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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K Small, J Margrett, D Russell – Successful aging and social contexts: The importance …, 2013
… 4 SPOUSAL CONCORDANCE ON COGNITIVE TRAJECTORIES: AN EXPLORATORY LATENT
CLASS APPROACH WITH MEXICAN AMERICAN OLDER ADULTS … provided oral informed consent
and were interviewed in their home by trained, professional personnel employed …
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A record 33.7 million Hispanics of Mexican origin resided in the United States in 2012, according to an analysis of Census Bureau data by Pew Research Center. This estimate includes 11.4 million immigrants born in Mexico and 22.3 million born in the U.S. who self-identified as Hispanics of Mexican origin.
by Ana Gonzalez-Barrera and Mark Hugo Lopez
Mexican-Origin Hispanics in the United States
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Mexican Latinos make up more than two thirds of all Latinos in the United States, according to a new Pew Hispanic report.
Of the 51.9 million Latinos living in the United States in 2011, more than 33.5 million trace their family back to Mexico.
The report looked at demographic data collected from the 2011 American Community Survey. The report also examined U.S. citizenship, education levels and median income among U.S. Hispanics.
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Benjamin Alire Sáenz Wins 2013 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction
By Lisa Y. Garibay
UTEP News Service
Chairman of the Department of Creative Writing Benjamin Alire Sáenz has been selected as the winner of the 2013 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, America’s largest peer juried prize for fiction. He won the prize for his collection of short stories titled Everything Begins and Ends at the Kentucky Club, published by El Paso company Cinco Puntos Press, making it a double honor for the city of El Paso.
“The people of the border have given me my voice. All I have ever done is return those words back to the people who taught me to speak,” Sáenz said. “This award does not belong to me — it belongs to us. This border is my heart and I believe it is the heart of this nation. And I also believe that Juárez is the heart of Mexico,” Sáenz said.
Taking its title from a storied Juárez club just over the U.S.-Mexico border, Everything Begins and Ends at the Kentucky Club offers seven different stories examining the lives of people in the El Paso-Juárez border region. The press release about the award describes them as struggling “with the impossible ambiguities of borders, whether they be sexual, emotional, national or economic.
“Ben Sáenz’s work is well-deserving of this award,” said UTEP College of Liberal Arts Dean Patricia Witherspoon, Ph.D. “He is a consummate storyteller who writes with strength and yet tenderness, who shares his space and time with his reader and always brings us willingly on the journeys he takes. He is one of the few writers who can speak eloquently to adults, young adults and children. And what a wonderful person to have among us as a colleague.”
“He’s one of the most prolific writers I have ever met, sometimes producing two books in one year, like he did this year,” said Saenz’s colleague Associate Professor of Creative Writing Daniel Chacon. “Both of those books have gone on to win amazing prizes and to get positive critical attention.”
In speaking about his experience as co-host of KTEP-FM’s (88.5) “Words on a Wire” radio program with Sáenz, Chacon said, “We have the chance to talk to some of the greatest writers in the country, and together we are able to extract a lot of valuable information and advice from these writers, but the ironic thing is that Ben himself is one of the country’s most distinguished writers.”
Judge A.J. Verdelle praised Saenz’s mastery of language.
“In Everything Begins and Ends at the Kentucky Club, his 20th published book, Benjamin Alire Sáenz shows how decades working at your craft gives birth to might and mastery … He presents a rendering of reality that is lush, tender, expansive, inclusive and profound. The author takes stunning care with language — English, Spanish, and the languages of sunlight, daylight, dimlight, night light — twisting and tumbling with the whispered language of the human heart. Sáenz also devotes impressive attention to rendering communities on the borders of the United States and Mexico, on the boundaries of sensual and sexual expression, on the edge of despair, and on the cusp of redemption.”
In addition to teaching at UTEP, Sáenz is a poet, fiction writer and essayist who has been a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and PEN Center’s award for young adult fiction. He was recently awarded the American Library Association’s Pura Belpré Award and the Stonewall Book Award for his young adult novel Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe. The book also was recognized as a 2013 Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature Honor Book.
As winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award, Sáenz receives $15,000. He will be honored during the 33rd annual PEN/Faulkner Award Ceremony at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., on May 4. Previous winners include E.L. Doctorow, Ann Patchett, Philip Roth, John Updike, Sherman Alexie, and Annie Proulx.
“He’s, quite frankly, a brilliant writer, and as a friend and as a colleague he has been incredibly supportive,” Chacon recalled. “When I started off here as a new writer, he was very encouraging, and I learned a lot. His passion for El Paso is unsurpassed by any other writer.
“In many ways, my latest book was improved because of his advice,” Chacon continued. “He once told me, ‘If it doesn’t hurt, it’s not worth much.’ He writes with unapologetic passion, and when he writes it hurts, but he produces some of the most beautiful prose in the country, which is obvious in winning this incredibly prestigious fiction prize.”
By Hector Tobar, Los Angeles Times
June 14, 2013, 8:00 a.m.
Journalist Alfredo Corchado has had a front seat to many of the most important events of recent Mexican history. In the 1980s he covered the protests in Northern Mexico that foreshadowed the end of one-party rule, and he was later a Mexico City correspondent for the Dallas Morning News. In 2000, he conducted the first interview with President-elect Vicente Fox, the opposition candidate…
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Ana Luisa Ramirez, a system engineering manager in the Intelligence, Surveillance, Reconnaissance and Targeting Systems Division at Northrop Grumman in Linthicum, has been named Woman of the Year by the Mexican American Opportunity Foundation.
She received the honor in recognition of her professional achievements and service to the Hispanic community. At Northrop Grumman, Ramirez leads the systems engineering integration and test function for an international program.
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MT Duong, D Schwartz, CA McCarty – Social Development, 2013
… We recruited participants from a middle school with sizeable numbers of Mexican-American and
Vietnamese-American students in order to identify a … fathers (96.0 percent) and 75.4 percent of
mothers were employed outside the home, with most working at non-professional jobs …
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It’s close to quitting time at Google. Some employees unwind with a beach volleyball game, others whiz off the Mountain View campus on motorized skateboards, and a few are meditating in the Zen garden.
But for Google mapping software engineer Ben Lindahl, his other job
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By Thalia Longoria \ EL PASO TIMES
Posted: 09/06/2011 12:00:00 AM MDT
Eva Luna was a successful manager at an auto dealership in Juárez for almost 20 years.
Her position at Touché Motors in Juárez allowed her to live in comfort without any financial concerns. She owned a three-bedroom home and, once in a while, enjoyed some luxuries.
That lifestyle ended unexpectedly…
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J Lim, P Gonzalez, MF Wang-Letzkus, O Baik… – … of Health Care for the Poor …, 2013
… and ethnically appropriate strategies for promoting healthy behaviors for Chinese American,
Korean American, and Mexican American BCS, who … in the health behavior changes among ethnic
minorities will assist both ethnic minorities and health care professionals to effectively …
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SA Taylor, BH Garland, BE Sanchez-Fournier, KF Allen… – Pediatrics, 2013
… Interview content was developed from empirical research, clinical experience, and consultation
with Mexican-American researchers and adolescents to … Interviews conducted in English were
transcribed by a professional tran- scription service and reviewed and corrected by a …
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PO Garriott, LY Flores – Journal of Latina/o Psychology, 2013
… Participants were 90 Mexican American students recruited from a public high school in the
Southwestern region of the United States as … school” (13.3%), “went to college but did not graduate”
(14.4%), “completed college” (15.6%), and “had graduate/professional training” (7.8 …
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Newswise — TORONTO, ON —New research indicates that Mexican-Americans born in the United States who are aged 55 and over are significantly more likely than Mexican-American immigrants to report that they have substantial limitations in one or more basic physical activities such as walking, climbing stairs, reaching, lifting, or carrying. (30% versus 25%).
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Ricardo Legorreta, the award-winning Mexican architect who designed the Max Palevsky Residential Commons at the University of Chicago, has died at age 80, the San Antonio Express-News reports.
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UCLA report charts Chicano experience over four decades
By Letisia Marquez March 20, 2008
Second-, third- and fourth-generation Mexican Americans speak English fluently, and most prefer American music. They are increasingly Protestant, and some may even vote for a Republican candidate…
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RJ Ruiz, RH Pickler, CN Marti, N Jallo – International Journal of Women’s Health, 2013
… and preterm birth in Mexican-American women … Objective: To examine the potential moderating
effects of family cohesion and acculturation on the physiological stress response (cortisol) as
a predictor of preterm birth (PTB) in pregnant Mexican-American women. …
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S Shivpuri, MA Allison, CA Macera, S Lindsay… – American Journal of …, 2013
… This study is part of a larger evaluation of sociocultural factors related to CVD risk in Mexican
American women. … as (i) less than 9th grade; (ii) 9th –11th grade; (iii) high school diploma or
equivalent; (iv) some college; (v) bachelors degree; and (vi) graduate or professional degree …
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H Chun, E Devall, P Sandau-Beckler – The Journal of Primary Prevention
… Parents, teachers, mental health professionals, business leaders, and community leaders
must work together to support Mexican American youth before they detach from social
institutions and turn to alcohol use as a coping mechanism
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E Hernandez – The Journal of Higher Education, 2013
… to work on retention, that that was important, that he was going to try to bring in instructors and
other professionals into the … The narratives of these seven Mexican American women activists
offer a historical accounting of Indiana University during a tumultuous decade of racial …
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ER Escobedo
… enclosure at Douglas Aircraft, 1945 & Black, Mexican, and white women sewing together at the
Pacific Parachute Company in San Diego, 1942 % Members of the Sefioritas USO, 1943 11 A
Mexican American clerical worker … By far my greatest professional thanks go to Vicki Ruiz …
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