Award finalist for poetry, Ada Limón writes of moving to Kentucky: “Confession: I did not want to live here.” It’s perhaps not a surprising sentiment coming from a coastally oriented person who was raised in Northern California, attended college in Seattle, and then spent over a decade in New York City.
But Limón and her husband, Lucas, have been in Lexington for seven years now and the effects of settling into this place are noticeable in her new book, The Carrying (Milkweed, Aug.). It’s a phenomenally lively and attentive collection replete with the trappings of living a little closer to nature. While Bright Dead Things is marked by a preponderance of light, such as images of fireflies and neon signs, The Carrying features numerous appearances by various trees, birds, and beetles. Limón also demonstrates a greater willingness to be explicit in naming colors, particularly green. “It’s crazy green, the whole book,” she says. “Lexington is the greenest place I’ve ever lived.” Similarly, where in Bright Dead Things, Limón tells a lot of stories and anecdotes, in The Carrying she is very present in her thoughts and experiences.
As it turns out, these shifts in focus have another, altogether unexpected source. While putting Bright Dead Things together, Limón was diagnosed with chronic vestibular neuronitis, which can cause bouts of vertigo. “If I’m really having vertigo, it’s pretty intense and I really have to focus,”
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4 Academic Agency in Ya Novels by Mexican American Women Authors
V Canales – Gender (ed) Identities: Critical Readings of Gender …, 2016 – books.google.com
The theme of academic achievement intention in contemporary young adult literature (YAL)
by Mexican American women authors demonstrates seizing power previously denied to
Mexican American youth and adolescents. A century ago, children of Mexican origin in the …
Link to book preview
4 Academic Agency in Ya Novels by Mexican American Women Authors
V Canales – Gender (ed) Identities: Critical Readings of Gender …, 2016 – books.google.com
The theme of academic achievement intention in contemporary young adult literature (YAL)
by Mexican American women authors demonstrates seizing power previously denied to
Mexican American youth and adolescents. A century ago, children of Mexican origin in the …
Link to article
Young Latina Poet’s Ode to Her Heritage Goes Viral
Xochitl Morales may be young, but she learned early to use her voice to highlight her community and culture. Through poetry, the sixteen year old demonstrates what it means to be a Mexican American. Her video poem, titled “Latino-Americanos: The Children of An Oscuro Pasado” addresses her cultural identity.
The video went viral and has been shared widely on Facebook and other social media, as well as by Latino sites. The poem is a response to Donald Trump’s comments about Mexicans in the U.S. “My culture is important, although it wasn’t always accepted. This poem is a call to action, it a reminder to never forget where you come from” Morales said…
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CantoMundo – celebration of Latino poetry is moving to New York
For the past five years, audiences in Austin have been able to enjoy public readings of CantoMundo, a national organization of Latino poets and poetry.
But this may be the last year CantoMundo is held in Austin, where they will hold two public readings July 22 and 23. Next year, it is moving to New York, where one of the founders, Deborah Paredez, recently accepted a professorship. The retreat may be held again in Austin in the future, but that’s uncertain…
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2 Brilliantly Written Novels From Mexico Head Up A Wave Of Literary Talent
To judge from our media coverage, you’d think that Mexico isn’t so much a country as a problem. But if you look beyond the endless talk of drug wars and The Wall, you discover that Mexico has a booming culture.
In recent years, there’s been an explosion of literary talent — from the sly provocateur Mario Bellatin to the brainy and funny Valeria Luiselli. This writing makes most American literary fiction feel pale and cannily packaged…
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Critical Content Analysis of Children’s and Young Adult Literature
CM Martínez-Roldán – Critical Content Analysis of Children’s and Young Adult …, 2016
… Nevertheless, whether pochismos are seen as positive or negative, the language used by the
Chihuahuas in the series misrepresents pocho language and Mexican Americans’ linguistic
practices and does not correspond to the literary bilingualism used by Chicano authors to …
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Spotlight on U.S. Hispanic Writers
The Hispanic Division and the Poetry and Literature Center at the Library of Congress have launched a collaborative series of recorded interviews, “Spotlight on U.S. Hispanic Writers.” This series is co-sponsored by Letras Latinas, the literary program of the Institute for Latino Studies at the University of Notre Dame.
“Spotlight on U.S. Hispanic Writers” features emerging and established American poets and prose writers of Hispanic descent who write predominantly in English. In each segment the featured poet or writer participates in a moderated discussion with the chief of the Hispanic Division, as well as reads from his or her work.
This series continues the tradition of the Hispanic Division Archive of Hispanic Literature on Tape (AHLOT). The AHLOT is an ongoing collection of recorded interviews and readings of contemporary poets and prose writers from the Iberian Peninsula, Latin America, the Caribbean, and U.S. Hispanics, which has been compiled by this Division since the 1940s…
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First Latino Newbery Medal Award winner set to visit Lee County Library
TUPELO – As the first Latino to win the prestigious Newbery Medal, Matt de la Peña writes stories that take place on the “other side of the tracks” by exploring identity and living as a young biracial boy.
De la Peña, author of the 2016 Newbery Medal award winner “The Last Stop on Market Street,” will visit the Lee County Library on April 11 to open up a conversation at the Helen Foster Lecture Series…
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The Road to Tamazunchale
Fiction. THE ROAD TO TAMAZUNCHALE is one of the first achieved works of Chicano consciousness and spirit–Library Journal. Nominated for the National Book Award, this classic, first published in 1987, tells the story of Don Fausto, a very old man on the verge of death who lives in the barrio of Los Angeles. Rather than resigning himself to death, he embarks on a glorious j …
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IDENTIDAD RASGADO Y LA LENGUA PERDIDA : THE IMPACT OF A TRADITIONAL LITERARY CANON ON LATINO PERCEPTIONS OF IDENTITY
A Hernandez – 2015
… Web. 8 Dec. 2015. Urrieta, Luis. “Identity Production in Figured Worlds: How Some Mexican
Americans Become Chicana/O Activist Educators.” Urban Review 39.2 (2007): 117- 144.
Psychology and Behavioral Sciences Collection. Web. 8 Dec. 2015…
Link to thesis
Ten Great Latino Books Published in 2015
Odyssean journeys of migration by Dominican boys, secret messages from underworld goddesses and Mexican gods and photographic volumes that capture the beauty and grace of Latin America: these 10 books by Latino authors published in 2015 will make you reflect, laugh, think and enjoy…
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10 New Books by Established Latino Authors
Over the summer I highlighted 9 books by emerging Latino voices, but it’s as important to acknowledge that Latino literature’s more familiar names are also gracing the covers on display on bookstore shelves in 2015.
Many of these prominent writers produced the foundational texts that shape the Latino literary canon such as The House on Mango Street (Sandra Cisneros), The Latin Deli (Judith Ortiz Cofer) and The Devil’s Highway (Luis Alberto Urrea). Others listed here include the Poet Laureate of the United States, Juan Felipe Herrera, and three younger writers (Joy Castro, Lorraine López and Urayoán Noel) whose prolific and stellar output has earned them a place among these legends of Latino letters. In celebration of Latino Heritage Month, I invite readers to consider the following new books from these established Latino authors…
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Juan Felipe Herrera, From Farm Fields to Poet Laureate
The Library of Congress is to announce on Wednesday that Juan Felipe Herrera, a son of migrant farmworkers whose writing fuses wide-ranging experimentalism with reflections on Mexican-American identity, will be the next poet laureate.
The appointment is the nation’s highest honor in poetry and also something of a direct promotion for Mr. Herrera, who was poet laureate of California from 2012 to 2014…
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Author and poet Gary Soto visits Murry Fly
Soto is the author of children’s favorites like “Too Many Tamales,” “Chato’s Kitchen” and “Lucky Luis.”
Three groups of youngsters, one after the other, gathered in the school’s library for a chance to ask Soto questions, hear his stories, share their poetry and draw his portrait. Two from each group were chosen to draw a portrait of Soto, who sported a striped button-down shirt and sweater, green pants and brown wingtips, using multi-colored magic markers…
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College welcomes distinguished Chicano writer for reading March 26
CHESTERTOWN — On Thursday, March 26, the Sophie Kerr Lecture Series at Washington College will present “An Evening of Fiction with Helena María Viramontes.” The event will take place at 4:30 p.m. at the Rose O’Neil Literary House, 407 Washington Ave., and is free and open to the public.
Viramontes is admired as one of Chicano literature’s most distinguished craftspeople. She began her career working for the innovative magazine ChismeArte and published her first book, “The Moths and Other Stories,” in 1985, quickly becoming a force on the Chicano literary scene. She has since published numerous essays and two novels, “Under the Feet of Jesus” and “Their Dogs Came with Them.”…
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Domingo Martinez’s Searing Memoir: ‘My Heart Is A Drunken Compass’
Author Domingo Martinez distinctly remembers the morning in October 2012 when his phone began ringing. He was lying in bed at his apartment in Seattle and his first thought was, “Wow, it’s so early, these bill collectors are calling earlier and earlier.”
It wasn’t a bill collector. It was his literary agent calling to tell him that his memoir, “The Boy Kings of Texas,” was a finalist for the National Book Award in the nonfiction category. Although Martinez did not win the award, his life was about to change. Soon he was being profiled in the New York Times and on NPR, with headlines like “From Boy King of Texas to Literary Superstar…
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Home Entertainment Story Berkeley: Mexican-American author Michele Serros, 48, dies
BERKELEY — Michele Serros, a short story writer, essayist and poet whose wry and witty observations on growing up Mexican-American in Southern California became required reading in many ethnic studies courses, has died at age 48.
Serros died Sunday at her home in Berkeley after a 20-month battle with a rare form of oral cancer, said her husband, Antonio Magana.
Serros was a community college student when she burst on the literary scene in 1994 with the publication of “Chicana Falsa and Other Stories of Death, Identity and Oxnard,” a collection of stories and poems inspired by her family life and childhood in a majority Hispanic coastal community. A fourth-generation Californian who did not learn to speak Spanish well until she was an adult, she gave voice to the struggle for belonging girls like her faced while straddling cultures…
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Contending with Poetry
On November 6th, Cal State LA was graced with a poetry reading by Associate Professor Ben V. Olguín of the University of Texas at San Antonio. The event titled, “Towards A Critical Masculinity: Lyrical Meditations on Gender, Race, and Violence from Houston to Havana: A Poetry Reading y Plática with B.V. Olguín,” was co-sponsored by the Department of Chicano Studies, the Programs in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, and the Center for Contemporary Poetry and Poetics. The event took place in King Hall C4070, at 3:15 p.m. and was primarily focused on Dr. Olguín’s latest collection of poems, Red Leather Gloves (Hansen Publishing Group, 2014) Dr. Olguín began by asking his audience if anyone had ever boxed in the ring, either as an amateur or professional. Startled by such a question from an academic who was introduced as a Stanford alumnus, the audience of about ten undergraduate and graduate CSULA students remained silent…
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The Book of Unknown Americans: A novel
by Cristina Henriquez
“A triumph of storytelling. Henríquez pulls us into the lives of her characters with such mastery that we hang on to them just as fiercely as they hang on to one another and their dreams. This passionate, powerful novel will stay with you long after you’ve turned the final page.” —Ben Fountain, author of Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk A boy and a girl who fall in love. Two families whose hopes collide …
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Mexican-American Dreams by Marty Salgado
Complied and Published by the English Graduate …, 2014
83 Mexican-American Dreams Non-Fiction Marty Salgado I had a problem with being Mexican. …
The Albertson’s employees didn’t have ties, but their uniform was a casual short sleeve white
collared shirt, and a blue apron—less professional than Stater Bros., but more modern. …
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