“The Border and Its Meaning: Forgotten Stories” 7th Annual CSWS Northwest Women Writers Symposium

Laila Lalami

cosponsored by CLLAS

Panel Discussion: 3:00 – 4:30 PM UO campus: JSMA Ford Lecture Hall
Light reception: 2:30 – 3 p.m. JSMA Ford Lecture Hall

Laila Lalami, novelist and columnist for The Nation, will read portions of her novel The Moor’s Account, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Commenting on their selected passages will be panelists:

• Liz Bohls, PhD, Professor, Department of English
• Miriam Gershow, MFA, novelist & Associate Director of Composition, Department of English
• Angela Joya, PhD, Assistant Professor, Department of International Studies
• Lamia Karim, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology
• Michael Najjar, MFA, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Theatre Arts

Keynote, Laila Lalami: “The Border and Its Meaning: Forgotten Stories,” 6 PM Eugene Public Library (with Q&A followed by booksigning)

To be held April 25, 2018, the 7th annual CSWS Northwest Women Writers Symposium will feature Pulitzer  finalist Laila Lalami and her novel The Moor’s Account.  › Continue reading

Tags: borders, CSWS, Laila Lalami, The Moor's Account, UO

“Achieving Justice: Gendered Violence, Displacement, and Legal Access in Guatemala and Oregon,” a roundtable

Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art (JSMA)
Ford Lecture Hall
1430 Johnson Lane
Eugene, OR  97403
UO campus
PDF: printable flyer

Organized by the Center for the Study of Women in Society’s Américas Research Interest Group, this roundtable will explore how gendered violence in Guatemala leads indigenous women to flee the country as refugees to seek asylum in the United States. By putting experts on gendered violence in Central America into conversation with Oregon-based asylum attorneys, the roundtable will explore the legal reforms with greatest potential to provide effective justice for its survivors. The roundtable will address many critical questions such as: in countries with multiple forms of violence and weak rule of law, what resources are available to displaced women seeking justice and security? What obstacles to gendered justice in Guatemala push women to leave the country? Once in the U.S., what factors prevent women from seeking protection through asylum, and what resources help them create new systems of support and autonomy?

Speakers:

• Erin Beck, UO Department of Political Science
• Gabriela Martínez, UO School of Journalism and Communication
• Lynn Stephen, UO Department of Anthropology
• Vannia Glasinovic, U.S. Asylum Attorney
• Christopher Anders, U.S. Asylum Attorney
• Anna Ciesielski, U.S. Asylum Attorney

Sponsored by the UO Center for the Study of Women in Society’s Américas Research Interest Group, the Wayne Morse Center for Law & Politics, and the Center for Latino/a and Latin American Studies.

Note: This is a pre-conference event connected to the LALISA Conference: http://las.uoregon.edu/2016/12/12/2nd-lalisa-conference-april-13-15/

Tags: CLLAS, CSWS, Erin Beck, Gendered Justice, Guatemala, Lynn Stephen

Combining Activism and Research: Synergies and Obstacles

Browsing Room
Knight Library
1501 Kincaid St.
UO campus

Panel: Combining Activism and Research: Synergies and Obstacles

Presentations by:

• Daniel HoSang, UO Department of Political Science
• Lynn Stephen, UO Department of Anthropology
• Irma Alicia Velásquez Nimatuj

Irma Alicia Velásquez Nimatuj is a journalist, social anthropologist, and international spokeswoman who has been at the forefront in struggles for respect for indigenous cultures. She was Executive Director of the Mecanismo de Apoyo a Pueblos Indígenas Oxlajuj Tzikin (Support Mechanism for Indigenous Peoples) (2005-2013). Dr. Velásquez Nimatuj is the first Maya-K’iche’ woman to earn the doctorate in Social Anthropology and she initiated the court case that made racial discrimination illegal in Guatemala.

She has won numerous academic fellowships and awards for her journalism, She was a member of the Latin American Consulting Group of Indigenous Leaders for UNICEF and participates in the UN through the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. She also served as advisor on indigenous issues for the Latin American and Caribbean office of UN Women (2014-2015). She is the author of Pueblos Indígenas, Estado y Lucha por Tierra en Guatemala (AVANCSO 2008) and La pequeña burguesía indígena comercial de Guatemala Desigualdades de clase, raza y género (AVANCSO-SERJUS 2002). She writes a weekly newspaper column in elPeriódico de Guatemala and through both her political and academic efforts seeks to create viable and realistic ways to create equality for indigenous people and a truly democratic and participatory democracy in Guatemala.

Sponsored by CSWS’s Americas Research Interest Group (Americas RIG), CLLAS, Department of Political Science, and the College of Arts and Sciences Program Grant.

Tags: CSWS, Daniel HoSang, Erin Beck, Irma Alicia Velásquez Nimatuj, Lynn Stephen, UO

NWWS “Crossing Borders: What It Means in the Life of a Child,” with keynote author Reyna Grande

Reyna Grande is the keynote author.

Browsing Room
Knight Library
1501 Kincaid St.
UO campus

5th Annual CSWS Northwest Women Writers Symposium

Friday afternoon Panel: “Crossing Borders: What It Means in the Life of a Child,” with keynote author Reyna Grande

This panel will focus on the memoir The Distance Between Us, featuring Reyna Grande reading sections from her work, with comments by community educators and University of Oregon faculty.

Reyna Grande’s novels, Across a Hundred Mountains and Dancing with Butterflies, were published to critical acclaim and have been read widely in schools across the country. In her memoir The Distance Between Us (Atria Books, 2012), Grande writes about her life before and after her undocumented border crossing as a young child from Mexico to the United States. A National Book Circle Critics Award finalist, this book was hailed by Los Angeles Times reviewer Hector Tobar as “the Angela’s Ashes of the modern Mexican immigrant experience.”

Panelists include:

• Reyna Grande, novelist and memoirist, keynote speaker.
• Moderator: Lynn Stephen, Distinguished Professor of Anthropology and Ethnic Studies at the University of Oregon and co-director of the Center for Latino/a and Latin American Studies (CLLAS).
• Gustavo Balderas, Superintendent, Eugene School District 4J
• Lidiana Soto, UO alumna; community activist
• Carmen Urbina, Program Development and Outreach Coordinator, Educational Methodology, Policy, and Leadership Program, UO College of Education.

This panel will be immediately followed by a light reception. › Continue reading

Tags: Carmen Urbina, CLLAS, CSWS, Gustavo Balderas, Lynn Stephen, Reyna Grande, UO

NWWS Documentary Film Premiere “Sad Happiness: Cinthya’s Transborder Journey,” directed by Lynn Stephen

Knight Library
Browsing Room
1501 Kincaid St.
UO campus

5th annual CSWS Northwest Women Writers Symposium

“Crossing Borders: Women’s Stories of Immigration, Migration, and Transition,” May 6 – 7, 2016

Documentary Film Premiere: 12-1 p.m. “Sad Happiness: Cinthya’s Transborder Journey,” followed by Q&A with the director. 

Directed by Lynn Stephen, Distinguished Professor of Anthropology and Ethnic Studies at the University of Oregon and co-director of the Center for Latino/a and Latin American Studies (CLLAS). Produced by Sonia De La Cruz and Lynn Stephen.

Sad Happiness: Cinthya’s Transborder Journey explores the differential rights that U.S. citizen children and their undocumented parents have through the story of one extended Zapotec family. Shot in Oregon and Oaxaca, Mexico, and narrated by 11-year old Cinthya, the film follows Cinthya’s trip to her parent’s home community of Teotitlán del Valle with her godmother, anthropologist Lynn Stephen. There she meets her extended family and discovers her indigenous Zapotec and Mexican roots. While in Oaxaca, she participates in her community’s annual celebration of their patron saint, learns how to make chocolate and spin wool, explores a Zapotec archaeological site, and shares in a family party where she dances with her great-grandmother. Her absent parents are omnipresent on the trip as Cinthya’s cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents and great-grandparents all talk to her about them and how they wish for their return. › Continue reading

Tags: CLLAS, CSWS, immigration, Lynn Stephen, NWWS, transborder, UO